Page - 80 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 03/01

80 | Simon Philipp Born www.jrfm.eu 2017, 3/1, 75–104 angel and demon in one person. In terms of mythology, he combines two major mythical archetypes, namely the hero and the shadow.13 Batman is a superhero, but a very human one. He has no special powers; he was not born on an alien planet and bitten by a radioactive insect. he relies pure- ly on his limitless resources: a multi-billion dollar heritage, outstanding combat skills, an inventive mind and, of course, his qualities as “world’s greatest detec- tive”, which relate him to other famous crime-solving characters from literature like sherlock holmes or pulp hero Doc savage. Batman accords perfectly with Joseph Campbell’s famous definition of the hero as “someone who has given his or her life to something bigger than oneself”.14 Batman is not driven, how- ever, by a noble impulse to altruism like superman, but rather by the experience of loss and a need for vengeance.15 having been unable to prevent the murder of his parents, he finds the only way to halt injustice is through his second life, as masked vigilante. But even when as new and empowered Caped Crusader he becomes painfully aware of the limits of his might, he cannot prevent either himself or those entrusted to him from getting hurt. in his masquerade, Batman does not overcome his trauma, but instead relives it anew night by night. there is an inherent darkness to the character and his setting. Newer comic books like frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns (1986) psychologize Batman as broken justice fanatic, a dark reflection of the bright Superman, the American Dream degenerated into a nightmare. he shares similarities with the Jungian arche- type of the shadow, the presentation of the psyche’s dark, hidden side, which is not necessarily evil, but rather everything the self wants to conceal and keep out of the light.16 Batman is not a savior, but an avenger. A creature of the night, a mystery figure dressed in black who employs his darkness to mercilessly fight crime like his pulp predecessor the shadow. his blackness condenses in the im- age of a bat, a central symbol in the American Gothic tradition of the late 19th and early 20th centuries that conjured up “images of darkness, terror, animal savagery, and soul-sapping vampirism, all of which were often linked to notions of ethnic infiltration”.17 Like the infamous title character of Bram stoker’s Dracu- la (1897), Batman operates in the shadows, flies through the night and radiates an intriguing aura of awe and terror. Bela Lugosi’s iconic portrayal of the prince of darkness in tod Browning’s Dracula (Us 1931) may even have inspired Bat- man’s cape – just as the mystery film The Bat Whispers (roland West, Us 1930), where a masked murderer named “the Bat” terrorizes America’s upper class, features a prototype of the Bat logo. 13 see Vogler 2007, 23–80. 14 Campbell/Moyers 1988, 151. 15 regalado 2015, 120. 16 Langley 2012, 170–171. 17 regalado 2015, 122.