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Why the “Batman should just kill the Joker” argument is stupid.

Pre-scriptum: This turned out a bit longer and a lot more complicated than I’ve expected. Please bear with it.

Sunday night, before heading back to uni, I decided not to sleep (like a sensible person would), and instead started watching Gotham.

And shit, son.

A show that actually understands the underlying themes of Gotham?

I can't believe it.

This realization reminded me of the million times, when I've been hit with the good ol’ "Batman should just kill the Joker, he is so stupid" argument.

Hearing this always drove me crazy, but now I can actually present a (somewhat) coherent debunking, so strap in for a little rant.

So the two main arguments, that come up are as follows: Killing the villains would more effectively reduce crime.

Batman’s presence is just worsening Gotham’s situation by creating/pulling supervillains into Gotham causing even more death and suffering in the process.

Now, depending on the exact iteration, these are correct observations, but they miss the goddamned point of everything.

Batman is not a person. He is an ideology. He is not a man, as much as the idea, that justice is real and is coming to kick your ass, in a city where major criminal offenses are justified with “this is Gotham, kid. Get over it”. It is not a coincidence that Bruce is commonly referred to as the mask of Batman and not the other way around.

He is trying to uphold the power of law and correct the system where it is goes to shit. This is the reason why many of his small scale opponents are corrupt cops and why several of his allies are people such as Jim Gordon (who is trying to fix the police from the inside) and pre-Two Face Harvey Dent (who does the same on a legal/political plane). How he uses his personal financial and political power reflects the same.

Now, the reason why I’m harping on about this is that one of the core tenets of human civilization is the “no kill” rule, which is also the most important element of Batman’s backstory. Killing is viewed as necessary evil by many people, but the end goal should always be minimizing it, and shifting the focus to rehabilitation. It is not a coincidence that Arkham is an asylum, not a prison. Due to writers wanting to use the same villains, and their relevant themes, they cannot be cured (long-run comics be damned), but that does not change the fact that it IS an asylum (a facility or rehabilitation), not a prison or the Phantom Zone (which are only for containment, and are linked to much more “wholesome” heroes).

Batman is often praised for his rouge’s gallery and for good reason. Besides packing style and AWESOME in troves, they are all (at least the good ones) defined by a single or a few overriding flaws and deviations from order. Here is a (non-conclusive) list: Wanting to demolish all order as a reaction to its flaws (Anarchy), declaring oneself above the rest due to outstanding intellect or some other quality (Riddler), wanting to abolish civilization and let nature take over (Posion Ivy), taking arbitrary laws too seriously (Two Face) or my personal favourite: putting one’s personal trauma above the rest of humanity (Dr. Freeze), they all represent real and understandable ideologies that are constantly up against the ideal of law and order. And don’t forget the antithesis of Bats and literal definition of LE, Joker, who quite literally represents men’s tendency to be evil just cause, and who also happens to be the ultimate cynic (more on that in a minute).

But the villains are not the main opposition of Batman. It is Gotham itself (thus the name of the show). Batman doesn’t become Batman because people are being abducted for experimentation or because the Joker is killing people. He becomes Batman, because he is living in a city, where two people are shot in front of their child for a necklace and everyone just waves it off as yesterday’s news. The real enemy is cynicism, the idea that things cannot and will not change for the better. He is one of the few, who faced with cynicism and neglect for such things, stands up and says ‘No. It does not have to be like that.” He is dead-set on bringing a better world to fruition and breaking the fundamentals of his beliefs would equal to ceasing to exist as what he is and the resistance he signifies. He can be cynical in his approach, but always within bounds, and never on an ideological level (barring deconstructions, but those are deconstructions for a reason).

(I don’t want to write an entire dissertation, so I swore I wouldn’t bring up paladins or Sanderson, therefore I assume the dear reader can make the connection)

In the faithful Batman stories, both his unrelenting realism and fundamental care for others are emphasized. He approaches situations with a level head, and almost always asks the villains to put the weapons down, before actually engaging in combat. For example, in the animated Justice League series (the be all, end all of animated superheroism) we see Batman tell the entire JLA that they can either kick him out or see why a contingency is needed for their own power, and we also see Batman sitting down on a swing with a little girl who might be a danger to the fabric of reality, so she wouldn’t have to spend her last minutes alone.

