Drawing by Jason Fabok.TM & © 2020 DC COMICS.
Deep down, he's just a human being.
He was not bitten by a radioactive spider, nor did the gods infuse him with supernatural abilities.
On the contrary, since he was a child, fate had placed a weight on his shoulders.
Two bullets deprived him of his parents and, perhaps, of a different future.
He himself knows that another shot could end his life at any moment.
No steel covers his muscles, only the skin.
Perhaps Batman's only superpower - pardon his bank account - is his willpower.
To fight crime.
And to move on, decade after decade, never kneeling.
He has suffered serious injuries, doubts, complexes and even amnesia.
Yet it has always risen, as have its stories: 81 years of uninterrupted posts.
"It has stood as a symbol of determination, courage and justice for generations of fans," says DC, the publisher that launched it in 1939 and has edited it ever since.
And that, today Saturday, he returns to celebrate his great party: Batman Day.
Batman: 80 years without his real father
Joker, the most charismatic villain, turns 80
There are dozens of events planned, all over the planet and for any age.
With scissors and a printer, the little ones can create their bat-signal to summon the bat man.
DC has held
online
contests
and a charity drawing auction to help struggling creators that would make Bruce Wayne proud.
ECC Ediciones, which publishes the adventures of the hero in Spain, also proposes a game with prizes on the Internet, has distributed gifts to some 200 bookstores in the country and, above all, has just launched in a single volume the complete saga perhaps the most celebrated of Batman:
The Dark Knight Returns,
by Frank Miller.
As clever as its protagonist, the book has appeared in bookstores, has been devastated and has been volatilized.
All sold out, so much so that a second edition is already being prepared.
One more proof, if necessary, of the validity of Batman.
"Any of his comics is always assured, at least, of moderate success," says Gustavo Martínez, responsible for the character and, in general, for the DC line at ECC Ediciones.
The speech actually transcends the comic book: The next batman movie has just resumed shooting, after the new Batman, Robert Pattinson, recovered from the coronavirus.
His umpteenth adventure in the video game,
Gotham Knights,
was revealed just a month ago.
The elusive and dark hero is no longer so: today he lends his image to dolls, amusement parks, backpacks or board games.
The US Postal Service dedicated special stamps to him and the Waze GPS application allows you to drive with the voice of the batman as co-pilot: "Take the second exit and stay focused!"
With some fantasy, one can feel behind the wheel of the bat-mobile.
"It's funny how a lonely and vengeful hero ended up being a franchise," defends Martínez.
And that, as much as an icon today, Batman was born as a commission.
The success of Superman, created in 1938, cried out for new heroes.
And the label that was then called National Comics and today is DC turned to cartoonist Bob Kane.
“He asked how much the authors of Superman charged.
When he found out, he said that for that money he would give them a new character the next day, ”recalls David Hernando, author of the book
Batman.
Nocturnal serenade
, editor of the character in Spain between 2005 and 2011 and now editorial director of Planeta's comics department.
Kane asked screenwriter Bill Finger for help, though he eventually tried to marginalize the role of the other co-creator.
They were inspired by films like
The Mark of Zorro, Dracula
and
The Whisperer Bat
, and a radio program called
The Shadow
, among other things.
Little by little, they took off the wings, gave up any red garment and bet on a somber tone and a detective talent worthy of Sherlock Holmes.
"Something like the opposite of Superman," agree Martínez and Hernando.
The United States emerging from the Great Depression also marked the character.
“It was a time of empowerment for ordinary people.
Batman was the dark side of the American dream, a shadow over the optimism of the time, ”wrote
The Guardian
.
On March 30, 1939, Issue 27 of
Detective Comics
hosted the debut of the Bat Man:
The Case of the Chemical Syndicate.
"The success was impressive, it soon surpassed Superman," recalls Martinez.
Much has changed since then, although other things remain the same.
His first play already revealed that Batman was Bruce Wayne, and Commissioner Gordon was there from the beginning.
In
Detective Comics
Issue 33
,
the deaths of Thomas and Martha Wayne were drawn for the first time.
Just a year later, the hero already had his own series, and immediately Catwoman, Robin or Joker crossed his path.
It was not long before he also jumped to the small screen.
“He represents the typical American
self made man.
He has this obsession with crime because of the trauma he suffered.
And he turns his entire existence into that ”, explains Hernando.
“Everything he has achieved is through effort and dedication.
Compared to other heroes, it's easier to feel like Batman, ”adds Martínez.
Although Kane turned out to have a completely different vision: according to him, Batman prevailed mainly "because of his camp element".
In its debut, if anything, the bat was barely fazed by the death of its first enemy.
“At first he killed without regard.
He went from a murderous vigilante to not taking justice into his own hands.
Also because the product was focused on the children, ”says Hernando.
Almost immediately, Batman lost his guns, and bet on his famous technological gadgets.
But he was still human, with his fears and his weaknesses.
“He can be more realistic than other heroes, anyone can get a fit of rage.
In his work the threshold of violence is more tolerated, he himself crosses it from time to time ”, insists Hernando.
Although the hero long ago vowed not to kill.
Precisely for this reason, the Joker's dream is to be killed by the bat: thus he would destroy his entire universe of values.
Always at the forefront of technology, Batman also adapted to the times.
In the 1950s, he traveled into space and defeated aliens.
And he had to deal with
The Seduction of the Innocents,
the 1954 essay where the psychiatrist Fredric Wertham accused comics of corrupting souls and being, practically, the devil.
If Wonder Woman was "a manifesto to recruit lesbians," in his vision Batman and Robin represented the unacceptable "dream of two homosexuals to live together," recalls
The New York Times.
Some argue that the introduction in the Batgirl and Batwoman comics a few years later was not at all the result of chance: in DC they must have thought that homophobia counted much less than the risk of losing readers.
After the controversies, in the sixties Batman became more carefree and ironic.
To sum up that decade, any sequence in the series with Adam West will do: his colorful success also influenced the comic, so much so that Hernando speaks of a somewhat "bizarre" time for the character.
The appearance of artists such as Dennis O'Neil, Neal Adams and Frank Miller returned the hero to his essence in the 1970s and 1980s: a detective shrouded in darkness and in a rotten city.
And it pushed him to the limits of his own mind and his fears.
It took the Tim Burton films, however, for Batman to achieve such a sweeping global success, that George Clooney's nippled costume was nearly loaded.
Christopher Nolan's film saga came to consecrate the character.
Today, at 81, he has everything behind him.
He was replaced for a time, faked his death several times, had children and was about to marry Catwoman.
Finally, she did not show up for the wedding.
The hero was alone again.
At the very least, your mission will always remain.
There it will be, where it is needed.
You just need to turn on the bat-signal.
A right-wing hero?
Batman's determination to restore order, along with the lifestyle of billionaire Bruce Wayne, has led more than one analyst to portray the bat as a right-wing character.
David Hernando maintains that, simply, the vision comes from who looks, and that the personage does not show any political tendency.
"When people say that he can be on the right it is because they see his social status, a billionaire who believes he has the power to impose the law. This crude concept is easy to link to the right. The trauma that created it and the motivation that leads him to be a hero is a tragedy that we can all connect with. Batman does not try to change the established, he only tries to bring a little justice to a very corrupt city. And, at the same time, he strives to make ordinary people have a chance. Through Wayne Industries, try to improve the city also with social housing programs or youth shelters. Wayne builds to save Gotham, "adds Gustavo Martinez.