Should Batman villains be redeemable?

[FaxModem1]

The Riddler is one of my favorite Batman villains. He leaves riddles to solve, generally robs bank or jewelry stores, and mostly does it to prove that he is smarter than Batman or anyone else in Gotham. This generally means that most adventures involving him deal with solving puzzles and figuring out clues rather than fighting thugs and rescuing hostages. However such a character might seem a little toothless compared to a monster like the Joker or terrorist leader Ras Al Ghul.

Because it might seem trivial for Batman to deal with an exotic thief as opposed to a dangerous criminal, the writers have two ways they can go with the character.

One, make his riddles deadly, with Innocent lives on the line. Essentially, he's Jigsaw from the Saw series, only testing intelligence rather than one's self worth or willingness to live. Either having his victims needing to solve their riddles to escape, or Batman having to do so.

Two, redeem him. Nygma becomes a Private Investigator, working for an honest buck, and as a foil for Batman in methods, thought process, and results. I honestly prefer the latter approach, as I find him an interesting character who is using his gimmick to get rich, only in a legal, prickish, way, even having his own heroic moments.

But this brings up an interesting situation with a few of Batman's villains: many of them could be good guys, if only given the chance.

Catwoman has danced between both sides of the law many times, which is almost the point of her character.

Mr. Freeze only wishes to save his wife in many interpretations, and seems to have little choice in his methods of doing so.

Harvey Dent/Two Face was a great hope for Gotham, but personal tragedy broke him. There's always the question of if the old Harvey can come back.

Harley Quinn was abused and tortured by the Joker, and seems to be a lot healthier and heroic when outside of his influence.

Poison Ivy cares very much about the environment, and can be talked down if it will help nature. She has also taken to protecting children under her care.

The Ventriloquist just needs proper integration therapy, and to not let Scarface dominate his life.

Aside from the Joker, it seems that for most of the Batman villains, if they were given a softer touch, they would be on the side of the angels. Should this be the case with them storywise, where if Batman actually tried to help them, they could reform? Or is it better that they be psychopaths, unable to become better people, who must be stopped?

Discuss

[Q99]

Some of them definitely can- My favorite era of the Riddler was when he was a private detective. Still trying to prove himself smarter than Batman, but by outdoing him, rather than fighting him.

Thought right now the comics is getting some pretty good mileage of villain-Riddler in 'the war of Jokes and Riddles,' so I can see the argument for villain him.

All in all, I like them redeemable- or at least, a lot of them, and at least mitigatable- because it makes for better storytelling. Especially if Batman doesn't kill. Like, if Poison Ivy is *mostly* a villain but will use her plants for good causes occasionally, Two-Face is *sometimes* Harvey Dent, and Riddler's brains can be redirected, that makes Batman's ongoing battles paint him better.

[The Romulan Republic]

The Riddler is one of my favorite Batman villains. He leaves riddles to solve, generally robs bank or jewelry stores, and mostly does it to prove that he is smarter than Batman or anyone else in Gotham. This generally means that most adventures involving him deal with solving puzzles and figuring out clues rather than fighting thugs and rescuing hostages. However such a character might seem a little toothless compared to a monster like the Joker or terrorist leader Ras Al Ghul.

Yeah, but not every villain needs to be pure evil.

The Joker will, to my mind, always be the definitive Batman villain, but if there were nothing but Joker stories, he'd get tired fast. For that matter, I've argued before that if you're going to be at all realistic (and leaving aside comic book resurrection/revolving door prisons), there are only so many Joker stories you can tell in a given continuity before the character has to either end up permanently incarcerated or die.

Sure, there are other, more obscure possibilities (like the possibility of a Joker-in-prison story, Hannibal Lecter-style), but still... he gets played out fast.

The Riddler you can keep around longer, perhaps, precisely because he's not that dangerous.

Because it might seem trivial for Batman to deal with an exotic thief as opposed to a dangerous criminal, the writers have two ways they can go with the character.

One, make his riddles deadly, with Innocent lives on the line. Essentially, he's Jigsaw from the Saw series, only testing intelligence rather than one's self worth or willingness to live. Either having his victims needing to solve their riddles to escape, or Batman having to do so.

Or that.

Two, redeem him. Nygma becomes a Private Investigator, working for an honest buck, and as a foil for Batman in methods, thought process, and results. I honestly prefer the latter approach, as I find him an interesting character who is using his gimmick to get rich, only in a legal, prickish, way, even having his own heroic moments.

