BATMAN:
A KING OF INFINITE SPACE
Hamlet:
To me Denmark is a prison.
Rosencrantz:
Why then your ambition makes it one. 'Tis too narrow
for your mind.
Hamlet:
O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a
king of infinite space— were it not that I have bad dreams.
Batman... has the great advantage, and the occasional disadvantage, of being only human.
-Isaac Asimov, Northwestward
Author's Note: I created Batman. Bob Kane and Bill Finger are myths perpetuated by the liberal media!
(Dusk. The sun is beginning to rise over the hills, to give the city of Gotham what light it has to offer. Amongst the dark alleys, the tobacco and piss sodden streets, and the dilapidated buildings that serve as homes for the weak and the downtrodden, the light is not great. But it is light nonetheless, and for some people it is enough.)
(The sun rises over Wayne Manor. We cut to the master bedroom: it's enormous, but the curtains are drawn over the window, and a thick, almost stifling darkness pervades the room. Several objects are brightly lit due to coloring responsibilities that I'll be leaving to you. I can't really think of any color for the objects, but white could work. Red might be too obvious a give-away, and it might turn out garish instead of unsettling. Anyway, there's a bed, a lamp table, and, of course, a lamp on top of that. The bed is very large, both long and wide, and neatly kept. Good work, Alfred.)
(A large, lumbering figure makes its way through the third story corridors on its way to the master bedroom. A big man with the body of a linebacker walks through the shadows; he seems almost more comfortable in the dark than in the light. We can't see much of this man: physiologically, his body is a masterpiece, and he wears flannel pajama pants. However, as one panel shows with the top half of this man shrouded in inky black shadow, this man has white, slitted demon eyes. He is clearly no ordinary human.)
(The man enters the master bedroom, almost hesitantly. A nice one page spread should show the identity of the man (and, yep, it's Bruce) right as he steps into the master bedroom. Even if you decide to skip it, I'd like Bruce to look almost ravaged, definitely exhausted. It's been a long night. And, somehow, it looks like the day might be even worse.)
(Bruce walks to the bed; strangely, his walking is stiff, like he's reluctant to reach his means of rest and revitalization. Bruce should be colored so that he's akin to a lone candle making its way through an impenetrable shroud. You know, I remember in Death Note that, in some special scenes, the eye and hair color would change dramatically in order to show the state of the characters e.g. Light Yagami's hair and eyes turned redder because, well, he's an evil motherf*cker. Something like that might be fitting here. One image I'd love to see is at least a quarter of Bruce's face and eye being shadowed in the room; on the shadowed side, we'd see Batman's white demon eye instead of Bruce's regular eye. Just some strange dualism that might foreshadow some of the ambiguity that's to come...)
(Anyway, Bruce reaches the bed and promptly crashes into it. The man is exhausted, but something is different. He's not physically exhausted, like he spent the night trying to prevent Mad Hatter from forcing children to take acid. No, Bruce may be physically drained, but, more than that, he's emotionally spent. Bruce is a master adept and meditator with a martial arts repertoire that would frustrate even Bruce Lee, but a close-up on Bruce's face clearly shows that his soul is hurting, and it's hurting bad.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR/MENTAL/MIND/WHATEVER): Today wasn't a bad day.
(Bruce opens one of the curtains ajar, just to get a glimpse of the sun. The sun is just barely over the hills now, but the light annoys Bruce all the same. He grunts and closes the curtains, returning to his bed.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): No insane masks or criminal metahumans. Arkham was quiet the whole day, with the exceptions of the guard that Two-Face tried to hang with an extension cord. Grabbed enough compromising evidence, and now I think the senator will be much more inclined to support that public rehabilitation clinic bill. Less crack, less desperation, less crime.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Mostly cloak and dagger stuff today. Not a whole lot of physical action. Easily broke up a gang war between some skinheads and some crips. Foiled a robbery. The robbers were young and scared, and it could have turned ugly quickly if their leader didn't calm them down and convince them to surrender. Considering that they were only packing about seven pistols, three uzi's, and one automatic rifle, they didn't stand much of a chance to begin with. Thank God some of these people are getting smarter.
