CP3S said:
zombie84 said:
But in the mid-1980s---30 years ago, I might remind you--Frank Miller re-wrote the mythology. He recast it in an R-rated noir, where an aging Batman comes out of retirement to give his life to save Gotham from one last threat, eventually deciding to fake his death and let a young replacement, who briefly fought along side him, take over as Batman, with Wayne retiring. Because Batman is a symbol, and Bruce Wayne's body no longer worked, he realized he could retire so long as there was someone worthy to take on the symbol as their identity.
Wait a minute... rereading this part of your comment, I'm thinking you have never even read The Dark Knight Returns yourself... The vast majority of everything you say in the above quote never even happens in The Dark Knight Returns. Carrie isn't intended to replace him as Batman (Batwoman?) and he doesn't decide Batman is just a symbol and so he can therefore let go and pass it on. The only reason he fakes his death is so that he can go into hiding rather than be killed and continue the desperate fight by training others. In the sequel, he comes back, as Batman. Older still, and still fighting. As Batman. No retirement ever depicted.
I think The Dark Knight Returns and the rest of Miller's Batman works serve much more as a defense for Warbler's side of this discussion than anything else. In other words, Miller got the character, why couldn't Nolan?
Going to have to disagree here. Dark Knight Returns opens with Batman already having given up being Batman. But he decides to come back for a final fight, with the understanding that it will probably kill him. Like in Dark Knight Rises, his health problems and the realization that this battle may be his last are hinted at throughout. Finally, Robin is clearly poised to sort of take up the fight where Batman left off; I think he may even have a line to the effect of "she's perfect." Not that she would necessarily become Batman, but she is presented as a sort of successor to him. Finally at the end, Batman does give up being Batman. The suit is retired, and he instead decides to spend his days training new recruits to do the work he once was able to do so effectively, passing on the torch as it were.
That is basically what happens throughout Dark Knight Rises. Not precisely, because the plots are very different, but you can clearly see the seeds germinating in Dark Knight Returns. As to the Dark Knight Returns sequel--which I haven't read--who is to say Bruce Wayne is done for good? Dark Knight Rises played out with more finality in that Bruce pretty much can never be Batman ever again, because Miller's universe is more fantastic where a 60-year-old Batman could still come back and fight crime (Dark Knight Rises is way more realistic: Bruce's body would be spent for good before he was forty), but if you think about it he can't really be done for good, like I said. He's not going to spend the next forty years sipping iced teas on a French beach with Selina Kyle. He has to come back to help Blake. As it stands, Blake couldn't just become Batman, he has to have someone show him how it all works, and he needs to have a support team, not to mention some training. So if the idea of Bruce Wayne walking away from Gotham for good rubs you the wrong way, that is not at all a stretch to imagine, in fact it's pretty realistic.