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• 1 Batman (Bruce Wayne)
• 2 Lantern Corps
• 3 Flash (Wally West)

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The dark knight trilogy: alfred's 10 best quotes.

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Among the many outstanding characters in Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight  trilogy is Bruce Wayne's butler Alfred Pennyworth (Michael Caine). This particular version of Alfred is considered the best version to appear on-screen. A huge reason for that is because he's portrayed by one of the best actors of all time.

RELATED:  10 Best Michael Caine Movies, According To IMDb

However, Alfred doesn't just shine because of Caine's resume. He is funny, he is philosophical and he can knock baddies unconscious too. Above all, Alfred makes some really interesting pronouncements throughout the 3 movies. Whether he is arguing with Bruce or making fun of him, Alfred can b counted on to drop a magnificent remark.

When He And Bruce Discuss The Joker's Rationale

"some men just want to watch the world burn.".

Alfred and Bruce have a discussion where they try to figure out what the Joker's motivations really are. According to Alfred, the Clown Prince of Crime isn't really after anything. He just wants to witness the destruction of the world.

Alfred's words are entirely accurate because the Joker has never pursued any position of power. Neither has he sought profits. He even burns millions of dollars belonging to the mob when he has the option of keeping the mountain of cash for himself. His goal is therefore simple: to make the world as chaotic as possible.

When He Consoles Bruce After The Burning Of The Wayne Manor

"the wayne legacy is more than bricks and mortar, sir.".

Bruce gets devasted when one of the best Dark Knight trilogy villains , Ra's al Ghul, sets the Wayne Manor on fire. He blames himself, claiming he has destroyed the Wayne family legacy but Alfred reassures him that there is more to the Wayne family than a house.

Like Alfred, it's hard for audiences to sympathize with Bruce. He has enough money to either rebuild the manor or buy another one. Alfred makes sense too by insisting that the Waynes have done way much more for Gotham. Their legacy cannot just be tied to a house alone. It's such comments that inspire Bruce to pick up the pieces and keep moving.

When He Learns That There Are Batman Copycats.

"why don't you hire them and take the weekend off".

Bruce keeps complaining that there are vigilantes out there that are copying his style. Well, Alfred doesn't see it as a big deal suggesting that maybe Bruce should hire them so he can rest.

RELATED:  10 Ways Alfred Pennyworth Is The Most Important Member Of The Bat Family

One thing Batman clearly lacks in the Dark Knight trilogy is a sidekick. Even though Alfred is being sarcastic, he isn't wrong in suggesting that this might be the perfect opportunity for Batman to take off days. Bruce, on the other hand, is right to be concerned too because he'll get all the blame if the copycats mess up.

When He Tries To Get Bruce To Go On A Date

"at this point, i'd set you up with a chimpanzee, if it'd brought you back to the world".

In order to help Bruce get over Rachel, Alfred tries to set him up with Selina Kyle. Bruce rejects the idea because Selina is a thief but Alred insists it doesn't matter.

Among the things Alfred does so well is getting Bruce to do things he doesn't want to do. To him, Batman needs to have a life. Moreover, Bruce doesn't appear to have many other dating options at the moment. And it isn't such a weird suggestion because, in the comics, there are plenty of Batman and Catwoman romance stories .

When He Advises Bruce To Not Reveal His Identity

"they'll hate you for it, but that's the point of batman.".

Bruce finds himself in a dilemma once again when the Joker dares him to reveal his identity or else he'll kill thousands of people. However, Alfred advises him not to do bow down to pressure because Batman is supposed to hold his ground and not let people know who he is.

There have been many "Bruce Wayne is Batman" movie reveals over the years but Alfred doesn't think of this as the appropriate time for that to happen. Even though lives are at stake, he believes protecting Batman's identity is the first priority. With his stand, it becomes clear that his loyalty isn't to Gotham but to the person he has known for most of his adult life.

When He Approves Of Bruce's Newfound Extroversion

"you start pretending to have fun, you might even have a little by accident.".

After cutting ties with the League Of Shadows, Bruce decides to return to Gotham. After a few weeks of staying indoors, he starts to go out, something that makes Alfred happy.

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Alfred understands that Bruce is still not feeling ready to step out after watching his mentor Ra's al Ghul die. However, he also feels that people might forget all about Bruce Wayne if he doesn't make himself more visible. For that reason, it's important for him to keep stepping out even when he doesn't feel like it. The advice works because Bruce not only goes out more but also gets the motivation to become Batman.

When He Tells Bruce How He Once Dealt With A Criminal Hiding In A Forest

"we burned the forest down.".

During one of his conversations with Bruce, Alfred remembers how he was once tasked with catching a jewel thief during his spy days in Burma. He tells Bruce that the thief was hiding in a forest and when Bruce asks how he caught him, Alfred gives a shocking answer.

A difference in ideologies is highlighted in the conversation because Alfred makes it obvious that he has no problem killing, whereas Batman has a "No Kill" rule. That he burned a whole forest just to eliminate one man is a bit extreme and the confession paints him as somewhat sadistic compared to the humble buttle fans are used to seeing.

When He Responds To Bruce's Refusal To Drive The Batmobile During The Day."

"the lamborghini, then... much more subtle.".

Bruce finds himself needing to drive out during the day when the Joker threatens to assassinate Wayne Enterprises employee, Coleman Reese. Alfred asks him whether he'll be needing the Batmobile but he says it attracts too much attention. Alfred then sarcastically suggests giving him the Lamborginhi.

Alfred feels it's ironic for Bruce to not want to use the Batmobile yet he doesn't have any other car that won't draw eyeballs. Audiences are tempted to join him in breaking into laughter when he suggests the Lamorginhi because it's just as shiny. Nonetheless, the Batmobile thrives best during the night so Bruce somehow makes sense.

When He Gets Fed Up With The Ballet Dancers Asking For Help

"if you can tell me the russian for, "apply your own bloody suntan lotion.".

As Bruce and Alfred are vacationing on a boat full of Russian ballet dancers, the latter grows tired of helping the women apply their lotion. He thus asks Bruce how he can reject their requests in Russian since they don't speak English.

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Alfred's golden comical form surfaces once again in the scene. The butler doesn't consider applying body lotion to random women as part of his job description so gets irked. Through the boat scene, Bruce Wayne's playboy side is also highlighted, so much that it makes headlines on the news.

When He Quits Working For Bruce

"i won't bury you. i've buried enough members of the wayne family.".

Though he has always wanted Bruce to save Gotham, Alfred, surprisingly refuses to agree with his decision to try and stop Bane. In an emotional scene, he declares that he won't watch Bruce die, then he leaves.

Alfred isn't just against the idea of Bruce becoming Batman once again. He is afraid he will fail because he has just learned how formidable Bane is. He figures the best thing for Bruce to do is simply retire and give his technology to the GCPD so that they can continue fighting crime. His concerns are inspired by genuine love but Bruce doesn't believe in failure.