(Bruce crawls under the covers. I don't know, this might be a stupid idea, but I'd like there to somehow be the faint possibility that there are a number of impossible monstrosities lurking in the dark. Bruce and the bed are lit, and just about everything else is submerged in the creepiest kind of darkness you can get, the inky black you find at the bottom of the sea. I'm thinking of Tim Sale here, particularly The Long Halloween and Dark Victory. If there are any monsters or whatever, it should just be shapes that easily blend into the dark. Maybe some bat inspired monsters? Nothing extravagant though. These are Bruce's personal demons more than anything else.)
(Bruce groggily opens one eye and looks at his bedside table. Right beside the lamp is a black and white portrait of Bruce as a young boy with his parents. Both Thomas and Martha Wayne are smiling genuinely. Bruce is smiling too, but... somethings off. Is that a flicker of doubt behind that boyish grin ?)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Still, despite the lack of crime, there's no denying that today I was more tense than I have been in a while. I expected anything and everything to go wrong. Joker holding a studio hostage until they agreed to air his part sitcom, part snuff film. Hush firing a rocket launcher at Leslie's apartment, all in spite of me. I even had Calendar Man on my mind, dreading whatever bizarre crime the invalid could have had in mind for today.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Still, the problem with that is that while Julian Day used to commit crimes on any day of the week, he preferred to commit them on holidays.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But today isn't a holiday.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Today is an anniversary.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): My parents have been dead for over twenty five years.
(Bruce reaches out his hand, hesitates, and then places the framed photo on its front side. Out of sight, out of mind.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Tonight, I get to sleep. No insufficient cat naps. No barely compensating meditations. Tonight I sleep at least eight hours, and I recharge my body with all the energy I've lost during the past weeks.
(Bruce grimaces.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I dread every minute of it.
(Something in the corner of the room catches Bruce's eyes: he stares and concentrates his vision. But, no, nothing there. Just a subtle, almost indiscernible shadow of something tall, winged, and hungry. The shape dissolves as soon as it is seen.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Some people bemoan the fact that they can't remember their dreams. It's as if they think that dreams are portals into other worlds, worlds where the rules and laws of our reality cease to be, where anything is possible, where you're allowed to escape mundanity and embrace all that your imagination can create.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I hate these kinds of people.
(A close upon a clenched fist could work here.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): It's not their fault. I know that. They don't know what power dreams have, what potential they hold.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Potential for Heaven. Potential to have those who barely know you exist suddenly say, "I love you". Potential to be more than you are now or ever will be. Potential to recreate the world exactly as you want it, exactly as it should be.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But it's like my sensei once told me.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): "Anything with the potential to create shares the potential to destroy".
(Somewhere among these thoughts we should have a reasonably clear shot of Bruce's bookcase. Since this is a story about dreams, books regarding Freud, Jung, Lacan, psychoanalysis, etc, are probably mandatory. Just for fun though, let's throw in a few "fan service" items that have to do with dreams like books by H.P. Lovecraft or a DVD of "A Nightmare on Elm Street".)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): My dreams are of destruction.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Not destruction of a certain person, although I've definitely felt the urge to snap Riddler's neck more than once. Not destruction of a certain place, although I've certainly felt compelled to stomp on Arkham like a child stomping on a sand castle.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): No, this destruction is more... personal than that.
(Bruce rolls onto his back, arms spread out. His exhausted composure suggests a 'Screw it,let's get this over with" kind of attitude.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): And I can remember ALL of it.
(Bruce closes his eye. Zoom in on just one closed eye here.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): God, don't let me dream tonight.
(Darkness now. Bruce hasn't started to dream yet.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But you will, won't you?
(Something shifts in the darkness of Bruce's subconscious. Bats?...)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Goddamn you.
(Bruce opens his eye. We pull back: this is no longer the eye of adult Bruce Wayne, but of Bruce Wayne, little boy, loving son, and heir to an empire. He's sitting at a desk at his private school, the kind that wealthy parents enroll their children in.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): In school, we study math, P.E., history, and English. Although I like all of my classes, and although my teachers think I have a special propensity for learning all manners of things, I still like English best.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): In English, we read stories. Because there are a few more boys than girls in the class, most of the stories are legends, particularly the ones about Sir Arthur and his Round Table. Later, I will learn that there are knights everywhere, not just in England, but for now I can only comprehend Camelot, Merlin, Lancelot, and the Lady of the Lake. Like any other boy my age, I'm fascinated by these characters, especially the courageous and tenacious knights.
