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Soltysik Monnet, Agnieszka. "“I’ll Be Whatever Gotham Needs Me to Be” Batman, the Gothic and Popular Culture." The Gothic in Contemporary Literature and Popular Culture. Pop Goth. Eds. Justin D. Edwards and Agnieszka Soltysik Monnet. Routledge Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Literature. London, New York: Routledge, 2012. 96–113. Added by: joachim (12/28/21, 5:01 PM) |
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| Resource type: Book Chapter Language: en: English BibTeX citation key: SoltysikMonnet2012 Email resource to friend View all bibliographic details  |
Categories: General Keywords: "Batman", Adaptation, Film adaptation, Horror, Superhero, USA Creators: Edwards, Soltysik Monnet Publisher: Routledge (London, New York) Collection: The Gothic in Contemporary Literature and Popular Culture. Pop Goth |
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| Abstract |
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“Although many superheroes were created in the 1940s and since then, Batman has remained the darkest and most problematic, not least because his powers come not from a magical source but from the brooding intensity of a childhood trauma. Over seventy years later, Batman has grown to become bigger than ever, eclipsing even Superman in recent decades. Why has this been the case? And how did this happen? In addressing these questions, I want to suggest that the main reason for the success of Batman in the twenty-first century—a multi-billion dollar Batman industry—has been Christopher Nolan’s return to the darker roots of the Batman story. Like any enduring Gothic figure, Batman’s regenerative cultural power depends on his ambivalence, his ethical complexity and moral ambiguity. On a formal level, this ambivalence plays itself out in the tension between Batman’s camp aesthetics and the Gothic characteristics of the figure; that is, between the campy smirk of the “Caped Crusader” and the furrowed brow of the brooding “Dark Knight.” Historically, whenever Batman is camped to its limit, the Gothic is used to return the character to a darker and more complicated figure within the narrative.”
Added by: joachim |