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• Alfred Pennyworth

• Cast & crew
• User reviews

The Dark Knight

• The Chechen : [ During a private sit down meeting with the gangsters ] What do you propose?
• The Joker : It's simple. We, uh, kill the Batman.
• [ mobsters laugh ]
• Salvatore Maroni : If it's so simple, why haven't you done it already?
• The Joker : If you're good at something, never do it for free.
• [ Batman slams The Joker's head on the table ]
• The Joker : Never start with the head. The victim gets all fuzzy. He can't feel the next...
• [ Batman punches the Joker's hand. The Joker pauses for a moment waiting for it to hurt ]
• The Joker : See?
• The Joker : You know. I don't want there to be any hard feelings between us, Harvey. When you and, uh...
• Harvey Dent : Rachel!
• The Joker : Rachel were being abducted. I was sitting in Gordon's cage. Now, *I* didn't rig those charges.
• Harvey Dent : Your men. Your plan.
• The Joker : Do I really look like a guy with a plan? You know what I am? I'm a dog chasing cars. I wouldn't know what to do with one if I caught it! You know, I just... *do* things.
• Harvey Dent : [ while having a fancy dinner with Bruce, Rachel and Natascha ] You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.
• Batman : [ in the interrogation room ] Then why do you want to kill me?
• The Joker : [ giggling ] I don't, I don't want to kill you! What would I do without you? Go back to ripping off mob dealers? No, no, NO! No. You... you... complete me.
• Batman : You're garbage who kills for money.
• The Joker : Don't talk like one of them. You're not! Even if you'd like to be. To them, you're just a freak, like me! They need you right now, but when they don't, they'll cast you out, like a leper! You see, their morals, their code, it's a bad joke. Dropped at the first sign of trouble. They're only as good as the world allows them to be. I'll show you. When the chips are down, these... these civilized people, they'll eat each other. See, I'm not a monster. I'm just ahead of the curve.
• Gambol : [ to The Joker during a private sit down meeting with the gangsters ] Give me one reason why I shouldn't have my boy here pull your head off.
• The Joker : How about a magic trick?
• [ pulls out a pencil and sticks it upright into the table ]
• The Joker : I'm gonna make this pencil disappear.
• [ Gambol's thug walks over to kill The Joker, who slams his face into the pencil and kills him ]
• The Joker : Ta-daa! It's... it's gone.
• Batman : Sometimes the truth isn't good enough, sometimes people deserve more. Sometimes people deserve to have their faith rewarded...
• Bruce Wayne : [ in his high rise apartment ] The bandit, in the forest in Burma, did you catch him?
• Alfred Pennyworth : Yes.
• Bruce Wayne : How?
• Alfred Pennyworth : We burned the forest down.
• The Joker : [ to Det. Stephens in the interrogation room ] Do you want to know why I use a knife? Guns are too quick. You can't savor all the... little emotions. In... you see, in their last moments, people show you who they really are. So in a way, I know your friends better than you ever did. Would you like to know which of them were cowards?
• Bruce Wayne : [ while in the underground bat cave ] Targeting me won't get their money back. I knew the mob wouldn't go down without a fight, but this is different. They crossed the line.
• Alfred Pennyworth : You crossed the line first, sir. You squeezed them, you hammered them to the point of desperation. And in their desperation, they turned to a man they didn't fully understand.
• Bruce Wayne : Criminals aren't complicated, Alfred. Just have to figure out what he's after.
• Alfred Pennyworth : With respect Master Wayne, perhaps this is a man that *you* don't fully understand, either. A long time ago, I was in Burma. My friends and I were working for the local government. They were trying to buy the loyalty of tribal leaders by bribing them with precious stones. But their caravans were being raided in a forest north of Rangoon by a bandit. So, we went looking for the stones. But in six months, we never met anybody who traded with him. One day, I saw a child playing with a ruby the size of a tangerine. The bandit had been throwing them away.
• Bruce Wayne : So why steal them?
• Alfred Pennyworth : Well, because he thought it was good sport. Because some men aren't looking for anything logical, like money. They can't be bought, bullied, reasoned, or negotiated with. Some men just want to watch the world burn.
• Gambol's Bodyguard : Yo, Gambol, there's somebody here for you. They say they just killed the Joker.
• Gambol's Bodyguard : They brought the body.
• [ a body bag is brought in and dropped on the table; Gambol unzips it, revealing Joker's face ]
• Gambol : So. For dead, that's 500...
• The Joker : [ sitting up and sticking a blade in Gambol's mouth ] How 'bout alive?
• [ Joker's men hold the bodyguards ]
• The Joker : You wanna know how I got these scars? My father, was a drinker, and a fiend. And one night, he goes off crazier than usual. Mommy gets the kitchen knife to defend herself. He doesn't like that. Not. One. Bit. So, me watching, he takes the knife to her, laughing while he does it. He turns to me and says, "Why so serious?" Comes at me with the knife. "WHY SO SERIOUS?" He sticks the blade in my mouth... "Let's put a smile on that face." And...
• [ glancing at thug ]
• The Joker : Why so serious?
• [ kills Gambol ]
• Alfred Pennyworth : [ as they leave the underground bat cave ] I suppose they'll lock me up as well. As your accomplice...
• Bruce Wayne : [ jokingly ] Accomplice? I'm going to tell them the whole thing was your idea.
• Batman : [ as Joker is holding Rachel out a window ] Let her go!
• The Joker : [ giving him a look ] Very poor choice of words...
• Lucius Fox : [ to Reese ] Let me get this straight, you think that your client, one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the world, is secretly a vigilante, who spends his nights beating criminals to a pulp with his bare hands, and your plan is to blackmail this person?
• [ Reese's face falls and Fox smiles ]
• Lucius Fox : Good luck.
• The Joker : [ in a warehouse next to a mountain of money ] All you care about is money. This city deserves a better class of criminal. And I'm gonna give it to them!
• The Joker : I just did what I do best. I took your little plan and I turned it on itself. Look what I did to this city with a few drums of gas and a couple of bullets. Hmmm? You know... You know what I've noticed? Nobody panics when things go "according to plan." Even if the plan is horrifying! If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it's all "part of the plan". But when I say that one little old mayor will die, well then everyone loses their minds!
• [ Joker hands Two-Face a gun and points it at himself ]
• The Joker : Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. I'm an agent of chaos. Oh, and you know the thing about chaos? It's fair!
• [ still holding the gun, Two-Face pauses and takes out his coin ]
• Two-Face : [ showing Joker the good side ] You live.
• The Joker : Mm-hmm.
• Two-Face : [ showing the scarred side ] You die.
• The Joker : Mmm, now we're talking.
• Harvey Dent : [ during a press conference ] The night is darkest just before the dawn. And I promise you, the dawn is coming.
• The Joker : [ while hanging upside down ] Oh, you. You just couldn't let me go, could you? This is what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object. You truly are incorruptible, aren't you? You won't kill me out of some misplaced sense of self-righteousness. And I won't kill you because you're just too much fun. I think you and I are destined to do this forever.
• Batman : You'll be in a padded cell forever.
• The Joker : Maybe we can share one. You know, they'll be doubling up, the rate this city's inhabitants are losing their minds.
• Batman : This city just showed you that it's full of people ready to believe in good.
• The Joker : Until their spirit breaks completely. Until they get a good look at the real Harvey Dent, and all the heroic things he's done. You didn't think I'd risk losing the battle for Gotham's soul in a fistfight with you? No. You need an ace in the hole. Mine's Harvey.
• Batman : What did you do?
• The Joker : I took Gotham's white knight and I brought him down to our level. It wasn't hard. You see, madness, as you know, is like gravity. All it takes is a little push!
• [ the Joker laughs hysterically as Batman races off and the cops come to take the Joker into custody ]
• The Joker : [ during the fundraiser party held for Harvey Dent ] You know, I'll settle for his loved ones.
• Gentleman at Party : We're not intimidated by thugs!
• The Joker : [ as he smacks his lips ] You know, you remind me of my father.
• [ the Joker pulls out his switchblade and brings it to the Gentleman's mouth ]
• The Joker : I hated my father!
• Rachel Dawes : [ off-screen ] Okay, stop!
• [ turns to face Rachel, tosses the Gentleman to his thugs and approaches Rachel, adjusting his hair with the knife ]
• The Joker : Well, hello, beautiful. You must be Harvey's squeeze. And you *are* beautiful.
• [ he walks around her ]
• The Joker : Oh, you look nervous. Is it the scars? You want to know how I got 'em?
• [ He grabs Rachel's head and positions the knife by her mouth ]
• The Joker : Come here. Hey! Look at me. So I had a wife. She was beautiful, like you. Who tells me I worry too much. Who tells me I ought to smile more. Who gambles and gets in deep with the sharks. One day, they carve her face. And we have no money for surgeries. She can't take it. I just want to see her smile again. I just want her to know that I don't care about the scars. So... I stick a razor in my mouth and do this...
• [ the Joker mimics slicing his mouth open with his tongue ]
• The Joker : ...to myself. And you know what? She can't stand the sight of me! She leaves. Now I see the funny side. Now I'm always smiling!
• [ Rachel knees the Joker in the groin; he merely laughs it off ]
• The Joker : A little fight in you. I like that.
• Batman : [ off-screen ] Then you're gonna love me.
• [ attacks him ]
• The Joker : [ in the interrogation room ] I want... my phone call. I want it. I want it! I want my phone call!
• Detective Stephens : That's nice.
• The Joker : How many of your friends have I killed?
• Detective Stephens : I'm a twenty-year man. I can tell the difference between punks who need a little lesson in manners, and the freaks like you who just enjoy it.
• Detective Stephens : And you've killed six of my friends.
• The Joker : [ mouths "six?" ]
• Batman : [ in the back of a factory at 250 52nd Street ] What happened to Rachel wasn't chance. We decided to act! We three!
• Two-Face : Then why was it me who was the only one who lost everything?
• Batman : It wasn't.
• Two-Face : The Joker chose ME!
• Batman : Because you were the best of us! He wanted to prove that even someone as good as you could fall.
• Two-Face : [ bitter ] And he was right.
• The Joker : [ after a news segment ] I had a vision, of a world without Batman. The mob ground out a little profit and the police tried to shut them down, one block at a time. And it was so... boring. I've had a change of heart. I don't want Mr. Reese spoiling everything, but why should I have all the fun? Let's give someone else a chance. If Coleman Reese isn't dead in sixty minutes then I blow up a hospital.
• The Chechen : [ in a warehouse next to a mountain of money ] Joker-man, what you do with all your money?
• The Joker : You see, I'm a guy of simple taste. I enjoy dynamite, and gunpowder, and gasoline!
• [ he pours gasoline on the mountain of cash ]
• The Chechen : [ panicked ] What the...?
• The Joker : Ah-ta-ta-ta-ta. And you know the thing they have in common? They're cheap.
• Two-Face : [ in the back of a factory at 250 52nd Street ] You thought we could be decent men in an indecent time. But you were wrong. The world is cruel, and the only morality in a cruel world is chance.
• [ holds up his coin ]
• Two-Face : Unbiased. Unprejudiced. Fair.
• [ the Joker has rigged two ferries to explode, one filled with prison inmates, one with ordinary people, giving each ferry one detonator and telling them they have to blow up the other, or he'll blow up both. A prisoner approaches the warden, who's holding the detonator ]