(Bruce imagines a few colorful scenes of himself as an older knight. Because Bruce can't imagine precisely what he'll look like when he grows up, I think his older self should look dubious as well as heroic, a mass of imperfect but formidable potential. This, I think, would also hint towards the ambiguity of this story's Batman later on. Maybe we could do a few Jack Kirby style things here? In any event, I think it's important that Bruce's colorful and romantic daydreams contrast greatly with the drab and gray reality he resides in.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): We learn a few fairy tales too, largely from the Brothers Grimm canon. Our teacher tries to sanitize the stories as best as he can, but there's no getting around the fact that the huntsman cuts open the wolf to free Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother.
(Another daydream: Bruce imagines himself an older [but still sketchy looking] woodsman confronting the wolf. Remarkably, both the huntsman and the wolf look thematically similar. Although the huntsman should probably be depicted as more virtuous, there is a [hopefully] unnerving similarity between him and the untamed, black wolf with white, slitted eyes. The wolf is full with the two women inside his belly, but he's still a ferocious beast.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I don't tell anyone, but this story frightens me.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): This is why I like the legends more than the fairy tales. In the fairy tales, the heroes and the victims do not always win. Sometimes, Bluebeard's wives are not resurrected from their murders, sometimes the little mermaid never gets her tongue back from the witch, and sometimes the boy who cries wolf is never saved.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Not then knowing the dismal fate of Arthur and his knights, I believe that in legends the heroes always win. Gawain always passes the test of the Green Knight, Gareth always bests the Black Knight, and Galahad always obtains the Holy Grail. I am entranced by the knights and their world, the world as it should be, with clear heroes and clear villains, with untainted victories and utter defeats. I know that I am young and weak, but I cannot help but feel ashamed in comparison to these brave souls. I wonder how it is that they do what they do, how they cross that threshold that begins with yawning, gaping terror and ends with exultant pride and supremacy.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But more than this, I wonder if I will ever be able to do the same.
(Next couple of panels show Bruce listening to his mother. Her back is to us, and she's lecturing Bruce albeit amiably. Bruce looks at her without emotion, just listening. For the next few panels, we'll zoom in on his face. It's clear that he's not very convinced by Martha.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I ask my mother about all this, about heroes and courage, and she tells me that my father is a hero because he spends hour after hour, day after day saving the lives of his patients, contributing to the welfare of Gotham. I hold my tongue for fear of disrespect, but I am not entirely satisfied with this answer.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): My father is a great man. In all actuality, his weight, height, and build are all average. But in my eyes, he is taller and stronger than any man I know. He works hard, harder than he should. But his work is not glamorous. Sometimes, patients die. Sometimes, tension rises and tempers flare. And sometimes, two of the people you look up to the most yell and scream at each other with such volume and intensity that you become sure that the walls will collapse.
(Bruce sits on a stairway, secretly eavesdropping on his parents as they argue. He looks sad, but at the same time he seems intrigued.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): It's during those times you begin to wonder if relationships are worth it.
(A series of panels, one large panel or, really, whatever you want, shows young Bruce doing a variety of things: fencing, horseback riding, swimming, piano playing, etc. Basically, things that rich parents would sign their children up for. Bruce is good at all of it, but he lacks passion and it doesn't seem like he's having much fun.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I do what my parents, my teachers, and my instructors tell me to do without fail,without complaint. Even at my young age, I can tell that this is too great a workload for most people, let alone a child, to pull off.
(Young Bruce pulls himself out of the pool, muscles straining, and then collapses exhausted onto the ground.)
(Close in on his eye. They seem dull from fatigue.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But I can't disappoint Mom or Dad.
(Zoom in even closer on Bruce's eye. Let's try to make it look young, but drained, vulnerable, and hurt.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): All I want is to make them proud.
(Bruce closes his eye. When he opens it, we pull out, and we're suddenly in his spacious bedroom. It's a typical boy's room despite it's mammoth size: model airplanes, mecha and kaiju toys, posters of athletes, etc. It's night: the light of the moon is filtered through a large bay window and shines down on Bruce who's nestled in his bed. Alfred sits nearby on a stool, reading Bruce a story.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Mom and Dad are gone most nights. I'm never really sure where they are. If Dad isn't performing surgery, then he's out of the country working with Doctors Without Borders. If Mom isn't trying to cheer up some sick little kids, then she's working at a soup kitchen. And if they're both not urging our congressman for more public funds, then they're helping open new bust stops, libraries, and unemployment offices out of their own pocket.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): They're never really around here.
