Why would Batman and Superman fight each other?
They're going to in the upcoming Batman v Superman movie set for release later this month.
At the end of next month, Captain America will go toe-to-toe with Iron Man in Captain America: Civil War.
Numerous writers over the long history of comic book superheroes have enjoyed pitting the favourite heroes against one another not just because of high reader interest but also because of the old and deep philosophical questions lying beneath the surface.
Both Superman and Batman were born in the late 1930s, mirror opposite responses for an America that had just endured the Great Depression and was now faced with the Second World War.
Superman was the return of Jesus, an alien figure that appears with God-like powers to defeat evil and save the world for the good and virtuous. An orphan raised by humans on an idyllic farm, Superman is uncomfortable with the power and responsibility of his uniform and would much rather be Clark Kent full-time.
Batman, meanwhile, has no special powers except for his wealth and his cunning. He resents the time he spends being Bruce Wayne because it interferes with the time he could be spending catching bad guys and restoring justice as Batman. He embraces the power and responsibility of his uniform because it embodies the best of himself.
From Batman's perspective, Superman is both a threat and a joke. The threat is an outsider able to hide among us because he looks human but his extraordinary abilities could be used against humanity at any time and nothing could stop him. The joke is both the ridiculous human disguise and his reluctance to use those vast powers to wipe out evil and evildoers.
For Superman, the very idea of Batman is dangerous. Ordinary people should not seize power autonomously, without the approval of the rest of society, and they definitely shouldn't do it from behind a mask. If one person does that without permission and gets away with it, everybody could do it so it needs to be put down quickly, setting an example for everyone else.
It's no surprise that both figures appeal to the American public. Superman is Nietzsche's Ubermensch, a noble ideal of our full potential and how it should be used altruistically for the betterment of everyone. Be super and be a man. For the little people, all we have to do is put our trust in the benevolence of the super among us and all will be well. In contrast, Batman is the ideal American Everyman, the cowboy who answers to no one but his own moral code and metes out justice whenever and however he chooses.
In Superman's eyes, Batman is the wild stallion that just needs to be brought back into line with the rest of the herd. In Batman's world, a Superman needs to be brought down to Earth and have that S ripped off his chest.
For those who think the battle would be a short one, guess again. Every Superman has his Kryptonite. Thirty years ago, Frank Miller reinvented Batman in his seminal four-part series The Dark Knight Returns and it featured a scene long-suffering Batman fans had always longed to see: the caped crusader from Gotham laying a first-class beating on an alien with the audacity to call himself both super and a man.
In a Globe and Mail column last Saturday, Doug Saunders compared Donald Trump to Batman, both flamboyant billionaires who see themselves as the only thing standing in the way of the evildoers at the gates, threatening to destroy civilization as we know it. Unfortunately, Saunders got his heroes mixed up. From an ideological standpoint, Trump is Superman, both in his own mind and in the eyes of his millions of supporters. Superman dresses in the colours of a clown and Trump acts like one but both insist their purity of heart can make things great.
Whether it's Superman, Batman, Iron Man, Captain America or Trump, it seems everyone loves their heroes and their anti-heroes. Even the most independent of individuals find themselves attracted to the simplicity of authoritarian figures, men in suits who reduce the complexities of good, evil, justice and the use of power and violence, to political slogans.
Whoever they are, if their power and authority is left unchecked, their good intentions form the pavement on the road to hell.
-- Managing editor Neil Godbout