• Tattooed Prisoner : You don't want to die, but you don't know how to take a life. Give it to me; these men would kill you, and take it anyway. Give it to me. You can tell 'em I took it by force. Give it to me, and I'll do what you shoulda did ten minutes ago.
• [ Scared, the warden hands over the detonator. The prisoner looks at it, then throws it out the window ]
• Lt. James Gordon : [ in the interrogation room ] Harvey Dent never made it home.
• The Joker : Of course not.
• Lt. James Gordon : What have you done with him?
• The Joker : Me? I was right here.
• [ holds up his arms in handcuffs ]
• The Joker : Who did you leave him with? Your people? Assuming, of course, they are still *your* people, and not Maroni's. Does it depress you, commissioner? To know just how alone you really are? Does it make you feel responsible for Harvey Dent's current predicament?
• Lt. James Gordon : Where is he?
• The Joker : What's the time?
• Lt. James Gordon : What difference does that make?
• The Joker : Well, depending on the time, he may be in one spot, or several.
• Lt. James Gordon : If we're gonna play games...
• [ takes off Joker's handcuffs ]
• Lt. James Gordon : I'm gonna need a cup of coffee.
• The Joker : Ah, the good cop, bad cop routine?
• Lt. James Gordon : Not exactly.
• The Joker : [ stumbles out of wrecked truck, playing chicken with Batman ] Come on, I want you to do it, I want you to do it. Come on, hit me. Hit me!
• The Joker : [ SPOILER ] We really should stop this fighting, otherwise we'll miss the fireworks!
• Batman : [ while being pinned down on the platform next to the ledge of a building that's still under construction ] There won't *be* any fireworks!
• The Joker : And here... we... go!
• [ Silence. Nothing happens. Confused, Joker turns to look at the clock, which shows that it's past midnight and neither ferry has blown the other up ]
• Batman : [ triumphantly ] What were you trying to prove? That deep down, everyone's as ugly as you? You're alone!
• The Joker : [ sighs ] Can't rely on anyone these days, you have to do everything yourself, don't we!
• [ bumps along while driving a hijacked semi truck ]
• The Joker : [ driving in the driver's seat ] I like this job - I like it!
• Harvey Dent : Alfred, right?
• Alfred Pennyworth : [ during the fundraiser party held for Harvey Dent ] That's right, sir.
• Harvey Dent : Yeah, Rachel talks about you all the time. You've known her, her whole life!
• Alfred Pennyworth : Oh, not yet, sir.
• Harvey Dent : Heh heh heh. Any psychotic ex-boyfriends I should be aware of?
• Alfred Pennyworth : [ smiles ] Oh, you have no idea.
• Grumpy : That's a lot of money. If this Joker guy was so smart, he'd have had us bring a bigger car.
• [ promptly draws his gun and points it a Bozo ]
• Grumpy : I'm bettin' the Joker told you to kill me as soon as we loaded the cash.
• Bozo : [ looks at his watch, checking it. He sighs ] No, no no no. I kill the bus driver.
• Grumpy : [ as Bozo moves a few paces to one side ] Bus driver? What bus driver?
• [ a yellow school bus reverses through the bank's doors and knocks Grumpy down. The driver jumps out ]
• Bus Driver : School's out! Time to go!
• Bus Driver : Cat's not gettin' up, is he?
• [ loading duffels ]
• Bus Driver : That's a lot of money. What happened to the rest of the guys?
• [ Bozo casually shoots the bus driver dead, then picks up the last duffel and throws it into the bus. Bozo prepares to climb in ]
• Gotham National Bank Manager : Think you're smart, huh? The guy that hired youze, he'll just do the same to you. Oh, criminals in this town used to believe in things. Honor. Respect. Look at you! What do you believe in, huh? WHAT DO YOU BELIEVE IN?
• Bozo : [ putting a gas grenade in the banker's mouth ] I believe, whatever doesn't kill you, simply makes you...
• [ takes off his mask revealing the face of the Joker ]
• The Joker : ...stranger.
• The Joker : Don't talk like one of them, you're not! Even if you'd like to be. To them, you're just a freak, like me. They need you right now. But when they don't, they'll cast you out, like a leper. See, their morals, their code... it's a bad joke. Dropped at the first sign of trouble. They're only as good as the world allows them to be. I'll show you, when the chips are down, these... these civilized people? They'll eat each other. See, I'm not a monster, I'm just ahead of the curve.
• Batman : [ grabs Joker ] Where's Dent?
• The Joker : You have all these rules and you think they'll save you!
• Lt. James Gordon : [ as Batman slams Joker into the wall ] He's in control.
• Batman : I have one rule.
• The Joker : Oh, then that's the rule you'll have to break to know the truth.
• Batman : [ getting impatient ] Which is?
• The Joker : The only sensible way to live in this world is without rules.
• [ mimicking Batman's voice ]
• The Joker : And tonight you're gonna break your one rule.
• Batman : I'm considering it.
• The Joker : Oh, there's only minutes left, so you're gonna have to play my little game if you wanna save one of them.
• Batman : [ softly, fearful ] Them?
• The Joker : You know for awhile there, I thought you really were Dent. The way you threw yourself after her.
• [ Joker laughs, Batman throws Joker on table, barricades door ]
• The Joker : Look at you go! Does Harvey know about you and his little bunny?
• Batman : [ slams Joker into mirror ] Where are they?
• The Joker : Killing is making a choice.
• Batman : [ punches Joker ] Where are they?
• The Joker : Choose between one life or the other. Your friend, the district attorney, or his blushing bride-to-be...
• [ punches Joker ]
• The Joker : [ laughs ] You have nothing, nothing to threaten me with! Nothing to do with all your strength!
• [ grabs Joker ]
• The Joker : Don't worry, I'm gonna tell you where they are. Both of them. And that's the point. You'll have to choose. He's at 250 52ND Street and she's on Avenue X, at Cicero.
• The Joker : [ over the PA ] Tonight you're all gonna be part of a social experiment. Through the magic of diesel fuel and ammonium nitrate, I'm ready right now to blow you all sky high. Anyone attempts to get off their boat, you all die. Each of you has a remote... to blow up the other boat. At midnight, I blow you all up. If, however, one of you presses the button, I'll let that boat live. So, who's it going to be: Harvey Dent's most wanted scumbag collection, or the sweet and innocent civilians? You choose... oh, and you might want to decide quickly, because the people on the other boat might not be so noble.
• Bruce Wayne : [ while in the underground bat cave ] People are dying, Alfred. What would you have me do?
• Alfred Pennyworth : Endure, Master Wayne. Take it. They'll hate you for it, but that's the point of Batman, he can be the outcast. He can make the choice that no one else can make, the right choice.
• Bruce Wayne : Well today I found out what Batman can't do. He can't endure this. Today you get to say "I told you so."
• Alfred Pennyworth : Today, I don't want to.
• [ pauses for several moments ]
• Alfred Pennyworth : But I did bloody tell you.
• Gambol : [ During a private sit down meeting with the gangsters ] You think you can steal from us and just walk away?
• The Joker : Yeah.
• The Joker : It's a funny world we live in. Speaking of which, do you know how I got these scars?
• Batman : [ while being pinned down on the platform next to the ledge of a building that's still under construction ] No! But I know how you got these!
• [ fires gauntlet blades into Joker's face ]
• [ last lines in the back of a factory ]
• James Gordon Jr. : Why's he running, Dad?
• Lt. James Gordon : Because we have to chase him.
• James Gordon Jr. : He didn't do anything wrong.
• Lt. James Gordon : Because he's the hero Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs right now. So we'll hunt him. Because he can take it. Because he's not our hero. He's a silent guardian, a watchful protector. A dark knight.
• Harvey Dent : [ during the fundraiser party held for Harvey Dent ] The famous Bruce Wayne. Rachel's told me everything about you.
• Bruce Wayne : I certainly hope not.
• Alfred Pennyworth : Will you be wanting the Batpod, sir?
• Bruce Wayne : In the middle of the day, Alfred? Not very subtle.
• Alfred Pennyworth : The Lamborghini, then.
• [ with deadpan sarcasm ]
• Alfred Pennyworth : Much more subtle.
• The Joker : [ after a news segment ] Are you the real Batman?
• Brian : No.
• The Joker : No? Then why do you dress like him?
• Brian : He's a symbol... that we don't have to be afraid of scum like you.
• The Joker : Yeah, you do, Brian. You *really* do!
• The Joker : [ upon entering the fundraiser party held for Harvey Dent while his henchmen follow behind him ] Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. We are tonight's entertainment! I only have one question. Where is Harvey Dent?
• [ nobody responds; The Joker walks around the room pointing with his shotgun at everyone ]
• The Joker : You know where Harvey is? You know who he is?
• [ grabs a man's face ]
• The Joker : You know where I can find Harvey? I need to talk to him about something. Just something, a little.
• [ turns the man's face away ]
• The Joker : No...
• Salvatore Maroni : [ in the back seat of his car ] Look, if I tell you, will you let me go?
• Two-Face : Can't hurt your chances.
• Salvatore Maroni : It was Ramirez.
• [ Two-Face pulls the coin out and cocks his gun ]
• Salvatore Maroni : [ panicking ] But you said...
• Two-Face : I said it couldn't hurt your chances.
• [ flips coin; good side ]
• Two-Face : You're a lucky man.
• [ flips again; bad side ]
• Two-Face : He's not.
• Salvatore Maroni : Who?
• Two-Face : [ buckles seat belt ] Your driver.
• [ He shoots the driver in the back; the car goes flying off the road ]
• Lt. James Gordon : [ after Bruce saves Reese by blocking a truck with his car ] It's mister Wayne, isn't it? That was a very brave thing you did!
• Bruce Wayne : Trying to catch the light?
• Lt. James Gordon : You weren't protecting the van?
• Bruce Wayne : Why, who's in it?
• [ Reese steps out, sees Bruce, who nods slightly ]
• Bruce Wayne : Do you think I should go to the hospital?
• Lt. James Gordon : You don't watch a whole lot of news, do you, Mr. Wayne?
• Batman : Because sometimes the truth isn't good enough.
• [ insert cut: Alfred burns the envelope from Rachel ]
• Batman : Sometimes, people deserve more.
• James Gordon Jr. : Did Batman save you, Daddy?
• Lt. James Gordon : Actually, this time I saved him.
• Alfred Pennyworth : [ looks at the large gash on Bruce's arm ] Did you get mauled by a tiger?
• Bruce Wayne : [ quietly ] It was a dog.
• Alfred Pennyworth : Huh?
• Bruce Wayne : It was a big dog!
• Bruce Wayne : More copycats last night, Alfred, with guns.
• Alfred Pennyworth : Why don't you hire them and take the weekend off?
• The Joker : [ During a private sit down meeting with the gangsters ] If we don't deal with this now, soon little, uh, Gambol here won't be able to get a nickel for his grandma.
• Gambol : [ explodes ] Enough from the clown!
• [ He rises to his feet; Joker does too, opening his coat to reveal a cluster of grenades, attached to a string around his thumb ]
• The Joker : Ah-ta-ta-ta! Let's not *blow*...
• Man No. 1 : Shit!
• The Joker : ...this out of proportion.
• Bruce Wayne : [ standing next to the storage drawers in the applied sciences division at Wayne Enterprises ] How will it hold up against dogs?
• Lucius Fox : We talking Rottweilers or Chihuahuas? Should do fine against cats.
• Rachel Dawes : [ narrating her letter to Bruce as Alfred reads it ] Dear Bruce. I need to be honest and clear. I'm going to marry Harvey Dent. I love him, and I want to spend the rest of my life with him. When I told you that if Gotham no longer needed Batman we could be together, I meant it. But now I'm sure the day won't come when *you* no longer need Batman. I hope it does; and if it does I will be there, but as your friend. I'm sorry to let you down. If you lose your faith in me, please keep your faith in people. Love, now and always, Rachel.
• Alfred Pennyworth : [ while in the underground bat cave ] Know your limits, Master Wayne.
• Bruce Wayne : Batman has no limits.
• Alfred Pennyworth : Well, you do, sir.
• Bruce Wayne : Well, can't afford to know 'em.
• Alfred Pennyworth : And what happens on the day that you find out?
• Bruce Wayne : Well, we all know how much you love to say "I told you so."
• Alfred Pennyworth : On that day, Master Wayne, even I won't want to. Probably.