(Focus a little more on Alfred. He looks tired, but he doesn't seem to mind it. In fact, he seems to be enjoying himself. Bruce watches with a precocious sense of appreciation.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Alfred is amazing. He served in the war. He's been an actor, surgeon, and even a spy. It seems like there's nothing that he can't do.
BRUCE (INTEROR): Most of the time, Alfred acts subservient to Mom and Dad. But Alfred is a bigger part of my life than they are. He drops me off and picks me up from school. He makes all my meals. He helps me study, he irons my clothes, and he reads to me at night.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Once or twice I ask Alfred if Mom and Dad really love me. I know that they work hard. I know that they give me a lot, more than a lot of other children have. But they're never there.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Alfred tells me everything I expect him to say in a patient and understanding voice. He tells me that Mom and Dad are so busy because everyone expects so much out of them. He tells me that they're the pillars of the community and that Gotham depends upon them for survival. He even tells me that everything that they do that keeps them away from the house and from me is all to insure that I grow up to be an even greater man than my father.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I understand everything that he says...
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But I'm just not sure if believe it.
(Alfred leaves the room. The panel should probably focus largely on him with Bruce in the background; he looks tired, but happy, as if its been a long but worthwhile day. My intention is to suggest that Alfred has no qualms about helping raise Bruce, which is ironic because...)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Sometimes, I wish Alfred was my dad.
(Scene changes. Bruce sits on a schoolyard bench reading a book during recess. He cannot help but glance at the other children who are playing soccer, dodgeball, four square, and the like. He looks lonely...)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I have few friends. It just doesn't seem all that worthwhile to me. The books I've read and the movies I've seen have made me come to the conclusion that friends are meant to help each other when something is wrong, when bullies torment, when parents exploit, when the pain becomes too much bear.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But I have no reason to feel pain. No reason at all. My parents love me. I'm more than well provided for. I have everything a child my age could possibly want.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I look at the others, and I cannot help but wonder if they experience similar sentiments. Do they know that their lives have been planned out for them, that they'll never be without because of their parents' wealth? Do they see nothing but a large, gaping hole when they try to imagine their futures, a void that's made tolerable by numbing hedonism and deadened decadence? And if and when they think about this and compare it to all the children who have it far, far worse than them...
BRUCE (INTERIOR): … do they hate themselves too?
(Bruce looks at his book. It's the 1001 Arabian Nights. The mundanity of Bruce's reality versus the thrills and glory of the fairy tales.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I feel empty.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Guilt and shame are the only things that I feel apart from this.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I think I prefer the emptiness.
(Next scene: its night, and we see Bruce, Thomas, and Martha trekking through the grimy streets of Downtown Gotham. With all the lights and banners around, its clear that this is the upscale part of the city, reserved for the rich and powerful. All the natural morbidity of Gotham cannot be completely negated, however, no matter how well decorated it is. Still, Bruce seems to be in relatively good spirits. He's finally with his Mom and Dad, walking proudly by him, obviously dressed up for some special occasion.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Today is my birthday. At first, I thought it was just going to be me and Alfred celebrating something I never thought was that special, one part of my surrogate father doing his best to entertain me, another part of him knowing the futility in trying to cover up for my parent's failings.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): As it turns out, Dad and Mom had this night in mind for months now. I can hardly believe it when Dad tells me that we're going to stay out late tonight, even less so when I'm told that we're all going to see a movie together.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Mom tells me that we're going to see Dad's favorite movie, an older film that's playing at the theater for a special "retro cinema" night. It's called "The Mark of Zorro". I know nothing about it, but I rationalize that even if the movie turns out to be bad, being with Mom and Dad will more than make up for it.
(Bruce gets to the theater, and, opposed to the noir black and white of Gotham, the theater is in lush, bright color. Its one of those old movie houses, the kinds with the large marquees, the double entrances, and the ticket booth right in the middle. "Mark of Zorro" is on the marquee in big bold letters along with "Tyrone Power", "Linda Darnell", and "Basil Rathbone".
BRUCE (INTERIOR): At least that's what I thought.
