The Class Dynamics of Batman

Batman has an uncomfortable relationship to other superhero comic books and films. While many, including Lawrence and Jewett and Eco, have argued that the superhero genre tends to be conservative in its narrative structure -- with an outsider coming into a community to restore order and reinforce the status quo -- Batman goes a step further. Rather than simply overcoming evil and restoring order, as a Jesus-like savior to the powerless masses, Batman is not a redemptive but a revenge narrative. Batman is avenging the murder of his parents, who are portrayed as the embodiment of the angelic rich, who only do good in the community. This is particularly true of the Batman Begins film, where the butler Alfred (Michael Caine) speaks of Thomas Wayne as a godlike figure that was a leader of his community and a voice of reason against the violent, unredeemable poor. Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham to seek his revenge, and while he ultimately rejects the idea of mass murder as the ultimate form of justice ala the evil Henri Ducard (notice the French nom), he does believe in violent revenge against all criminals. This theme is repeated in the more recent Dark Knight, though they at least show some criminals as above complete reproach. 

The overarching theme of the entire series could be summed up as the "White Prince on the Mountain" looking over the dark, corrupt and dreary world of the poor and working class below. The police are corrupt, the court system is corrupt, the media is corrupt (particularly in the original version), politicians are corrupt (and even Harvey Dent loses his virtue in the death of Rachel) and the masses are corrupt. Only Batman, with the help of the one honest cop, Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman) and his faithful "servants" Alfred and Lucius Fox (Morgan Freeman), can restore order and bring peace to the darkness below. What then is the message? Everyone is corruptible except the rich, who must selflessly protect us from the evil that lurks in the mind of the common man. And how does he do this? By spying on the masses, through violent retribution and by ignoring the corrupt systems of the state that can't do their jobs. Like so much Hollywood fare, the only answer is the outsider, the lone ranger (or American monomyth) that has to live in lonely isolation from the normative, unable to consummate his love in the long run. Sure Bruce Wayne actually has sex, unlike so many other superheroes (lest us forget that Superman getting laid and married led to the planet being overtaken by three aliens), but he can't actually have a normal relationship. There is a new love interest in almost every film and his love Rachel from the past two actually dies before the end of that film. 

The troubling portrayal of the working class and poor in recent Hollywood films is a theme that has not been adequately analyzed within film studies (I did have an essay on this in my book Hollywood Exploited and there is the book Hard Hats, Rednecks and Macho Men). There are few films that valorize the working class, as was often the case in old Hollywood and the many great "auteur" films of the 70s. Since then, we have the tale of the working class girl or boy that finds not only love with a richer mate but also social status and wealth (from Pretty in Pink to Here on Earth to Good Will Hunting and Pretty  Woman). We have the gritty working class crime drama (Gone Baby Gone; Mystic River; etc.). We have the naturalistic treatment of the corruption and evil of the working class and poor (Winter's Bone; The Wrestler; Bar Fly). And we have the working class hero film (Rocky; Cinderella Man; etc.) showing that escape is always the ultimate goal. Batman goes a step further showing a society that is really beyond redemption, even as it occasionally surprises us. Everyone is corruptible except for the selfless rich white man that is the only respite from chaos and madness -- a Leviathon of one that reenacts the Hobbesian nightmare in the contemporary urban landscape. 

Batman is possibly the most obvious representation of the great irony in American popular culture today, a hatred for the very working class that serve as the embodiment of the "before" in the American dream transformation. The fact that he is violent and without mercy only further solidifies the contemporary American sensibility -- borderline sociopathology with a skewed sense of justice to legitimate greed as the raison d'etre of the entire system. Don't worry about the 1%, they are actually selfless representatives of the very best in the human spirit. Fight on sweet prince!