Batman vs Superman

Listen, it was only a matter of time before I talked about this so at least be grateful I left it a week before I wrote this!

I love Batman movies. I love Superman movies. Naturally I was worried about how this would all work out – suffice to say, LOVED IT. But this isn’t a review I’m afraid. This is more of a wish…

When I watch movies I always have this ‘what if…’ moment at the end and typically, after watching this film twice… (shhh, I’m an adult, I can do what I want!) I came away with so many excited ideas about the world they created.

My wish is this; that someone, anyone, do a flip-reverse story of Batman growing up in a loving family and Superman being an actual orphan and left in the care of the state.

What’s great about this film is how they played off the character parallels; both are similar in their fight for justice but they each see the world in a different light and react in different ways because… well, character development.

So I want to see Batman as this do-gooder character who struggles with humanity like Superman generally does. A Batman who sees humanity as something to be protected with morals which all point north and a childhood of happy memories and fatherly advice which guides him in his later life. If Bruce Wayne grew up with parents I like to think he’d be a figurehead working for the government rather than a vigilante with a butler who knows how to stitch a wound. I know, I know, ‘but then he wouldn’t be Batman’. 

Batman became who he was because he lost his parents but in graphic novels there’s always the underlying tone of destiny. Let’s go with that for the sake of the funs.

Superman, similarly, could have easily turned bad if he’d lost Jonathan and Martha in early childhood. To know parental love and then lose it would have shattered his character. Would he have become the vigilante? I like to imagine he would. I like to imagine a Clark who joins the Daily Planet as a bitter journalist who rifles through the paper’s archives and tracks down criminals who have escaped justice. That twisted sense of right and wrong would have been his to carry and without the morals taught to him by his parents he’d be making it up as he went along. I would also love a story where his powers are different because he did haven’t the luxury of figuring them out on a farm in the middle of nowhere.

I feel like it’s a story that has legs. I don’t really know the rules of writing a story using characters that already exist. Maybe I’ll just drum up a short story for my own peace of mind…

Are you a graphic novel/ DC fan? DC over Marvel any day! I wish I knew more people who would listen to my ramblings in real life!

Sam

Ps. I’m officially a Wonder Woman fan now. Please tell your friends.