(This should probably be a two page spread. Bruce sits watching the screen, transfixed, almost rapturous. Everyone else is having a good time, enjoying a fun and exciting movie, but for Bruce it's more than just thrilling action; the actions of Zorro are having a profound effect on the boy's mind. The theater is still noir, but we see visions of Don Diego Vega [as Bruce imagines him: dashing, gallant, and charismatic] over and above Bruce. In these film scenes, Zorro should be doing all manners of things heroes did before America became cynical: rescuing damsels in distress, sword-fighting with villains, defending the weak and the abused, etc. By the by, there was this great Batman arc I read once named "Blades" where Bats became the ally and then the enemy of a Zorro like character named "Cavalier". Tim Sale's artwork was incredible [per usual], and I have fond memories of marveling over his handling of the sword-fight sequence between Bruce and Cavalier. Bruce is obviously a grim and gloomy guy, but its those kinds of special moments where he opposes colorful "adventure" characters like Cavalier and Ra's Al Gul, giving the stories more of an innocent tone reminiscent of stuff like "Raiders of the Lost Ark". Let's go for that here, another mixture of the surreal and the dark grittiness of noir now combined with the optimism of old hero stories.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But then I saw him.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): And everything changed from that moment on.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I no longer resented the world for its corruption...
BRUCE (INTERIOR): … because I discovered the means to save it.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Don Diego had something that all the other heroes didn't have.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): He had a secret.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): A secret that he would take to the grave.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): And with that secret...
BRUCE (INTERIOR): … he could save lives.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): He could be a hero.
(The movie ends, and Bruce, Thomas, and Martha head home, tired but exuberant, the excitement of the movie still lasting with them. Bruce has a wide smile on his face, but he seems distracted. Either his mother and father don't seem to notice or Bruce does a really good job covering up his reflective mood.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): A secret to make a hero.
(This might be my favorite part. Joe Chill comes out of the dark of the filthy alleys, scrawny and pathetic but still dangerous. I think the irony of the Wayne's' deaths has always been sharpened by any and all begrimed and destitute appearances of Chill: the very same type of weak person that the Wayne's have tried to help with their philanthropy ends up taking their lives. I don't want to sound mean, but its kind of like a king or queen being done in by a peasant. This is why I don't like interpretations of the Wayne's death where Chill is a hitman (Batman: The Ultimate Evil), a new superhero (Batman Year Two), or a fledgling gangster (Batman: The Black Glove). Strangely, the Nolan brothers, David Goyer, and Richard Brake seem to have crafted the ideal Chill so far as I know; I'm not used to movie adaptations outdoing the source material in that kind of regard. Monotonous philosophy aside, Chill is, yes, gaunt, dirty, shaggy, and probably homeless, but the kicker here is that he has red demon eyes. He's not evil, not necessarily, but what he's about to do is evil, and the eyes reflect both how deadly yet despondent he is, and how Bruce interprets the man who is about to rock the foundation of his world. As you can probably tell, I like physical contrasts.)
DIALOGUE:
CHILL: D-don't make a move. Money. N-now.
THOMAS: OK. OK, look, just take it easy, alright? Look, I'm reaching for my wallet...
(Thomas makes a grab for Chill. Chill panics and plugs Thomas. Blood erupts from Thomas' chest, painting the bland streets with a bright red. This might be gratuitous, but I like the aesthetic effect. It reminds me of a more depressing Frank Miller style...)
DIALOGUE:
CHILL: Shit!
(Chill continues to panic and snatches at Martha's pearl necklace. Martha screams, and Chill blasts her in the shoulder. The necklace breaks in half; Bruce watches transfixed as the pearls fall off their string and hit the ground, as impassively beautiful and tragic as the falling of rain. Chill, now thoroughly spooked by this mugging turned sour, drops his gun and flees.)
(Bruce is left alone with Martha. One panel shows him with his normal shadow. The next panel is exactly the same, except that his shadow has changed. It isn't the shadow of a young boy and it isn't the shadow of a grown man. It's the shadow of something that has been reborn into a god of the dead. Anubis and Mictlantecuhtli would be proud.)
