Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Batman, Comics, dc, dc comics, entertainment, philosophy, scott snyder

Bruce Wayne, The True Mad Scientist Of The DC Universe (Batman #49 SPOILERS)

We have seen the future. Scott Snyder has already shown us a number of Batman futures, in which an aging Batman uses Lex Luthor's technology to clone himself, each clone having a lifespan of twenty-seven years, to fight in his place as the Batman that Gotham needs.

Some speculated that the Bruce Wayne with no memory of being Batman, is one of those clones, escaped.

Today's Batman #49 puts pay to that theory. But it wasn't far off the solution. And it paints Bruce Wayne as the true mad scientist of the DC universe, with many horrific consequences.

The comic focuses on the consequences for a very few. Alfred, Bruce and Madison. After a Batmanless-Bruce Wayne has discovered the truth about who he was and who he needs to be.

So in Batman #27, we saw the machine at work.

And in Batman: Future's End, set five years hence, we saw the development of what would lead to that future.

And today it all plays out. And in Batman #49, this Bruce Wayne has the jump start on this cloning procedure now, not with the body aspect – but with the mind, using what the old Bruce Wayne left behind. Physically if not mentally. Irony, there.

See, the cave knows. The hubris, the drive, the disregard for personal safety… it's scientist Bruce Wayne.
 A hug goodbye – for that is what it is. A lever is pulled. Mwahahahahahahah! But there's a snag, and only one way to get round it.

Yup, just like he did in that alleyway all those years ago. And yes we are seeing other worldly fantasies of other Batmen, other Bruce Wayne lives, each of which are as fantastic as, well, the one on the Batman comic book. All Bruce Wayne is doing here is choosing which one.

It's what we do every day. We choose the person we want to be, every day we wake up. Circumstances shape up, sure, but the biggest drive is always ourselves. Every night we go to sleep, the person we were dies, and we get to make ourselves all over again every day. That's not an uncommon philosophical observation, there's plenty of good reading on this may I recommend Altruism and Reality: Studies in the Philosophy of the Bodhicaryavatara by Paul Williams? Or, you know, Batman #49 by Scott Snyder and Yanick Paquette?

Think about that, when you are going to sleep. If all we are is our conscious thoughts, our sentient mind, then every night, that person dies. Is this live, or is it Memorex, as Brundel asked after his first teleportation in The Fly. And our dreams are all the other lives we could, or couldn't have lived…

Which is all well and good for Batman #49. But now that this technology exists and has been used in this way – well, we're into Dollhouse technology. Transmit it across hospital wi-fi into brain dead patients and you have a ward full of Batmen. Or whoever else's mind you have implanted into the tech. Use it to kill a nation, and then revive them all as proud, loyal, same-thinking citizens of your own nation.

All it took was for someone evil like Lex Luthor to invent it. And then someone good like Batman to steal it.

You know what the road to hell is paved with…

Of course, it could also go wrong in new and even more interesting ways…. Grant?

Comics courtesy of Orbital Comics, London. Who have a couple of signings today and on Friday… 

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