Also, just because he's a "good guy", doesn't mean he's a... good guy. He could be a seedy, amoral private investigator who dances through the grey areas at the edge of the law, who Batman occasionally works with out of necessity only.

But this brings up an interesting situation with a few of Batman's villains: many of them could be good guys, if only given the chance.

Hell, pretty much any character can be redeemed, if you do it right (though not all of them should be in a given continuity, because if you make redemption too easy/common, it starts to seem cheap).

Catwoman has danced between both sides of the law many times, which is almost the point of her character.

Mr. Freeze only wishes to save his wife in many interpretations, and seems to have little choice in his methods of doing so.

Harvey Dent/Two Face was a great hope for Gotham, but personal tragedy broke him. There's always the question of if the old Harvey can come back.

I recall the courtroom scene from the novelization of No Man's Land, where Two Face puts Gordon on trial, and Gordon asks for Harvey Dent to defend him. And Dent wins.

Harley Quinn was abused and tortured by the Joker, and seems to be a lot healthier and heroic when outside of his influence.

Yup.

Harley does some horrible things, but at the start, she was ultimately a brainwashing/domestic abuse victim.

Poison Ivy cares very much about the environment, and can be talked down if it will help nature. She has also taken to protecting children under her care.

This one's a stretch. The environment thing just proves she's a sincere fanatic.

The Ventriloquist just needs proper integration therapy, and to not let Scarface dominate his life.

Aside from the Joker, it seems that for most of the Batman villains, if they were given a softer touch, they would be on the side of the angels. Should this be the case with them storywise, where if Batman actually tried to help them, they could reform? Or is it better that they be psychopaths, unable to become better people, who must be stopped?

Discuss

Depends on the story and character.

[Batman]

I recall the courtroom scene from the novelization of No Man's Land, where Two Face puts Gordon on trial, and Gordon asks for Harvey Dent to defend him. And Dent wins.

Actually that's in the comics too

[Q99]

Poison Ivy is absolutely a fanatic but, say, during No Man's Land, her park was one of the safest places to be and helped keep people from starving. Or in Sensation Comics starring Wonder Woman, there's something up with the Earth so she comes to Themyscira and teams up with Wonder Woman.

She will never not be a fanatic, but she can be redirected.

[Batman]

Like pretty much every Batman villain she has been portrayed inconsistently. She's been everything from a petty criminal that uses her control over plants for personal gain to murderous generic supervillain that kills people by the truckload just because to ecofreak who's pretty benign as long as you leave her plants alone

[The Romulan Republic]

I recall the courtroom scene from the novelization of No Man's Land, where Two Face puts Gordon on trial, and Gordon asks for Harvey Dent to defend him. And Dent wins.

Actually that's in the comics too

Not surprised. I'm just more familiar with the novelization, because I'm not a big comics reader.

[FaxModem1]

Heck, for a while, Dent worked as the vigilante for Gotham during the One Year Later event while the Bat-family traveled the world.

[Simon_Jester]

Hm.

My view is that there should be a continuum. Batman needs a rogue's gallery that contains a few genuine psychos and monsters, a few easily redeemed figures who are more victims of circumstance than anything else, and plenty of figures in between. Exactly which ones should fit into each category... eh, dunno.

[Batman]

Arguably I already have that. Joker and Ra's are in the 'no can do' crowd because the Joker's just stark raving mad and Ra's is a fanatic that won't be swayed from his course. Fries and Harvey are victims of circumstance and Selina, Pamela and much of the rest are somewhere in between. Helena and Jean Paul very nearly ended up villains.

[FaxModem1]

Arguably I already have that. Joker and Ra's are in the 'no can do' crowd because the Joker's just stark raving mad and Ra's is a fanatic that won't be swayed from his course. Fries and Harvey are victims of circumstance and Selina, Pamela and much of the rest are somewhere in between. Helena and Jean Paul very nearly ended up villains.

And Cobblepott and Nygma?

[The Romulan Republic]

Cobblepot just comes off as a corrupt businessman/mobster who happens to look strange, more or less (at least in most of the versions I've seen). Not someone who's necessarily pure evil or incurably mad, but I don't know how sympathetic he is.

[Batman]

Cobblepott is your basic corrupt businessman/mobster except with a really pointy nose and a strange penchant for umbrellas and tuxedos/top hats. He may be irredeemable bu no more so than any real world criminal businessman/mobster.
Nygma as already mentioned HAS been redeemed on occasion because in most incarnations, he's doing it for the intellectual challenge, not material profit or to hurt people.