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The Untold Truth Of Bruce Wayne

Tossing the keys to his shiny Lamborghini at the valet and waltzing through the front doors of an opulent dining establishment with two ladies in tow is how Bruce Wayne maintains a playboy exterior to divert the public's attention from his real job:  Batman . The world is well-acquainted with the Dark Knight, but Bruce Wayne often takes the back seat to his more aggressively thrilling alter-ego. Bruce is simply one side of the Batman coin, anchoring the hero to the real world so he can maintain human social connections while immersing himself in the muck and mire of Gotham City on a nightly basis.

Bruce Wayne's story is one of tragedy. Not only were his parents killed when he was a young boy, but it's also completely clear that Bruce Wayne, in a way, died that very night as well. Whatever ambitions or aspirations he had as a young lad were laid to rest at the altar of Batman, a figure that consumed his obsessive need to eradicate criminality and fight for justice. 

This loss of innocence forced Bruce to face the world in all of its potential ugliness. That's something parents often attempt to shield their children from until they're at an age that they can properly cope. However, Bruce's life was fractured in two the moment his parents were killed. Everything following his parent's death was consumed by his need to ensure that he's protecting other potential young Bruce Waynes from experiencing his trauma. This is the untold story of Bruce Wayne.

Bruce Wayne's name is an amalgamation of two historical figures

For a master detective capable of thwarting high-profile criminal plots, it was important that his name was inspired. Bill Finger and Bob Kane did just that, taking two notable historical figures as the inspiration for Bruce Wayne . The name Bruce came from King Bruce I of Scottish notoriety. Robert the Bruce was known to be one of the most famous warriors during his time. He led Scotland during the First War of Scottish Independence from England. Because of that, he is seen in Scottish history as a hero among the people.

The name Wayne was derived from the brigadier general Anthony Wayne of the American Revolution. He led several battles during the Revolutionary War. Wayne was highly decorated for his exploits during the war, being recognized by George Washington and promoted to commanding officer. Because he was a fierce fighter and leader, he garnered the nick name "Mad Anthony Wayne." 

In fact, it was established in "World's Finest" #186 that Anthony Wayne is an ancestor of Bruce Wayne in DC Comics canon. In that comic, Batman had the opportunity to meet his ancestor as he traveled to the past. It's clear Bob Kane and Bill Finger had an affinity for revolutionaries who fought against tyranny, and wanted to instill those qualities in their creation.

Bruce Wayne had a brother

Most people know Bruce Wayne to be the singular child of Thomas and Martha Wayne, who became the sole heir to their entire estate. However, "World's Finest" #223 tells the tale of Thomas Wayne Jr., the eldest son of the Waynes. 

He was three years older than Bruce, and mentally unstable due to severe head trauma suffered as a child from a car accident. After becoming a danger to himself and others, Thomas and Martha made the decision to have him institutionalized. Thomas Jr. eventually changed his surname to conceal the fact that he was a Wayne. Although Bruce's parents intended to tell him of his older brother, they were killed before they could do so. 

In time, Thomas Jr. resurfaced as the villain known as the Boomerang Killer. His story ended in heroism, ultimately, as he protected Bruce from gunfire by sacrificing himself.

In the wake of the New 52 shift in DC Comics continuity, Thomas Wayne Jr. still existed but was now Bruce's younger brother. This new story said that following his premature birth as the result of a car accident, his ensuing mental health issues had him sent to a home for children. However, the Court of Owls nabbed the boy and trained him to become a Talon — a deadly assassin of the shadowy court. Whichever way that you look at the story of Thomas Wayne Jr., it's a tragic one.

If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, please contact the Crisis Text Line by texting HOME to 741741, call the National Alliance on Mental Illness helpline at 1-800-950-NAMI (6264), or visit the National Institute of Mental Health website .

