MY PARENTS ARE DEEEAAAD!!! (But that's ok!)

[omgwtflolbbqbye]

espanolbot 's post about Martha Wayne's underrepresentation in Batman stories inspired me to post pages from Greg Rucka's and Klaus Jansen's 2003 miniseries Batman: Death and the Maidens.



Rucka's run on the regular Batman titles culminated with Batman realizing that he's still Bruce Wayne at his core, and that he should be nicer to his family for the x time.

When Rucka came back to write "Death and the Maidens" he simultaneously reinforced his previous points while attempting to plug one of Bruce's other persistent wells of angst and drama: the perpetual mourning over his parent's death.

And in doing so, he gave Martha one her most extensive roles in a Batman story that I can think of.
















Batman's tail turns out to be Ubu, who explains that Ra's Al Ghul, wants to meet him at the Batcave.

Ra's estranged daughter, Nyssa, has been waging war on her father by destroying as many Lazarus Pits as she can find, leaving him without the means to rejuvenate himself for longer than normal, and certainly longer than he can bear.

Upon seeing him it's apparent that father time is collecting on the years owed by Ra's, plus interest.

Since Bruce also has information on the remaining pits, Ra's offers him something for that information: "Your Parents."

.

While Bruce believes that Ra's claims are sincere, he still runs tests to check if it's the real deal, but they come up inconclusive. After some hesitation, he gives in to temptation and drinks the elixir which instantly knocks him out. Either to dream, or elsewhere...












































Thomas: I asked you a question, son.

Bruce: ...I...I don't understand. I don't know what to say.

Thomas: This from my son who was never at a loss for words? Odd what can change in a quarter of a century. My precocious boy who always had a question on his lips, the voracious reader, the endless inquisitor, the one who talked so much I brager to my colleagues that you'd be president one day... finds himself speechless. (To Martha) You were right. I don't recognize him... I don't recognize him at all.






















Bruce tells Alfred about what he saw the next day.






Bruce goes out as Batman to investigate what Nyssa is doing, stuff happens, long story short: Nyssa kills Ra's, brainwashes Talia into becoming her personal henchwoman, and assumes leadership of the League of Shadows. Batman confronts Nyssa at her new digs to find out what happened to Talia, as well as plead for her to quit while she's ahead, since she already got her revenge for all the atrocities Ra's committed against her and her own family (all part of Ra's Xanatos Gambit this whole time, as he also found out).



Nyssa shows off Talia's new brainwashed personality and attire, and they both ask Batman to leave them to scheme against him and the world.



 

Comments

[althechi]

Wow, I haven't liked Klaus Janson's art this much in a long time. Did he ink this himself?

The story contains a number of interesting conceits, and seems to be attempting to reconstruct (to an extent) the Batman of To Kill a Legend, with the ideas that Batman hasn't properly recalled his parent's death in years (a statement he pretty makes verbatim after his dream of their murders in that story) and that Bruce Wayne would become Batman because he was "meant to" - Batman prevents an alternate universe's Thomas and Martha from being killed, but the other Bruce Wayne is put on a track to becoming a different kind of Batman.

However, the execution is just a little odd - since this is the post-Crisis continuity, 18 years had passed between the deaths of the Waynes and Batman's debut, noting his still-vivid memories (it's this page, but not in these panels), so the continual emphasis on how 7 more years have eradicated the finer details of Bruce's parents, while not implausible, may not be as effective.

Beyond that, I approve of any story that gives Thomas Wayne a moustache. Having watched BTAS first, I always assumed that was the way it was meant to be and was sorely disappointed when I watched Batman Begins and he didn't have one.

PTSD

[7dialsmystery]

He "forgot" the existence of his older brother Thomas. He also forgot his mother was pregnant with a younger sibling at one point too.

Re: PTSD

[espanolbot]

Wasn't canon at this point. Unless you count the brief time just before this when Bane thought that his father might have been Thomas Wayne.

[lego_joker]

I have several friends who hate this story for what Nyssa does to Talia, but I just can't bring my self to care enough about any member of the al-Ghul clan for it to matter.

That said... yeah, Janson's art is really goddamn beautiful here, and Rucka's just reminded me (for the umpteenth time) of how excellent a writer he can be as long as he's not writing the Joker.

An excellent post.

[doctor_spanky]

Bruce's acceptance that Batman isn't a curse or obligation, but who he chooses to be, is one of my favorite interpretations of the character. It makes his entire Bat-schpiel so much more mature and his actions so much more purposeful and interesting

[crimsonmoonmist]

Indeed. It's an interpretation that I find myself wishing was the generally accepted attitude Bruce should have, because we've seen enough of him brooding and distance himself because his parents are DEEAD! (tm).

I suppose he's like Peter Parker in that sense, never truly being allowed to progress and even when he does, status quo will catch up sooner or later.

[starwolf_oakley]

Bruce Wayne and Peter Parker don't really progress, but for different reasons. Bruce has never really progressed because of the Scary Bat-God that lives in his head. Peter hasn't progressed (or has his progressions retconned by Mephisto) because he knows someone is always going to need Spider-Man to save them.
.

[filthysize]

DARKNESS

NO PARENTS

CONTINUED DARKNESS

MORE DARKNESS

SUPER RICH

KIND OF MAKES IT BETTER

[mrstatham]

I do like that Rucka pretty much takes a swing at the 'my parents are dead' variant of Batman by making the pearls - so often grossly fetishised and made a ridiculously prominent visual element in the Wayne murders - fakes. It does a good job of putting across that it's maybe not so much the Waynes dying that matters, that someone died AT ALL. By making the murder of his parents so profoundly personal to the point it's all about him, I think it kind of misses the point and almost suggests Batman should've just stopped at Joe Chill. In the best incarnations of the character, it should just be about making sure that no-one else goes through the pain he has; Which is still personal, but not self-obsessive to a horrible degree. And I think that's what Rucka's getting at here; It might not be emotionally about his parents any more, but clearly it's important for Bruce to have them in mind constantly as a reminder.

I just wish more people took a page from Rucka's book, given right after the resolution of the Brubaker/Rucka run (Yes, I know he was a complete dick during the run, but the resolution had a point) he went back to Batdick, and this was done pretty much in the midst of yet more Batdickery.

[lego_joker]

Bringing in Jeph Loeb right after the Rucka/Brubaker era was probably a bad idea, in that regard...

[starwolf_oakley]

I once posted some pages from DETECTIVE COMICS #600 that had Bruce realize since the world needs Batman, his mind has put the murder of the Waynes on a constant loop.

I wanted something like this in DARK KNIGHT RISES. Bruce dreams/ hallucinates about Thomas and Martha, who "get" a lot of everything, the mission, the costume, even the bat, but not why Bruce thinks he doesn't deserve to be happy.