Years will pass, but we will always enjoy new Batman stories capable of squeezing the imagination of their creative minds, both in film and in their original format, comics. This is what has happened this week in the US with the publication of the first issue of Absolute Batman by Scott Snyder and Nick Dragotta for DC Comics, an alternative story to the company’s official canon with very, very important changes. Let me tell you about it.
Spoiler alert. This topic is intended for the curious, so if you plan to read the comic, it’s better to stay away from here to avoid spoiling the experience.
Throughout the character’s over 80-year history, we have seen Batman go through different stages that have made him more sociable, more distrustful, more of a planner, more violent, more “superhero,” etc., but something that has always remained intact is his origin story. As you all know, this story is summarized in how one night, young Bruce witnesses the murder of his parents in a dark alley after they had enjoyed a movie together.
From a legendary Batman writer
With small alterations here and there, this has been respected in the canon and in its adaptations to film and TV, but writer Scott Snyder (Court of Owls), taking advantage of the alternative nature of Absolute Batman, has taken several liberties that, personally, are quite respectful but at the same time allow us to imagine a curious What If…? with the Dark Knight.
In Absolute Batman, we don’t have a crime alley, but a shootout in broad daylight at a zoo where Bruce was with his schoolmates and his father, who here doesn’t seem to be a millionaire businessman, nor a surgeon, but a school teacher willing to give his life for his students. So much so that at one point in the comic, we see him leading them to a safe place, a kind of bat exhibit, and closing the door behind him. The next thing we see is a gunshot, we don’t need more.
Batman keeps his mother in this iteration
That’s when he loses his father. But, what about his mother? Here comes the most important change, she’s still alive! Bruce didn’t become entirely orphaned and was taken care of by his mother. Although that didn’t prevent his childhood from being disrupted forever and as he grew older, he felt the need to change things in Gotham.
He will do it, but in a somewhat more chaotic way than we remember. “Bruce is someone who is trying to change systemic things and show people that even if you have to burn some things along the way, you can build something even better and more inspiring,” Snyder explains in an interview with Polygon.
We don’t want to discuss all the differences that this first issue presents to avoid spoiling more than strictly necessary, but we can leave you with the synopsis of Absolute Batman which reads: “In this version, fans will meet a version of the Dark Knight who doesn’t have the money, the mansion, or the butler of his mainstream counterpart in DC.” And if you’re wondering, both Superman and Wonder Woman see their origins altered, and their way of acting, in this new universe of the American publisher.
Flashpoint (Edición cartoné) (Cuarta edición)
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Of course, in alternative stories, or Elseworlds, we have seen changes in Batman’s origin. There is Flashpoint where Batman was actually Thomas Wayne, trying to cope with the death of his son Bruce.
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