BACK TO INTERIOR MONOLOGUE:
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I experience the train of logic as seamlessly as the pearls that hit the pavement. Even from this distance, I can tell that the still, hunched figure that was once Thomas Wayne is now gone, is now wherever it is that all men, great and small, wind up.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): As I realize that my mother is still alive, a cold, frozen patch of panic builds up in my chest. She will live, and the memory of this terrible night will haunt her for the rest of her days. Dad will be gone, I'll be all that she has left, and she will smother me with overbearing maternity until I can breathe no more.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Nothing will ever truly be mine. I will never be able to truly earn something for myself, never be able to gain that rare satisfaction that comes from spilling sweat and dripping blood and knowing, just knowing that it was you and only you that who made things happen, who achieved the light at the end of the tunnel.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I'll never get to be Arthur. I'll never get to be Zorro.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I'll never get to be a hero.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Unless I act now.
(Bruce bends over and picks up the gun. We can see that he has black gloves on, a portent of what's to come in the future.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): It was cold. My mother insisted that I wear gloves.
(Bruce cocks the gun.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I'll say that he fired twice.
(Bruce aims.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): The muses chant at the sky, the valkyres raise their spears, Childe Roland blows his horn,and deep down in my heart of hearts, I know, even if it is just for this one, single moment...
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I know that what I'm doing is right.
(Martha struggles to get to her hands and knees in the background. Some of her wound's blood has landed on her face and under her right eye. Weird visual: it looks like she's crying a single, thin, and long tear of blood.)
DIALOGUE
MARTHA: B-Bruce?
(Martha looks up, and the expression on her face says more than I could ever write.)
MARTHA: No...
(Two one-page spreads follow. The first shows Bruce pointing the gun at Martha, only due to the way that the panel is set up it kind of look likes the gun is being pointed at the reader. The "camera" looks up at Bruce, giving him an aura of terrible power. As for the face, I can really see his eyes as widened but unfeeling, almost disgusted. Maybe that's why I can see his nose and lip slightly upturned, as if he's disgusted by the repugnance of this chore. The second spread shows Bruce looking exactly the same, but there's something jarringly new behind him: the shroud of Batman, tall, grim, and onyx. I see this Batman with a slightly hunched posture, head looking downward. The eyes are still white slits, but they look guilty, like maybe he feels he's to blame for all this. I saw something similar on that great Spawn TV show, so I think this could work well. Bruce usually doesn't even allow himself to feel bad for his actions, immoral or otherwise, so that would add to the power of this image.)
(Maybe two more one page spreads? However you want to handle the paneling, I have two more images in mind. The first is that we see Bruce and Martha from a distance: everything is quiet and no one moves. Then, in the next image, Bruce fires the gun and Martha falls. I want to stress that I don't think the two panels should really be all that different; I'd like them both to have that type of feeling you get when you know something horrible is about to happen but you can't do anything to stop it. Also, we probably shouldn't use a lot of blood here. I don't know, it seems kind of disrespectful to Martha. Yeah, I know, I know, I did the exact opposite to Thomas, but I do need my blood and gore fix. Also, I think it would be a cool, tragic visual if we put them both under a street light, the rest of Gotham a limitless abyss.)
(We get a shot of Martha lying on her back, her blood running out of her wounds and onto the gravel. It begins to rain and the red of the blood mixes with the blue of the rain, the color of fire and passion versus the color of tranquility and water.)
(Bruce stands over his dead mother. There are dark shades where his eyes should be.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): The police will be here in half an hour. By that time, there will be no way to save Mom. They'll show up with the paramedics and firemen and they'll look sheepishly around while their captain, a man with a thick mustache and glasses, berates them for not arriving sooner.
(Yeah, it's Gordon. What a shocker.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Years later, I will become an ally with this man in our pursuit to wage war against crime and the human evil that fuels it. More importantly, he will become my friend. But for now, he tells me everything I expect him to say: he's so sorry, I'm going to be alright, they're going to find the man who did this and bring him to justice.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): For the most part, he's kind, strong, and comforting; I look on his desk, see a picture of a young woman and young boy framed, and realize that he must be a good husband and father. Maybe that's why I can read what his eyes say so well:
BRUCE (INTERIOR) "I am not going to stop protecting Gotham until I can make sure that no child will ever see his parents die."
BRUCE (INTERIOR): If there is one thing I feel bad about this entire night, it's probably that.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Years later, I will need creative inspiration to strike fear into my enemies. I will read a book by a mythologist named Joseph Campbell, and while his book will fascinate me with it's knowledge of religion, mythology, and folklore, I will be struck the hardest by a single theory. The author will claim that in order to free himself and to achieve his potential, the hero of the story must murder his parents.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): It's all a metaphor of course; what I did was all too real.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): But while I did not know that theory at the time, I could feel just how true it really was.