One could say that Batman himself is quite the broken and hypocritical character as he exhibits many of the traits which identify his villains. He is a vigilante (Anarchy), almost solely inspired by personal trauma and loss (Freeze), constantly imposes an arbitrary moral code on others (Two-face), and so on. However there are many reasons why this only betters the whole thing.

First and foremost, Batman is trying to create the synthesis of the ideal and the realistic and make it into a comprehensive and ordered system, which just so happens to be the fundamental challenge of legislation and governance. Secondly the best Batman stories and his meta villains (Arkham series, Red Hood) can very effectively bounce off of these “flaws” allowing for a further exploration of the themes. Thirdly, when his fundamentals are broken (the original Dark Knight) and it is not fucked up (LOOKIN’ AT YOU SNYDER) it makes for a very effective deconstruction. There is also a fourth reason, but let me get back to that later.

Now, on the show itself. In one of the first scenes we witness Gordon being ridiculed, after not shooting an obviously miserable junkie and taking a more circumvent approach, just so killing could be avoided. Later we see police applaud a serial killer for killing crooks, right up until he targets a policeman (who is also a crook btw), where they suddenly go all “we don’t kill a policemen, hurrdurr”. Said serial killer turns out to be a guy who worked with orphans for decades and thought the only way to change the city would be to start killing the corrupt. He doesn’t even have to pick his targets, because anyone, who has the slightest smidgen of power in Gotham would be a proper target.

The villains in the show are also shown to be evil, but also fundamentally broken as people, which is the cause of their villainy. Cobblepot is very obviously a bullied loner, Nigma is viewed as a loser by everyone while he just wants to share what he finds interesting, Selina’s only brush with authority was getting thrown into institutions and Ivy experienced an abusive family. Being broken doesn’t excuse their choices, but it does give rise to them, tying into the fact that there is a root cause for evil other than human nature and that it can be treated.

Now the final reason why Batman not being perfect is not a problem, is that he is not actually the ideal hero of the world of Gotham. Due to all his hypocrisies and nigh superhuman nature, he is not actually the best synthesis of order and Gotham. The real ideal is Jimmy Gordon himself.

Why? He shares, both the unrelenting idealism and humanity of Batman, but he does so without having to resort to terror tactics or vigilantism. And without access to ALL THE MONEY or superhuman intellect. This is the reason why he is the main of the show and not Bruce and also why in some versions of the story, Batman falls, giving rise to more perfect heroes and Gordon is the one who tidies up the GCPD and/or becomes mayor.

Take for example the pier scene from the show [mild spoliers]. Harvey (a different one) takes Jim and Cobblepot out to the pier and says that Jim must shoot the guy into the water or their ass is grass. Now, Jim is presented with two options here. Comply (give in to status quo) or Resist (and die shortly thereafter, also feeding into the status quo). Batman would choose Resist, which is a valid choice, but only for him and not the layman. However, Jim recognizes the false ‘agency’ inherent in the choice and breaks the system by coming to a third solution. This moment, in one scene summarized, what the struggle for a better Gotham is and how it can be achieved.

(Struggling not to bring Geralt into this)

Which ties us back to the main point of this whole thing. Killing the Joker or any other villain for that matter, does not solve the problem, because the Joker is not the problem. The problem is that Gotham is a place which produces people like him on a consistent and reliable basis and that its own habitants believe that this cannot be changed. Viewing killing as the only solution only strengthens the very core of the problem and at best momentarily cures some of the symptoms, but not the sickness itself.

In the spawn of 4 episodes, the show demonstrated, what is the problem of Gotham, how it affects everyday life and thinking, how truly superhuman Bruce is even as a kid, how the city creates its own broken people, what challenges someone has to face if they want to produce change and it managed not to be crowded to incomprehensibility or made into a cheese-fest. I hope it will not go off its rails, as I don’t know if anything ever inspired this type of positive excitement from me. Rant over

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