Getting further into my re-read of Gotham Central, I’m reminded that this was one of the first comics that really got me to understand just how it is that Batman has such a strained relationship with the city and GCPD.
In the “Keystone Kops” arc, when the GCPD is desperate to save one of their own who was caught in a booby trap left by Flash villain Dr. Alchemy, Batman approaches Renee Montoya and tells her not to try and make a deal with Alchemy. However he doesn’t ask her not to make a deal, he doesn’t persuade her not to make a deal, he tells her. As though he’s giving her an order and expects it to be followed. As if he’s got the legal and moral authority to just make this decision for her and everybody else involved.
As if the GCPD really are just soldiers in his personal army, exactly as he had tried to act during the “War Games” event.
And as an outside observer I of course know that he’s right and they never should have tried to deal with Alchemy -- I know this because I’ve literally already read the story so I know how it ends and I’m also familiar with the genre conventions and writing style -- but internally he gives Renee nothing. He doesn’t approach her as a mentor or ally, and he doesn’t give her any information that she can use to justify not approaching Alchemy. He doesn’t bring up Alchemy’s psych profile, or the way his powers are only temporary in some situations and thus he can’t cure Officer Kelly. He just barks an order and leaves.
If we’d been following Batman throughout this story, if it had been from his point of view, we would have seen him at the Bat Computer running his analyses and talking to Alfred, and this information would have been presented to us then. We-the-audience would therefor know why the GCPD shouldn’t try to talk to Alchemy, and so when Batman tells Renee not to do it we would nod our heads and say “She should listen”. Then when they don’t listen we would say “See, this is why the city needs Batman”. But since it hasn’t been laid out for us, since we get only the information that Renee herself gets, all we see is a guy in a mask giving cryptic orders from the shadows.
And there’s no trust there.
Seeing things form Batman’s perspective makes a lot of what happens in Gotham make sense, but the people living there don’t see if from Batman’s perspective. They’re on the ground while it all happens around them, and all they have is the trust that Batman isn’t part of the problem. And when he doesn’t support that trust...
