Comments | mithen: 1985-1990 Summary: "Not Exactly Friends"

mithen

1985-1990 Summary: "Not Exactly Friends"

Jan 02, 2009 21:46

Crisis on Infinite Earths ran from 1985-1986, a massive universe(s)-wide crossover that rebooted the entire universe, radically rewriting some aspects of DC history. One of the major changes was to the history of Superman and Batman's relationship, which was shifted from chummy to antagonistic from the very beginning.

World's Finest was canceled in ( Read more... )

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mithen May 6 2010, 04:55:39 UTC

I've always found it so interesting that Bruce was such a team player here, and it was Clark that actually had to be asked to join them. And considering JLI is such wacky bunch (well, before they turned them all grimdarrrkk again) in the first place, it makes Bruce's involvement with them even more fascinating.

I read Giffen wasn't given any choice on the tea--the editors just grabbed a bunch of characters and said, "Okay, use these guys. Oh, and I guess we can spare Batman to give the team some heft." I would think making Batman work with that bunch would have given anyone nightmares, but he pulls it off pretty well in the long run, lol.

I agree about that ending! It's clear both of them have a bedrock respect for each other even when they're not friends (the thing that kills me about Miller isn't that they don't like each other when he writes them, it's that they don't respect each other!)...in some ways that's a lot more importat.

Something's missing here...? kawahori June 27 2010, 14:10:57 UTC

I re-read some of the posts today, and "Casel never shows us exactly when they meet up as Clark and Bruce for the first time (semi-canonically, that's the infamous cruise ship adventure that's shown in the first Superman/Batman annual). At some point, however, they do become aware of their alter egos, and start having some more heartfelt conversations." this paragraph caught my attention. Have you mentioned HOW the boys knew each others' secret ID yet? If not, it happened in 1988--during what I called "The Scrapbook" arc, LOL. Here is the list:

1987.11: Action Comics #594(with 3 pages)--Superman asked Batman to investigate a certain scrapbook for him; Robin's fanboying Superman. *cute*
1988.05: Adventures of Superman #440(with 5 pages)--Batman finished the examination and realized who Superman is, and Superman must did something other than just peeked.
1998.01: Superman Secret Files and Origins #1--Ten years later, someone paid the Kents a visit. Superman Blue is not amused. (This one's good, :P ( ... )

Re: Something's missing here...? mithen June 29 2010, 02:23:44 UTC

Oh yeah, the scrapbook! Darn! I shall have to go back and add that, lol. And I'll have to look up the rest of these--maybe I've seen some, but I'm not sure, hm. I'd like these scans to be pretty complete, so you've given me some great leads! I owe you so much for all this! Thanks!

Aw...they broke up... dr_feel_good_md August 2 2011, 14:04:24 UTC

~ I really liked the Golden Age when Batman and Superman were just ridiculously gay together and best friends that had cocoa and long meaningful conversations into the night...the comics weren't allowed to show the hot steamy mansex that was going on but I picked it up anyway...

~ So, the later Batman, Mr. Lone Wolf Dark Knight, 'I don't need any help from anyone and everyone else stay out of Gotham cuz it's MINE'...working on a team...with people...social-ness in the JLI. Yeah. Have you watched the Justice League cartoons? There, they reconcile Batman's involvement (actually, creation and funding) with the Justice League as something he saw as a necessary move to more effectively defend Earth from outside problems and keep order. It also helped that he's such a control freak so this let him monitor the activities of the metas. Paranoid much? He wouldn't be Batman if he wasn't.

Re: Aw...they broke up... mithen August 3 2011, 07:21:16 UTC

~ So, the later Batman, Mr. Lone Wolf Dark Knight, 'I don't need any help from anyone and everyone else stay out of Gotham cuz it's MINE'...working on a team...with people...social-ness in the JLI.

Isn't that always the most ironic thing? Batman's the "loner" who's constantly surrounded with friends and family and works great on teams and everything. So funny. And it looks like in the reboot they're going to use some of the same motivation as in the animated series, having Batman basically create the League in order to help defend Earth better. I'll be really curious to see if they can make that work!