Bruce took Dick Grayson in because of their kinship over family tragedy

Dick Grayson was Batman's first sidekick under the title of Robin, although many more would later earn the title. As a youngster, Dick and his biological mother and father performed an acrobatic show known as the Flying Graysons. Dick's parents were murdered during a performance by a ruthless mafioso named Tony Zucco, hellbent on extorting money from the circus that employed the family.

In the aftermath of the tragedy, Bruce took Dick as his legal ward, training the athletic young boy to refocus his anger and emotions in more productive, albeit vigilante-adjacent, ways. It's obvious that Bruce felt a connection with Dick Grayson, as they both shared the same trauma. This led Bruce to step in as a father figure for Grayson, something the hero never quite had after his own parents died, outside of the companionship of his faithful butler, Alfred.

Bruce received a message from his father from an alternate timeline

Comic books are often clouded by messy timelines, rewritten history, and dead characters brought back to life. But such things can also provide remarkable character insight.

Thomas Wayne received a quasi-resurrection during 2011's "Flashpoint" storyline, which had the Flash traveling back in time to save his own mother from being murdered. In doing so, he alters history dramatically, leaving present-day littered with chaos as Aquaman goes to war with Wonder Woman and Superman never lands in Kansas — instead captured by the government and kept in isolation for study.

Perhaps most interesting of these alternate realities, however, is a depiction of Bruce Wayne being killed as a young boy by the alley assailant instead of his parents. 

We see his mother go mad (in essence becoming the Joker), while his father becomes Batman to combat the criminal element. This Thomas Wayne, however, does not share Batman's aversion to lethal force; he carries firearms and murders criminals regularly. When the Flash reveals to Thomas that he changed history, Thomas does everything he can to help Flash correct the course of events so his son can live again. Once they succeed, Thomas Wayne gives the Flash a letter to deliver to Bruce. 

Heading off into the speed force, the Flash manages to set things back to normal once again. He meets Batman (once again Bruce) in the Batcave, retells the story of what occurred, and gives him the letter from his father. With tears in his eyes, Batman tells the Flash, "You're one hell of a messenger. Thank you."

Bruce Wayne is actually Batman's mask

Every night, Bruce Wayne puts on the cape and cowl and scrambles across the rooftops of Gotham City hunting criminals who plague the city. As a character, Batman has a massive array of offensive and defensive toys that enable him to gain the upper hand, always able to out-think and out-strategize his opponents. 

But much like Superman "pretends" to be Clark Kent to fit in with humanity, the Caped Crusader "pretends" to be Bruce when he needs something from humanity that a guy in a cowl can't get. His mask is the Bruce Wayne playboy façade he puts on every day as he steps out into the streets of Gotham City or interacts with associates at Wayne Enterprises. Bruce Wayne essentially died along with his parents, his hopes and dreams for the future eviscerated, and Batman was born out of that tragedy and has been the dominant personality ever since.

Ultimately, Bruce Wayne/Batman couldn't care less about fancy cars, trophy girlfriends, or lavish surroundings. He's more concerned with ensuring that the Joker doesn't hurt any more innocent Gothamites. When he's among the people, he's wearing a mask that protects his real identity as the Batman.

Bruce Wayne's intellect surpasses his Justice League colleagues

He has an endless supply of batarangs and batmobiles, but Batman's greatest asset might be his mind. Bruce Wayne has one of the most capable minds in the entirety of the DC superhero catalog, with the ability to manipulate and properly strategize against his opponents, a skill he has honed and always uses to stay prepared. As a result, Batman is rarely caught off guard and always seems to have contingency plans on top of contingency plans. It's a crucial element of his success, since he is one of the few heroes that doesn't have powers, and he is constantly surrounded by beings who do.

During Grant Morrison's "JLA: Tower of Babel" storyline, Ra's al Ghul targets the Justice League , managing to take down nearly every member including Superman. The trick, however, is that those in the Justice League realize that the methods of their downfall or incapacitation contain specific details that are secretive or unique to each of the members. In reality, Batman made contingency plans for dismantling any member of the Justice League should they go rogue, and Ra's Al Ghul merely stole those secret plans and used them against the group. While Batman's compatriots felt betrayed, it became clear that the superhero had simply planned for the worst-case scenario. Such plans typically help the Justice League accomplish great feats — in this case, a villain simply got the better of him.

Bruce Wayne helps fund the Justice League

It's easy to think, "Hey, Bruce Wayne is a billionaire, so of course he can fund all of the Justice League 's operations." However, that's not entirely the case. Maintaining the Watch Tower that sits in Earth's orbit is a bit much, even for a billionaire. Besides, if Bruce Wayne was the sole donor for the Justice League, it might seem a bit suspicious, and would connect the dots to Batman's identity rather quickly.

While Bruce does contribute to the Justice League, he has actively secured other donors as well, including Michael Holt (also known as Mr. Terrific), Oliver Queen (the Green Arrow), Maxwell Lord, Ted Kord, the United States government, and even the villainous Lex Luthor has, on occasion, been known to donate heavily to the League, whether for appearances or other benefits. Regardless, Bruce may provide a lot of the financial backing that the league needs to operate, but he hasn't done it alone, maintaining a healthy network of monetary avenues for the heroes.

Bruce Wayne trained his mind to create a back-up persona

As Batman, Bruce Wayne has run the gamut of trials and exercises of endurance. In 2008's "Batman R.I.P." written by Grant Morrison , a psychiatrist by the name of Simon Hurt had previously given Bruce Wayne a psychological trigger during an isolation experiment that Bruce had organized – unbeknownst to the billionaire. Later, as part of a secretive organization called the Black Glove, Jezebel Jet got close to Bruce Wayne and became his girlfriend, ultimately learning that he was Batman. In conjunction with the psychiatrist, Jet and Hurt drugged Bruce and caused the collapse of his mind through the trigger word "Zur-En-Arrh."

Bruce would later awaken in alley with no memory. He'd eventually fashion a Batman costume of purple, red, and yellow threads and carry a baseball bat. This is because Bruce had trained his mind to create a back-up persona in the event that his mind ever became corrupted. The Batman of Zur-En Arrh was far more aggressive, and even lethal should he go off the rails. His primary weapon became a baseball bat. In order to keep himself from ever going too far with the bolder and more aggressive Batman, Bruce also ensured he'd see a visual of his conscience in the form of Bat-mite, a small eighth dimension being who'd guide and keep him from ever crossing the line in his quest to restore his psyche. All this proves once again that Bruce Wayne is literally prepared for anything.

Bruce has had many love interests

Batman may be a stoic guardian of Gotham City who sticks to the shadows, but he's also a human being who desires love and companionship (even if he frequently does his best to suppress that need). Throughout his career, across multiple storylines, he's had several love interests. In the Golden Age of comics, Bruce had a dalliance with Vicki Vale, an intrepid reporter who suspected he was Batman; the character would eventually be realized on the big screen by Kim Basinger in Tim Burton's 1989 "Batman."

Batman has also had  many flirtations over the years with Catwoman , or Selina Kyle as she is known among civilians. In most of these storylines, Catwoman becomes fascinated with Batman and toys with him, while he begins to hope that she could possibly be set on a straight and narrow path. Even if it most often doesn't work out, the two characters have an affection for each other, one that sometimes leads to them teaming up.

Then there's Talia al Ghul, daughter of Batman's nemesis Ra's al Ghul. Talia and Bruce share a child by the name of Damian, who eventually becomes a Robin in some storylines, testing his father's patience along the way.

Bruce Wayne has had several other relationships, a few of which are his crime-fighting colleagues. Some of his romantic connections include Black Canary, Batwoman, Jezebel Jet, Wonder Woman, Silver St. Cloud, Julia Pennyworth, and Zatanna among others. 

Bruce Wayne fathered multiple children

With such an active love life, Bruce has fathered several children over the years. Not all of them are canon, as some exist in different timelines or universes, but the Wayne genetics are certainly flourishing into future generations. His most famous child is Damian Wayne, a feisty combatant Bruce has had to temper under his tutelage as Robin .

During the Silver Age of comics, Bruce Wayne Jr. made his debut as the son of Bruce and an unknown woman. He fought crime alongside his father and went on multiple adventures with Batman. However, his story was later retconned as a Fortress of Solitude computer simulation, therefore writing him out of existence.

On Earth Two, Batman and Catwoman shared a daughter by the name of Helena Wayne. She was this Earth's version of Huntress as opposed to the traditional Huntress that is Helena Bertinelli. The apple didn't fall far from the tree in the costumed vigilante department.

In an Elseworlds storyline entitled "Batman: League of Batmen," Bruce Wayne and Talia al Ghul's son named Tallant Wayne leads a very different life from his father. He warps the callings of both Bruce and Talia by creating a team of Batmen similar to the League of Assassins his mother is known for.