[Elheru Aran]

The craziest Cobblepot ever got was in the Burton movie. In most incarnations he's pretty reasonable. Corrupt, evil, whatever, sure, but apart from the occasional bird noise and a taste for raw fish, he's pretty much standard human.

The thing with a lot of these guys is that Batman in his Bruce Wayne persona has WAY more than enough money to rehabilitate them in any number of ways...

Freeze is happy enough if you give him a big walk-in cooler and all the science equipment he wants to play around with. I really don't know why Bruce hasn't just gone ahead and done that for him, the "Victor Fries Study Center for Cryogenics and Immortality". Bring your winter jacket to work... every day!

Ditto Ivy. Set up some multinational environmental charitable organization, put her in charge, keep her so busy jet-setting around the world that she can't get up to any naughtiness. Just acknowledge the whole lesbian subtext between her and Harley and have them shack up, that'll keep Harley out of trouble too. Not that she's much of a villain these days anyway.

Dent and a few of the more irredeemably broken heroes on the other hand do need some serious heavily-secure psychiatric therapy. Which again Bruce can pay for. Doesn't he actually financially support Arkham as it is anyway? (pretty sure I've read that he's at least a contributor or something)

[FaxModem1]

Problem is that Bruce and the rest of Gotham likes to treat Arkham more like a cage than a therapy center to make people well.

Which is one of the reasons I made this thread. If all Nygma needs is a healthy outlet like an occasional riddle hunt from the smart people in town, than that could be arranged, could even be made into a social event for the season. Can you beat Edward Nygma's riddles? Make a donation to the Gotham Mental Wellness Center for tickets. And it would create a draw for Gotham as well, with people wanting to come to solve his riddles. Escape rooms are a hit in real life, after all.

As Elheru mentioned, Fries and Isley both just need research and funding, and they would probably be rather happy to just work away. This sounds much preferable to Icebergs or plants tearing Gotham apart, as well as potentially creating new cures and technologies to benefit the public.

But, this is for the more balanced versions of the characters. The ones who are potential good guys. Other interpretations are wild, single-issue fanatics or psychotics who kill with only the trappings of those characteristics.

Should it be that they are beyond redeeming, so that there is an excuse for Batman to hunt them, or could they potentially make stories about Batman redeeming his villains(aside from the Joker, because even I think he's beyond saving), one by one, making them into productive members of society? If so, why haven't they tried to have these types of stories more often?

[Crazedwraith]

They can't make stories about Batman redeeming his foes for the same reason as the Joker will never die. They'd have to stop telling stories about them and stories about them are what sell comic books.

[FaxModem1]

They can't make stories about Batman redeeming his foes for the same reason as the Joker will never die. They'd have to stop telling stories about them and stories about them are what sell comic books.

You could make comics about them, if you wanted. Poison Ivy's adventures in the Amazon stopping unscrupulous loggers, Riddler's adventures as a PI and mysteries, Mister Freeze and his investigations into companies holding back treatments, etc.

Each one of these could be a book by itself, if they wanted to go that direction. And since DC loves to make everything about Batman anyway, why not take this step?

[Crazedwraith]

But then who would Batman punch?

Status Quo is god.

[FaxModem1]

But then who would Batman punch?

Status Quo is god.

Mafiosos? Corrupt officials? Donald Trump?

[Batman]

I'd never get there in time. If Trump lived in the DCU it'd be a toss-up which Speedster Infinite Mass Punches him into oblivion

[The Romulan Republic]

They can't make stories about Batman redeeming his foes for the same reason as the Joker will never die. They'd have to stop telling stories about them and stories about them are what sell comic books.

This is part of why I tend to prefer the films and TV shows to the comics. In them, you can actually have story arcs that lead to lasting changes and resolutions.

For comics... honestly, you might as well reboot every five years or so. Nothing much sticks anyway, and rebooting lets new writers play with the same old toys (and maybe take them in a different direction), while allowing a given continuity to actually have real resolutions and direction.

[Q99]

They can't make stories about Batman redeeming his foes for the same reason as the Joker will never die. They'd have to stop telling stories about them and stories about them are what sell comic books.

You could make comics about them, if you wanted. Poison Ivy's adventures in the Amazon stopping unscrupulous loggers, Riddler's adventures as a PI and mysteries, Mister Freeze and his investigations into companies holding back treatments, etc.

Each one of these could be a book by itself, if they wanted to go that direction. And since DC loves to make everything about Batman anyway, why not take this step?

Ivy does have a comic even.