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Simple question. Or not.

Now, people often joke that Batman's real super power is being rich. But that's not what this is about. Its also true that he (in typical action hero style) pulls off physical feats and takes physical beatings that ought to be impossible, or cripple or kill a real person. That is also not what this is about.

My idea is that Batman does have a super power, but its a subtle one, and not usually thought of as one. Namely, super human strength of will. After all, extraordinary will power is a mental trait, and mental powers are nothing new. And Batman has a ridiculous level of dedication to his cause. Its that will that has driven him to become a super hero, to train himself and dedicate his resources, indeed his entire life, to the cause.

Is it beyond what any real human could posses? Maybe, maybe not. Probably depends on the version. But its an interesting thought.

Its also basically spelled out in both the Justice League cartoon and Batman Begins, I believe. In one episode of the former, IIRC, a villain comments on Batman's lack of powers and he replies that his power is that he never gives up. And in Batman Begins, when Ras is training Bruce, they have an exchange which goes something like this:

Ras: "Your parents' death was not your fault. It was your father's."

(Bruce attacks Ras).

Ras: "Anger does not change the fact that your father failed to act."

Bruce: "The man had a gun!"

Ras: "Would that have stopped you?"

Bruce: "I've had training."

Ras: "But training is nothing! Will is everything. The will to act."

(Emphasis mine).

Thoughts?

I don't think so, for a simple reason. Superpowers are, by definition, something that a normal human being does not and can not possess. Superpowers, superhuman, literally "above human". Now, if you have a look around you or look back into history, you'll find a lot of people who pulled through the worst things humans can face and still somehow made it out alive. And you will find people who, despipte all odds, knowlingly went forward regardless in full knowledge, that they can not survive, will not survive. War is possibly one of the most prevalent catalysators for such feats. Entire armies of men fighting a fight they know they can not win or survive. People powering through starvation, desperation and coming out the other end of a years-long siege or a decade of forced labour in the most impossible conditions and still somehow leading a normal live afterwards. The examples are plenty.

Yes, I suppose its not technically a "super power" in the sense of being something beyond what humans are theoretically capable of (though its probably hard to find a lot of examples of a real life human who sustained that level of commitment to a hopeless cause for that many years).

But I would say that at any rate, his will power arguably fills the same role for Batman that super powers do for other super heroes.

The Romulan Republic wrote:But I would say that at any rate, his will power arguably fills the same role for Batman that super powers do for other super heroes.

Willpower is generally a question of sufficient motivation. I'd argue, that his actual superpower is his intellect. He repeatedly shows feats of "superknowledge" that noone with a normal life could aquire in the given time. He just knows too much, understands too many, expects and anticipates each and everything. He's almost a Mentat, if not an outright Kwisatz Haderach.

That's more true of some versions than others. Nolan Batman (or even Affleck Batman), for example, while not stupid, don't show any particular brilliance as scientists or detectives.

But the unflinching devotion to his crusade, to the point that he dedicates his entire life to a basically hopeless and arguably insane cause, is pretty much common across various versions of the character. Arguably its Batman's primary defining characteristic, besides his motivation being the murder of his parents and wearing a batsuit, anyway.

One could argue, that this is simply a type of obsessive compulsive disorder caused by a traumatic experience. In essence, his superpower would be being insane. Puts the Joker-Batman-Duality into a whole new light, doesn't it?

Surely Batman's superpower is teleportation? That's how he's so good at the Stealth Hi/Bye.


Being serious though, there is support of him having superhuman willpower; in Final Crisis Darkseid's henchmen try to create a clone army out from Batman and as part of that they try copying his memories into them, so Bats pours every traumatic memory he has into the clones and the memories are so traumatic the entire army is driven insane and starts to claw their own eyes out, and the two scientists (who are both sadists and pure evil) are so horrified by what he's done that they euthanise the entire army (one of them says something like "What sort of man can weaponise his own memories?).

Another piece of evidence is Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader. The premise of that story is that Batman's ghost is watching his own funeral/wake and the various guests (including members of his rogue's gallery) are taking turns to tell how he died, but each tells a story that's incompatible with the others and it soon becomes clear each is from a different parallel universe and is telling about how their universe's Batman died. Although they're incompatible, they all share a common thread, namely that Batman never gives up. No matter the odds, no matter what needs to be done. He keeps on going, never giving up, never surrendering, and in many of them he still wins even though it costs him his life.