Terry McGinnis is a biological son to Bruce Wayne

Children of the late 90s and early '00s are familiar with "Batman Beyond," another brainchild of Bruce Timm (who created " Batman: The Animated Series "). This show followed Bruce in his waning years, as an old man retiring from the life of crimefighting. He recruits a teenager by the name of Terry McGinnis to take up the mantle, training him to be a new Batman.

Strangely enough, Bruce and Terry's union as a Batman team was all part of fate's grand design. While Terry was the son of Warren McGinnis, genetically this wasn't the case. It's later revealed in a "Justice League Unlimited" episode that Amanda Waller began a future Batman project that included Bruce's DNA. She sought out a couple with the same profile as Thomas and Martha Wayne. Waller found that couple in McGinnis's parents. Then, Cadmus rewrote Warren's reproductive DNA to be Bruce's. When his wife, Mary, bore Terry as an infant, he was technically Bruce's son. 

Amanda Waller even sought to recreate the tragedy Bruce experienced as a young child to push Terry into prime Batman mode. She and her cohort, who was supposed to assassinate the McGinnis couple, ultimately couldn't bring themselves to go through with it. Nevertheless, Terry's parents still perished tragically; perhaps the cherry on this tale of tragedy was that Bruce never learned before his death that Terry was his son.

Bruce Wayne traveled through time thanks to Darkseid's Omega Sanction

During "Final Crisis," all hands were on deck to stop Darkseid and his apocalyptic incursion. Batman confronted the villain face-to-face and the rest of the heroes believed that Darkseid had killed the Caped Crusader. This was actually not the case; Darkseid used his Omega Sanction ability to send Bruce Wayne through time.

This began a series of comics entitled "Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne." He began his journey in the Paleolithic era, confronting t a pack of blood-thirsty Neanderthals led by the immortal villain Vandal Savage. Continually catapulted through time, he later found himself in the Puritan era. Eventually, he surfaced up in the 18 th century, crossing paths with Blackbeard the pirate. After a trip to the wild West and then the early 1900s, Bruce eventually found his way home, discovering that Dick Grayson had taken up the mantle of Batman in Bruce's "death."

Forbes has recognized Bruce Wayne's wealth

In Gotham City, Bruce Wayne is an icon, celebrity and benefactor. His family holds a deep connection to Gotham, one that had Bruce's parents frequently struggling to lift the city out of its despair through donations and civic action. When they were alive, much of their wealth became allocated to infrastructure support, political causes, and giving back to Gotham. Bruce's father rarely held an official role in the family company; he instead became a doctor to help others.

Bruce's own philanthropic efforts are, in a way, frequently realized through his secretive job as Batman. But when he can't stop crime and ease inequality with his actions, he does it with his checkbook. Because of his wealth and ability to raise funds for causes he believes in ( Harvey Dent for DA, anybody? ), Bruce Wayne has been recognized by Forbes on their " Fictional 15 " list multiple times.

Batman (1940-2011) #1

• 1.1 Synopsis
• 1.2.1 Individuals
• 1.2.2 Locations
• 1.2.3 Objects
• 1.2.4 Creatures
• 2.1 Synopsis
• 2.2.1 Individuals
• 2.2.2 Organizations
• 2.2.3 Locations
• 2.2.4 Objects
• 3.1 Synopsis
• 3.2.1 Individuals
• 3.2.2 Organizations
• 3.2.3 Locations
• 3.2.4 Vehicles
• 3.2.5 Objects
• 3.2.6 Creatures
• 4.1 Synopsis
• 4.2.1 Individuals
• 4.2.2 Organizations
• 4.2.3 Locations
• 4.2.4 Vehicles
• 4.2.5 Objects
• 5.1 Synopsis
• 5.2.1 Individuals
• 5.2.2 Locations
• 5.2.3 Objects

"The Legend of the Batman - Who He is, and How he Came to Be"

Fifteen years ago, a young Bruce Wayne returns home with his parents after a night at the theatre . However, they are accosted by a mugger who demands they hand over his mother's necklace . When his father interferes, the mugger shoots both of Bruce's parents dead and flees the scene. Traumatized by the events, Bruce vows to avenge their deaths by dedicating his life to fighting crime.

For years, Bruce trains his body to physical peak and studies various subjects, including martial arts and fields of sciences. In the present day, he decides to enact his crusade, though decides to don a disguise to strike fear into the hearts of criminals. At that moment, a bat flies through the window. Believing it to be an omen, Bruce decides to don the identity of " Batman ", using his inherited wealth to fund his crusade.

Appearances

Individuals.

• Batman / Bruce Wayne ( Flashback and Main Story )
• Martha Wayne (Flashback Only)
• Thomas Wayne (Flashback Only)
• Joe Chill (Flashback Only) ( Unnamed )
• Crime Alley ( Unnamed )
• Wayne Manor
• Utility Belt
• Joe Chill's Gun

"The Joker"

On the radio one evening, a criminal calling himself the Joker hijacks the broadcast, threatening to kill Henry Claridge and steal his prized diamond at midnight. Terrified, Claridge contacts the police department for protection. Despite the precautions they set up, Claridge dies with a grotesque grin and the diamond is revealed to have been replaced with a replica. Meanwhile, the Joker mulls over his success, revealing he'd actually broken in the night before to steal the diamond and injected Claridge with a slow-acting version of his venom . With the crime becoming public, Robin wants to investigate, though Batman suggests they wait until another time.

The following night, the Joker announces he will kill Jay Wilde and steal his prized ruby within the hour. Police again once again set up protection for the victim. However, at the allotted time, Wilde drops dead and the officers present are paralyzed by a mysterious gas. It is revealed that Joker hid in a suit of armor and shot Wild with a blowgun. After removing the metal armor, he steals the diamond and flees the scene.

Due to the Joker beating him to the robberies of the jewels, a mobster called Brute Nelson decides to lure him into a trap and sends word out to lure him into it. Deciding it to be the right time, Batman decides to intervene before either can kill each other. That night, the Joker breaks into Nelson's home to kill him, though the mobster has men waiting in the other rooms. Watching from the stairway, Batman is discovered by the mobsters and attacked, forcing him to fight them. Using the confusion as an opportunity to escape, Joker shoots Nelson and flees. After subduing the last of them, Batman pursues the Joker. With the confrontation taken to a nearby bridge, the Joker knocks Batman from the structure, almost resulting the vigilante's death.

The following night, the Joker threatens to kill Judge Drake . Disguising himself as the Police Chief, he slips into the house and injects his victim with his venom, also using the disguise to flee the scene unstopped. This time, Robin is monitoring the scene and traces him to his hideout, though the Joker manages to subdue him. Arriving shortly later, Batman traces his footsteps with an Infrared Light , bringing him to the lair just as Joker prepares to inject Robin with his venom. In the ensuing struggle, Joker's lab is set alight and he uses his paralyzing variant to subdue the Dark Knight, fleeing the scene in anticipation he and Robin will die. However, Batman quickly recovers and flees the scene.

In the aftermath, Robin reveals that the Joker intends to steal the Cleopatra Necklace , due to the criminal's goading before the attempted murder. Knowing the owner, Batman and Robin trace him to the penthouse and confront him. During the fight, Joker is knocked from the building but saved by Batman, who intends to have him arrested as an example to other like-minded fiends. As he is locked up at the State Prison, Joker vows to escape and have "the last laugh!"

• Batman/Bruce Wayne
• Robin/Dick Grayson
• The Joker (First Appearance)
• Brute Nelson ( Only appearance; dies )
• Henry Claridge ( Only appearance; dies )
• Jay Wylde ( Only appearance; dies )
• Judge Drake ( Only appearance; dies )
• Otto Drexel ( Mentioned only )
• Police Chief ( Mentioned only )

Organizations

• Police Department
• Brute Nelson's Gang (Only appearance)
• Claridge Residence (Only appearance)
• Wayne Manor ( Unnamed )
• Joker's House and Lab
• Wilde Residence (Only appearance)
• Unnamed Bar
• Brute Nelson's Home (Only appearance)
• Unnamed Bridge
• Judge Drake's Home (Only appearance)
• Drexel Penthouse (Only appearance)
• Unnamed Construction Site
• State Prison
• Infrared Light
• Robin's Uniform
• Joker Venom (First Appearance)
• Joker Cards (First Appearance)
• Claridge Diamond
• Ronkers Ruby
• Cleopatra Necklace ( Mentioned only )

"The Giants of Dr. Hugo Strange"

Some time after his first battle with Batman , Hugo Strange is able to arrange a prison riot, during which he and his henchmen escape. The following night, the group break into an insane asylum and release five patients. Batman learns of the attack and wonders whether he'll encounter Strange in the future, suspecting he plans for another terrible plan. A month later, a giant " Monster Man " attacks Lower Manhattan, terrorizing the streets and killing multiple people. Police are overwhelmed and are unable to harm the attacker, even with weapons. The Monster Man later flees within a van, destroying a police car that chases after him. After hearing of the attack, Batman deduces that Strange is responsible and decides to investigate.

