Time Out Dubai - Bat's Man

Originally published on www.timeoutdubai.com, 21st July 2008

BAT'S MAN

Grant Morrison, Batman comic book writer, tells James Wilkinson about the development of the caped crusader from his creation to the present day.

"Batman’s an aspirational hero for dark times. He takes the notion of the self-made man to the max – Bruce Wayne’s not only rich and beloved, he’s also taken the time to become the greatest martial artist in the world, the best detective ever, the smartest criminologist... It’s outrageous, but people can look at him and say, “Yeah I could do that... if I could be bothered going to the kung-fu class.”

1930s

The Bat-Thug

‘These guys span out of the Depression-era pulp magazines and street gangs of the 30s. Back then, justice was swift and uncompromising, so in their early years you’d have Batman throwing people out of windows to their deaths.’

1940s

My father the hero

‘During and after the Second World War, people were looking for heroes they could trust, ones who were more like policemen and firemen. It’s not about terrifying people anymore, it’s about reassuring them. So we see Batman becoming a father figure to Robin, and working with the police rather than throwing gangsters off rooftops.’

1950s

Batman in space!

‘Western governments wanted the media to encourage children into science and astronautics, to keep up with the Communists. So you’d have Batman fighting aliens and travelling in time machines, which didn’t suit him at all. The era’s now become Batman’s secret shame.’

1960s

The camped crusader

‘After that, you hit the 60s and suddenly everything is shiny and new. Pop art is in and people are flying to the moon. Batman’s brought back to Earth and they try to play up the crime elements. But he was superseded in the popular imagination by the camp, colourful Batman TV show.’

1970s

Gothic realism

‘Then the 70s came and Vietnam was hanging over everyone, so popular culture started shifting away from colourful craziness and back towards realism. Hollywood had all these gritty auteur movies from Scorsese and Coppola, and so the Batman comics go back to his gothic roots: he’s out fighting street crime and psychopaths, and being drawn in a photorealistic style.’

1980s

The vigilante redefined

‘Frank Miller revitalised the character in 1986 with The Dark Knight Returns. It’s a Regan-era, right-wing fable, a real libertarian muscle-man fantasy: one man rising up to tame the chaos. For me, it’s up there with American Psycho as a US text of the 80s.’

1990s

Returning to the silver screen

‘The comic limped through the 90s, but on screen the Tim Burton Batman film was huge and did for the wider culture what Frank Miller had done – reminded people that Batman was supposed to be this really gritty, a**-kicking fighter. It looks very pantomimey and cheap now, but it really worked at the time: the 80s were over, people were starting to unwind and were more in tune with Burton’s gothic fantasy atmosphere.’

1990s

Batman at the circus

‘Joel Schumacher took over the films at the mid-point of the 90s, when the Berlin Wall had come down, everyone was looking forward to the millennium and it all seemed to be going great. You can watch [Batman Forever and Batman & Robin] and see the glorious, shallow attempts of the 90s to recreate the 60s. So many bands wanted to be The Beatles or the Kinks – and then we had a Batman film that was as camp and stupid as the 60s one, but without the charm.’

2000s

The Dark Knight

‘I enjoyed Batman Begins for about the first 40 minutes and then I thought it was quite formulaic. But the new one breaks all the rules. It’s like a Citizen Kane for superhero movies, with an incredible amount of intelligence. It’s about order versus chaos. Health versus the viral monster that is The Joker. He’s a nice metaphor for Al Qaeda, and the fact that the US can’t quite defend itself from a danger that’s slipped in under the border.’

2000s

The post-9/11 hero

‘I’m writing a post-9/11 Batman who’s now racked with guilt and trauma, who’s been through all kinds of misunderstandings and realised that his mission hasn’t worked out the way he’d planned it. It’s about a great American hero who is brought to his knees, and the greatness inside him that lets him get back up again. America invented the superhero, the hero who doesn’t kill, so there is something very nice at the heart of the US that I want to remind people of.’

2010s

Batman Ends?

‘I’m doing a story right now called Batman RIP, which is going to end next year with Bruce Wayne no longer as Batman. Bruce Wayne will still be Bruce Wayne, but there will be different people in the Batman and Robin suits. It’s my attempt to do a comic for the psychedelic dark kids that are appearing – it’s going to have a David Lynch-style darkness. Visually, we’re moving away from the shadows and instead silhouetting Batman against neon, so there will be lots more colour and lots more nasty surrealism."