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Josh Goldberg
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 25 October 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 2065
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 3:36pm | IP Logged | 1
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The Batman I first read as a kid in the 1970s was a contemporary of the 29 year-old Superman and very-much at the top of his game. Unquestionably so.
As a fictional/fantasy character, his physical strength, stamina and agility are far beyond what any real-world athlete could accomplish. No football player or boxer could reproduce the physical feats of Batman, nor take the physical stress that the attempt alone would produce. Yet on a normal night, Batman does just that and is none the worse for wear.
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Brian O'Neill
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 13 November 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 1964
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 4:44pm | IP Logged | 2
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And '70s Batman' didn't need all that 'body armor'!
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Michael Casselman
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 14 January 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 1225
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 4:50pm | IP Logged | 3
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When I was a kid in the 70s/80s, I read the "Superman/Batman are 29" proclamation as a glib extension of the then-recent Relevance Era "Don't trust anyone over 30" mantra, so that the hip kids would still want to read about them... but even so, if someone like Batman is going to have a ward, I still essentially saw him as a contemporary of my parents whether they were in their late twenties or older... which I didn't (and still don't) see as a bad thing. There's nothing wrong with having a role model being around mom and dad's age... unless you're trying to peg Superman or Batman as some 'cool younger uncle' type.
I never questioned the potential wear-and-tear on their bodies or considered it as relevant simply based on the flighty nature of 'super-hero science'. If you attempt to consider how many fights, concussions, gunshot wounds, stabbings, etc. that Batman had had even by 1980, to equivocate that to a real world person would be a fool's errand. I compartmentalized those cumulative injuries under the same category as I did stories that simply aren't referred to or brought up, like Superboy finding his cryo-frozen parents
Back when Batman was created, 40 was old, yet in the last 70+ years, between advances in science and medicine as well as shifting perceptions, there are folks in their late 30s, 40's and beyond that defy the old standards. Kind of like the 'Hollywood 30/40' alluded to above (this of course was before HD screenings could really give away age lines around the eyes and mouth, which even today are botoxed/make-up application fixes). Hell, I've met, lived around and worked around people who look absolutely fantastic at advanced ages, and I've also encountered 20-somethings who look like they've already lived a very hard life... and teenagers with full-grown beards, grey hairs and/or male-pattern baldness! This is why I usually cringe when casting for movies is debated and someone chimes in that Captain Fonebone is no older than 35 and how dare they cast a 41 year old and, if, by the time they do 2 sequels.... it's tiring at times to slavishly look into the future and find reasons to hate something they haven't even seen yet...
I guess this is why I liked books like Legends of the Dark Knight, which could feature stories from the early, early-middle, middle, late-middle, etc. adventures of Batman without having to tie-in directly with the middle shown in other contemporary series. Nothing says that Batman couldn't have started around college-age, sure... and so long as you aren't trying to show a character's final adventure, that middle can be a very long time-period to play with.
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 5:35pm | IP Logged | 4
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As a kid I saw Batman as older than Superman, but not by much. I suppose it was the fact tha Batman "had a kid." I figured he was around 8 when Kal-El's rocket landed. Of course, in GENERATIONS I made them contemporaries. Just made it easier to tell my stories!
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Brian O'Neill
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 13 November 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 1964
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 5:42pm | IP Logged | 5
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There were Lord-knows-how-many Superboy stories in the '50s..some 'imaginary', some not...that established a friendship between teenage Clark and Bruce, who either visited or temporarily moved to Smallville.
The 'Earth-2' continuity, at one point, had Kal-L's rocket landing in 1914, and Bruce Wayne's parents being shot in 1924(based on the fact that the movie they saw that night was that year's 'Zorro' picture, with Douglas Fairbanks.) Flashabcks, both in Golden and Silver Age continuity, had Bruce's age at the time of the shooting vary from about 7 to 10, depending on the story.
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Josh Goldberg
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 25 October 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 2065
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 5:50pm | IP Logged | 6
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"When I was a kid in the 70s/80s, I read the 'Superman/Batman are 29'proclamation as a glib extension of the then-recent Relevance Era 'Don't trust anyone over 30' mantra, so that the hip kids would still want to read about them."****
Remember when that magic hippie put his whammy-jammy on the city, and everyone over the age of 30 had to get out of Metropolis? And Superman barely made the cut off because he was 29.
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Kip Lewis
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 01 March 2011
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 6:04pm | IP Logged | 7
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As a kid, it probably depended on what
your definition of an adult was. To me
it was the mid-thirties. That was how old
Han Solo, Steve Austin, David Banner were
to me.
But on to the question at hand. I say
Batman too but for another reason. Even
young, Peter had all the tools to beat
Batman. Add a few years experience and
growth, and it would be that much easier.
He is fast enough to dodge machine guns
bullets and strong enough to knock out any
normal human with one punch. All the skill
in the world is negated by Peter's speed
and spider sense. But Peter cares too
much; he isn't the aggressor kind of hero.
Especially if he knows Batman is a good
guy, he would never hit Batman with all
his strength because he wouldn't want to
hurt him. And that is why he would lose.
Edited by Kip Lewis on 13 January 2015 at 6:06pm
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Bill Guerra
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 29 March 2012
Location: United States
Posts: 1069
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 6:24pm | IP Logged | 8
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When I was a kid (heck, even as an adult), I never worried about characters ages. I didn't realize so many people thought a lot about it.
I was always happy with knowing that Spider-Man, the Human Torch, the original X-Men, Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch were all younger than characters like the Invisible Woman, the Wasp and Hawkeye. It was obvious that characters like Mr. Fantastic, the Thing, Dr. Doom and Ant-Man were the older ones. That was good enough for me. It keeps everything timeless.
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Aaron Smith
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 06 September 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 10461
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 6:50pm | IP Logged | 9
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As a kid I saw Batman as older than Superman, but not by much.
***
You showed that very well in MAN OF STEEL #3. It was very clear that Batman was a few years older and more experienced than Superman, as well as being very intense (but without being the psycho he was so often portrayed as later by other writers).
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Jason Czeskleba
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4565
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| Posted: 13 January 2015 at 10:57pm | IP Logged | 10
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Stephen Robinson wrote:
| And if you wish to overrule the comics themselves with logic, that's fine, but it disputes the larger logic that in reality, it's IMPOSSIBLE to ever train to become Batman. |
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Excellent point. The notion that Batman travelled the world on a "global journey of learning and discovery" as part of his self-training is a relatively new one. I never saw such a thing mentioned in any pre-Crisis comic that I can recall. Prior to that, Batman's training was depicted as him working out in a gym and studying in a lab, period. The idea that he would need to travel the world and take over a decade to master everything is indeed an unnecessary attempt to make a fantasy concept more "realistic." As is the notion that he would make a lot of mistakes initially and take years to master his skills. The Batman I grew up reading trained throughout his teen years. When he became Batman he was good at it right away. And he was an adult who seemed to be between 25 and 35. It wasn't important to me his exact age.
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Michael Penn
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 12 April 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 12548
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| Posted: 14 January 2015 at 3:20am | IP Logged | 11
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I hate "Ninja" Batman.
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Paul Kimball
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 21 September 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 2181
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| Posted: 14 January 2015 at 3:44pm | IP Logged | 12
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I always assumed Batman and Superman were in their early 30's
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