The following day, the Monster Man attacks again and escapes in a similar fashion. However, Batman, piloting the Batplane , locates and follows them from the sky. Following them to a house on the outskirts of the city, Batman investigates and is captured by Strange. Demanding his last rights, Batman learns that Strange has mutated the Asylum Patients using a newly developed mutagen to enhance their height, though the serum greatly reduces the victims' intelligence. Strange plans to use the Monster Men to distract the police whilst he and his gang rob from the city's banks. To prevent Batman from interfering, Strange injects him with the Monster Man serum and knocks him out, taking away his Utility Belt to prevent escape.

Recovering hours later in a cell, Batman sees Strange dispatch his men to release the Monster Men at two different locations. With hours left before he transforms, he uses chemicals hidden in his costume's boots to create an explosive and confronts Strange, who falls from the cliff. Batman is then met with three of the Monster Men, though he tricks them into fighting between themselves. As they maul each other to death, Batman uses Strange's lab to mix an antidote to the serum and is able to cure himself in time. With the Monster Men dead at each others' hands, Batman recovers his utility belt and goes to stop the others.

As he catches up to one of them, Batman, having decided that lethal force is necessary on this occasion, uses a machine gun to crash the vehicle. As the Monster Man exits, he uses a rope to hang him from the Batplane, strangling him to death. Batman later catches up with the second one in the city, causing it to also crash. Drawing the Monster Man's attention, he draws the Monster to the top of a tower and uses a Gas Pellet to disable him. As the Monster Man falls to his death, Batman wonders whether Strange has survived and if they'll meet again in the future...

• Hugo Strange
• Monster Men
• Hugo Strange's Gang
• Daly Avenue
• Empire State Building
• Metropolis Insane Asylum (Only appearance)
• Hugo Strange's Lair
• Hugo Strange's Trucks
• Gas Capsule
• Hidden Chemical Capsules
• Monster Men Serum (First Appearance)
• Hugo Strange's Whip
• Counteragent for Monster Men Serum (First Appearance)

Hearing of a high profile ball being held on The Dolphin yacht, Bruce Wayne suspects the owner Martha Travers may be targeted for her priceless emerald necklace . Arranging for Dick to be stationed as a steward, he asks him to monitor the scene whilst he investigates another case. Among the guests are Travis' brother Roger , nephew Denny , personal doctor Wallace , and the injured Mrs. Peggs. From his observations, Dick learns that Denny has a somewhat sketchy reputation, Wallace has a gambling addiction, and Roger has lost their fortune in several failed investments. He also intercepts a message set to Denny by a high profile thief called "the Cat" .

Shorty after obtaining the message, Dick learns that Travers' necklace has disappeared. Moments later, a gang of criminals board the yacht by pretending to the Coast Guard . Hoping to steal the necklace, they learn of its disappearance and, hoping to compensate, steal from the other patrons. Dick attempts to intervene, but is forced to jump overboard by gunfire. Using the opportunity to change into his costume, Dick boards the gang's boat as they flee the scene.

Having lost his trail on his case, Batman drives up to the criminals with a speedboat and confronts them. Robin also makes his presence known by subduing the others in a lasso. After disarming the criminals, Batman forces them to fight against Robin, hoping to show how "yellow" they are without guns. The Boy Wonder singlehandedly defeats them. The Dynamic Duo then leave the criminals to return to The Dolphin , bringing the stolen jewelry with them.

Arriving in the midst of a costume party, Batman, briefly confused as a guest, returns the stolen items. Meanwhile, Robin activates the ship's fire alarm, causing the apparently injured Peggs to flee. As the Captain calls the false alarm, Batman and Robin intercept Peggs, revealing she is actually the Cat in disguise. The Cat had faked the injury and used the bandages to hide Travers' necklace. Batman subdues Denny as he attempts to steal the necklace and takes the Cat into custody, rejecting her offer to shift allegiance together. As they return to the mainland, the Cat jumps overboard and the enamored Batman stops Robin from interfering, allowing her to escape. As Robin realizes he allowed her to leave deliberately, Batman wonders whether he'll encounter the Cat again...

• Batman/Bruce Wayne ( Flashback and Main Story )
• Robin/Dick Grayson ( Flashback and Main Story )
• The Cat (First Appearance)
• "Boss" (Only appearance)
• Denny Travers (Only appearance)
• Martha Travers (Only appearance)
• Roger Travers (Only appearance)
• Doctor Wallace (Only appearance)
• Unnamed Steward (Only appearance)
• Julie Madison ( Mentioned only )
• Unnamed Gang
• Coast Guard ( Mentioned only )
• Atlantic Ocean
• The Dolphin
• Batman's Speedboat
• Robin's Costume
• Silken Cordss
• Travers Necklace

"The Joker Returns"

Two days after his captured, the Joker manages to escape prison by using explosive chemicals he had disguised as false teeth. Batman and Robin learn of it and decide to prepare for the future. Joker meanwhile flees to a lair hidden in an abandoned cemetery, using it to restart his operations quickly. He then once again begins a reign of terror, killing Police Chief Chalmers using a dart hidden on the phone, replaces a priceless painting with a Joker card, steals a rare gem and murders its owner.

When Joker once again threatens to steal the Cleopatra Necklace , Batman decides to intercede again. Whilst police guard it at the museum holding the necklace, Joker hides within an Egyptian sarcophagus and attacks officers guarding it with an airborne variant of his venom. Batman attempts to stop him, but the criminal knocks him unconscious and flees as reinforcements arrive. As the police prepare to unmask him, Batman regains consciousness and escapes.

When political reformer Edgar Martin publicly lashes out at him, the Joker decides to make him the next target and public threatens him. Despite police efforts, Joker manages to kill him by slipping in a set of poisoned cards. With police efforts further embarrassed, Bruce Wayne meets with Commissioner Gordon and convinces him to set a trap for the Joker. The police then use newspapers to advertise the Fire Ruby, gaining Joker's interest. As he breaks into the apartment, the police jump him, having stood guard from the start. However, the Joker gasses them with his venom and flees the scene.

Unknown to both Joker and the officers, Robin also watches the building and chases after the criminal as he flees. However, Joker knocks him off the building as the chase after discovering his presence, though Robin is able to catch a flagpole before he hits the ground. As Joker reaches the streets and prepares to gun the Boy Wonder down, Batman appears and the duo battle the criminal. Eventually, Joker draws a knife and tries to stab Batman, but accidently stabs himself in the struggle. Believing he has finally died, Batman and Robin flee the scene as the police arrive. However, as he is taken away in an ambulance, the medic discovers that the criminal has actually survived...

• The Joker (Apparent Death)
• Commissioner Gordon
• Chalmers ( Only appearance; dies )
• Edgar Martin ( Only appearance; dies )
• Unnamed Gem Owner ( Only appearance; dies )
• J. Johnson ( Mentioned only )
• Gotham State Penitentiary ( Unnamed )
• Unnamed Cemetery (Only appearance)
• Gotham City Police Headquarters
• Unnamed Gallery (Only appearance)
• Drake Museum (Only appearance)
• Martin Estate (Only appearance)
• Johnson Residence (Only appearance)
• Joker's Knife (First Appearance)
• Joker's Revolver (First Appearance)
• Poisoned Deck of Jokers (Only appearance)
• Explosive False Teeth (First Appearance)
• Cleopatra Necklace
• Fire Ruby ( Mentioned only )
• The issue sees Batman, Robin and Commissioner Gordon's first appearances outside of Detective Comics . It also sees the debut of the Joker and Catwoman , who would quickly become recurring enemies in Batman stories. Joker Venom and Hugo Strange 's Monster Men also make their debuts during this issue. The comic also features a new Batplane, replacing the Batgyro which was destroyed in Detective Comics #33 .
• In initial publication, the stories "The Joker" and "The Cat" were never titled. However, the titles have been given in subsequent publications.
• Batman 's murder of Strange's monster men proved controversial, resulting in editor Whitney Ellsworth asking Kane and Finger to tone down the violence in future stories. This eventually led to editorial establishing "No Killing" rules for Batman and other DC superheroes.
• The plot from "The Joker" was re-imagined in the 2005 graphic novel Batman: The Man Who Laughs , with the events also feeding into Batman: Year One .
• The plots from "The Joker" and "The Joker Returns" are major influences on the 2008 feature film The Dark Knight . Among the similarities include the Joker publicly announcing his crimes before committing them, disguising himself as a police officer to gain access to a person he threatened to kill, using a powerful bomb smuggled into jail to escape, killing to create chaos and disorder, and infringing on the city's old-fashioned mobsters.
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• 1 Bat-Family
• 2 Nora Clavicle
• 3 Jason Todd

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Batman rewatch: We will never see anything like Adam West's  Batman again, alas

The Dynamic Duo rev up the Batboat in the Caped Crusader's first and looniest film.