WHttCC also could give argument that his superpower is reincarnation. Over the course of the story it's revealed that every version of Batman is the same person. I don't mean in the parallel reality version sense, I mean literally the same person. Every single time Batman dies he reincarnates as a new Bruce Wayne in one of those parallel realities, and as reward for being Batman he gets about eight years being Bruce Wayne with his parents before having to watch them getting murdered and then having to become Batman all over again.

Madner Kami wrote:One could argue, that this is simply a type of obsessive compulsive disorder caused by a traumatic experience. In essence, his superpower would be being insane. Puts the Joker-Batman-Duality into a whole new light, doesn't it?

Yes, I've heard the "Batman is insane" theories. I don't really like it, even if it could fit. I feel that it diminishes the character to say that he's just another lunatic, and it smacks of gratuitous grimdark for the sake of grimdark cynicism.

I would say that Batman is entirely defined (in a lot of versions, anyway), by the deaths of his parents. But what separates him from his villains is that he is able to channel that horror into something productive, rather than simply vengeance, cruelty, or destruction.

Dînadan wrote:Surely Batman's superpower is teleportation? That's how he's so good at the Stealth Hi/Bye.


Being serious though, there is support of him having superhuman willpower; in Final Crisis Darkseid's henchmen try to create a clone army out from Batman and as part of that they try copying his memories into them, so Bats pours every traumatic memory he has into the clones and the memories are so traumatic the entire army is driven insane and starts to claw their own eyes out, and the two scientists (who are both sadists and pure evil) are so horrified by what he's done that they euthanise the entire army (one of them says something like "What sort of man can weaponise his own memories?).

Yeah, I don't think "Batman is too ruthless even for Darkseid's goons" is going to help my "Batman is not insane" argument.

Another piece of evidence is Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader. The premise of that story is that Batman's ghost is watching his own funeral/wake and the various guests (including members of his rogue's gallery) are taking turns to tell how he died, but each tells a story that's incompatible with the others and it soon becomes clear each is from a different parallel universe and is telling about how their universe's Batman died. Although they're incompatible, they all share a common thread, namely that Batman never gives up. No matter the odds, no matter what needs to be done. He keeps on going, never giving up, never surrendering, and in many of them he still wins even though it costs him his life.


WHttCC also could give argument that his superpower is reincarnation. Over the course of the story it's revealed that every version of Batman is the same person. I don't mean in the parallel reality version sense, I mean literally the same person. Every single time Batman dies he reincarnates as a new Bruce Wayne in one of those parallel realities, and as reward for being Batman he gets about eight years being Bruce Wayne with his parents before having to watch them getting murdered and then having to become Batman all over again.

That's just... horribly depressing.

I also feel that its somewhat thematically counterproductive. To me, it works better if Batman is Batman because he chooses to be Batman, rather than because he's just crazy or fated to be Batman.

Honestly, sometimes superpowers is more a function of the justification more than what happens on screen. Consider Stan Lee's Lucky Man compared with an action movie. Take out the bracelet and deliberately showing off the main character's luck, and you get something that could work as a relatively standard action movie. The justification shifts from magic to "They're just that good". Or in a slasher movie, when the villain moves ridiculously fast with ridiculous quietness (i.e. from one side of a room into a duct on the other). This is considered believable, even though its de facto teleportation.

As Batman is considered a super-normal, all of his powers are thus considered normal, even if they could be reasonably justified as superpowers.

I mean, the super-cynical side of me classifies Batman as a mental illness Bruce has (the paranoid obsession of it all), but because of his economic resources, he's allowed to be humored instead of put away in Arkham.

But I don't think there's anything inherently bad as seeing Batman as a comic'd up, proto-Dexter. Lots of villains have good reasons for what they do, understandable, even justified at times. I don't think it's a big stretch or ruining anything to say that one of ours is the reverse of that, doing good deeds because of his diseased personality.

Whether or not it's a truth played out is open to interpretation, but as a concept I can't see anything wrong with it.