What's Wrong with Batman: Part 1 of 3

I love Batman and I'm not alone. Batman is more beloved by the internet than a Jesus made of bacon. The concept of Batman has changed a lot over the last 75 years, but its core quality is that it adapts to the culture of which it is a part.

Batman does have some problems though. While some of these are products of their time, many are the result of concepts executed without considering of the implications. I'm no Batmanologist, but I'd like to take a few days to look at these problems.

Early Batman was built in the mold of pulp heroes; an extraordinary man who has set out to fight crime with his extraordinary abilities. Compared to later superheroes, and even many of his contemporaries, Batman has no powers. He eschews most technologies, relying wholly on the physical and mental capacities of humanity, even decades later when he's matching wits with immortal aliens boasting entire war worlds. That's not the best approach; someone who wears circus tights and a tool belt is worthless in a world where villains can punch through metal, control minds, or have guns. After all, what can a guy do that even a second-rate hero like Hawkman--who is literally a guy plus wings--can't?

Geeks and Sports

The craziness that is the conversation about the ability of athletes to speak their minds is still ongoing.

What's weird is that, after watching a few episodes of The I.T. Crowd, I realized what a fucked up status symbol it is for nerds not to like sports and sports fandom. T. Campbell was ahead of the crowd by about a decade when he termed what was then the narrow sub-culture of science fiction and fantasy "fandom." Now, we refer to "geek chic" when we talk about people who love everything from Cougar Town to Twilight, and man, neither of those two things are geek as I understand them. Hell, check out this Comic Critics from a few days ago. Same fucking thing, but from a different angle. Yes, I know that sports, as an interest, is more mainstream than comics or sci-fi and that there are a lot of loud, obnoxious idiots who like sports and can't wrap their heads around why anyone would not love it, but fuck, that sentence is also an exact description of people who like Star Wars so fucking much they reciprocate those feelings towards sports fans.

Touchback

Skiltao said somethings a while back and I never got back with him. His comment got stuck  in the comments tab where I didn't notice it. Even after I did, it took a while to get around to framing a response to it. It was pretty crappy of me to miss it, then to take so long to get back.

I'm intermittently rewatching "The Pretender" with my sister, and I quite like that show. Four seasons and two TV movies, though.

Someone else was telling me about that too. It looks good and I'm tentatively putting it in my queue after the review series after There Will Be Brawl.

BUT! VHS'd commercials on my copies of Pretender pointed me to a show called "DarkSkies." Only lasted one season, and it does for Cold War UFO paranoia what There Will Be Brawl does for Nintendo.

I'll be honest, I've watched enough Cold Case that I have to suppress an urge to dragon punch any screen trying to show me a period piece television show. It's even spoiled Quantum Leap for me. Maybe...in time...I can come to watch it, but sadly that time is not now.

As a quick aside Cold Case is the worst television show ever created. The Gary Coleman Show had a more supportable premise, more likeable characters, and a less aggressively distasteful premise.