(Close up on Bruce's eyes here; they look older now, the eyes of someone whose soul has grown a little older and wiser. What he's about to say is horribly true, and we can tell from his composed posture that he believes in it.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR) And I finally felt free.
(Adult Bruce wakes up with a horrified gasp, sitting upright and rigid while sweat pours off of him. Short of breath, he tries to slow down his breathing and regain what little control he currently has; he eventually settles for placing his face inbetween his knees. After a few moments, he gets up, grabs his framed photo of his parents, and heads for the bay window. He opens the shades, and there, in all its glory, stands the mother of all things serene and tranquil: the moon.)
(Bruce stares for a time at his photo with a thoughtful expression. Then he turns to stare at the moon.)
BRUCE (INTERIOR): For years I've wondered if I really did it, and for years I've never found an answer. I can tell no one about it; to let anyone know this would negate everything I've ever worked for, everything that Batman has ever accomplished. Maybe it isn't true. But there's always that doubt about me among my friends and family, around Dick, Tim, Barbara and the rest. I know they consider me paranoid. I know that they think I'm cynical. And that doubt is all that would be needed to make my secret a plausible scenario.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Years ago, while performing my mythology research, I learned that the sun is a symbol for truth and clarification. This is why Christ, Ra, Amaterasu and other sun gods represented illumination and clarity. This is why people like the Aztecs and the Druids once worshipped the sun.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): The funny thing is, if you stare into the sun, you'll get blinded.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): So I stare at the moon instead.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Maybe someday I'll learn the truth. Maybe someday things will make sense.
BRUCE (INTERIOR): Until then...
BRUCE (INTERIOR): I'll keep dreaming.
THE END
AFTERWORD
Let me answer what I suspect will be the most pertinent question asked by readers of "Infinite Space" (that's right, all three of you): Did Bruce really kill off Martha? Or, to be more precise, do I personally think that Bats was responsible for the death of his dear old ma?
No. No no no. No no no no no no no no oh my God I cannot write "no" enough. If I ever get the chance and privilege to write an official Batman story and make the egregious decision to stick this charming little anecdote in there as part of the canon... well, if you don't tar and feather my ass, you'll be missing out on one hell of an evening. Liquor, fire, and danger!
I think "Infinite Space" was more of an exercise for me, a story that needed to be told (even if just for me) simply because it needed to exist. I don't believe that Batman is as insane as the Joker, but it's a fascinating possibility, and Alan Moore did the field of comics a huge solid when he wrote "The Killing Joke". It's kind of like that here. (Except, you know, Moore could take a crap and it would inevitably outshine anything I put out. I blame that snake god of his.)
Of course, screwing around with an origin as revered as Christ's and the Buddha's does not necessarily entail a good story. I'm not exactly sure if this is necessarily a well-written tale (it sometimes comes across as a cheap, hallow imitation of Brian Azzarello , I think), but I'm fairly certain that it has some emotional power, and as Ingmar Bergman once said, it's more important for art to make you feel something rather than understand something. In this regard, I think I might have succeeded. Still, what I do know is that this is a step above my previous Batman fanfics, which, in my humble opinion, were pieces of dog crap. There's only so much nihilistic bullsh*t you can inject into Batman before you realize that that you need to get him off his soliloquies and get him to start kicking some ass. That's something I need to start working on too.
And in my next Batman story, a crossover with the manga/anime Death Note, I plan to do just that.
There's going to be a war in Gotham. I'm going to ask questions that will make my readers and I uncomfortable. But if there is a solution to our problems, then a full look at the worst is mandatory. Unlike in my hypothetical one-shot, Batman knows the value of the truth and will search the deep and dark places of his soul to find answers. Like anyone else my age, I don't believe in much, and I find it difficult to build up faith and hope. I have my share fair of doubts regarding religion, the government, and our future as a species, and sometimes it seems like the best thing that could happen to me is a long and quiet sleep with no waking.
So... what do you believe in?
Glenda Dent used to believe in her husband, Harvey.
The Joker believes in chaos.
Bruce believes in Gotham.
Me?
Well, whatever this story may say or imply...
I believe in Batman.
Pleasant dreams, my friends.