Every Wednesday from now until The Batman hits theaters, we're watching Batman's theatrical films in chronological order. This week: the 1966 feature from the classic TV show's cast and crew. Available to rent on VOD, but track down the glorious Blu-ray. See you next Waynesday, when we dance with the devil in the pale moonlight.

By the time Adam West published his memoir in 1994, it was conventional to think of him as a bad actor and his Batman as a travesty. Dark Knights on page and screen were moping through BDSM role-play, getting spine-crunched by philosophical 'roidheads, and carving steel cleats across Superman's chin. West's version looked like a toothless punchline in reruns. Which was, of course, the point. "We were farce," West explains in Back to the Batcave (co-written by Jeff Rovin). "We were a lampoon." The book reads defensive. Critics were wrong to call his series "camp." Comic book fans were wrong to say his silliness ruined the character. The creators of the TV show were wrong not to pay him more money. The mega-grossing 1989 film Batman was wrong, because Michael Keaton 's moody hero was "psychotic," "addle-headed," "shallow," and "unpleasant." (West wishes the film had starred West.)

No one reading Back to the Batcave had seen Lookwell , the astounding pilot West filmed a few years earlier. He plays a struggling actor semi-famous for a long-gone, three-season TV show: Hmmm. Former fake TV cop Ty Lookwell tries to solve actual crimes, and still chases hot-young-dude casting calls. He should be adrift in the wrong era, a turtlenecked Gloria Swanson washed up on grunge beach — but his baritone assurance warps the world around him. The script came from two young whoevers, Conan O'Brien and Robert Smigel, and they realized West's stentorian I-Am-So-Normal manners had gotten weirder (and funnier) with age.

Lookwell didn't get a pick up, but the absurdist-referential clique loved West and kept him employed. Steady cartoon work and sitcom cameos rebuilt his nostalgic legacy. By the time he died in 2017 , inflated self-parody was very lucrative, and maybe the default mode of American masculinity. "His serious delusions made him funny in a goofy way," is how West describes his Batman. He could be talking about Lookwell, or the version of himself he played for decades. Now it's conventional to overpraise his Bat-show's wacky mentality as Pop Art, and no one thinks "camp" is an insult.

But 1966's Batman movie still arrives revitalized in this century. The feature was made right after the show's runaway debut season, and the silliest scenes are shocking in the context of everything that followed. Colors pop, performers shriek. Batman by daylight, Batman at the harbor, the Batboat, the Batcopter, the Batcycle, literal pirates steering a Penguin-shaped submarine: Yo-ho! It's the only Batman film for a toddler, and the best one for a 30-year-old bored after decades of grimacing.

"THIS YACHT!" starts the narrator (William Dozier). "Is bringing a REVOLUTIONARY SCIENTIFIC INVENTION to GOTHAM CITY!" Cut to "millionaire Bruce Wayne" (West) and "his youthful ward Dick Grayson" (Burt Ward) driving a convertible, top down. To 2021 eyes, Dick dresses like a middle-aged man, which makes it funnier that Ward gives his lines ("Holy Long John Silver!") a little rascal squeak. Whereas Bruce looks like a sitcom husband who left his wife for an ascot. West was twice-divorced and living hot in Malibu. His hair is sunkissed; the memoir makes it clear his '60s were well swung.

They park at Wayne Manor, played by a Pasadena insta-castle. After a costume change, they drive the Batmobile to their private helipad. High above sunny Gotham City, they greet an adoring public. A swarm of bikini-clad ladies wave at them as they pass overhead. That's a direct echo of the helicopter prologue from La Dolce Vita , except the Italian women were gawking at a Jesus statue, and Batman never had to die to get worshipped.

The movie was written by Lorenzo Semple Jr., who had developed the TV show, and directed by Leslie H. Martinson. It wasn't the first time the Caped Crusader ever played in theaters. (That honor belongs to a 15-part serial from 1943, one of the worst things I've ever seen.) But it would be the first proper feature, and a bigger screen required a bigger idea. So four guest villains unite into one superbad team, the United Underworld. Penguin (Burgess Meredith) waddles. The Riddler (Frank Gorshin) has his crazy laughter. Joker (Cesar Romero) has, errr, different crazy laughter.

I can take them or leave them, but put Lee Meriwether on Supervillain Mount Rushmore. She took over as Catwoman from Julie Newmar, and the central nefarious plan requires her femme fatale to go undercover in commie drag. As "Miss Kitka," she seduces capitalist pig Bruce Wayne. Their date night turns into a paranoid masquerade of shifting identities. The Underworld wants to flush out Batman by kidnapping Bruce, because they don't know he is Batman. Bruce wants to protect Miss Kitka from villains like Catwoman, who she herself is. Robin and Alfred (Alan Napier) secretly watch the pair via closed circuit Bat-camera. The other baddies receive secret updates via Cat-morse code. It's a dizzy surveillance circus, and a dreamy interlude. Bruce and Kitka dance in a lounge, serenaded by a magenta-lit vocalist singing "Plaisir D'Amour." He really likes her, and one decent ambiguity in this howling megaphone of a movie is that she sorta seems to like him.

They cozy up in a horse-drawn carriage, and the Bat-signal fills the sky. Bruce assures her that Batman and Robin must be racing to police headquarters.

"I close my eyes," Kitka/Catwoman says, "And I dream of those savage Cossacks racing over the steppes on their brutal mission."

"How strange," he responds. "I close… MY eyes.. and I dream of something… quite… ASTONISHINGLY different."

Their eyes close. His cheek rubs her temple.

" Da , da ," she says, "Keep your eyes closed. Continue with this dream."

"The dream continues," Bruce whispers. "It approaches a climax!"

" Nyet ," she purrs. "Not so fast. Be more slow."

Kapow! Meriwether was 11 years past a Miss America crown. West had only just been that guy from that Nestle Quik commercial . These roles would later be played by various Oscar winners, and I'm not sure either performer is being asked for anything here beyond attractive teasing. But their scenes sizzle like nothing else in Bat cinema. His patrician demeanor, her thick Badenov accent, the fact they're both lying to each other about almost everything: We're in the realm of pure screwball.

And this is all before Batman has to spend two minutes running around a pier, desperately trying to find a safe place to throw a gigantic bomb. Watch out, nuns! Oh no, a baby! Mind the tuba! Now surely, Batman, you won't blow up those poor birds?

Will Batman ever stop running? WarnerMedia prays no. As long as I've been alive, the character has been a prize jealously guarded by his corporate parent. One movie every few years, one cartoon at a time, no Smallville cameo for fear of brand diffusion — and remember the near-decade separating George Clooney from Christian Bale ? The latter wasn't one of our modern franchise extensions, Spider-Verse or Cobra Kai or Force Awakens , a sequel-as-rescue-mission that honors and fixes what came before. Batman Begins hated Batman & Robin , and wanted you to know.

That business model collapsed. Witness the infinity buffet. Barring further COVID delays, we are two months from Robert Pattinson headlining The Batman . He's taking over the cowl from Ben Affleck — except not, because Affleck will be back in The Flash . So will Michael Keaton — thanks, multiverse! — who will also be in Batgirl . Every era can coexist, and must , really. The primary vehicle for filmed blockbuster entertainment is no longer the individual film but the Holy Archive. HBO Max has already planned two TV spin-offs from The Batman , which will play alongside a new animated series ( Caped Crusader ) and the aggressive animated parody of Harley Quinn . I count six or seven semi-regular Batman titles published monthly by DC Comics, not to mention a galaxy of Gotham titles: Catwoman , Nightwing , Joker , Robin , Batgirls . I'm forgetting something. I'm forgetting Titans .

This is the normal showbiz bet for the 2020s: No one will ever get tired of anything! Is that right, though? My predictions are always wrong, but I doubt The Batman will put up Dark Knight numbers (at least partly because COVID keeps crunching the theatrical window to dust). Batfleck, known for their amiable disposition, may yet wage a culture war against Pattzman. We live in a society where a Joker movie without Batman significantly outgrossed a Batman movie with Superman. The trendiest character from the Gotham corner of DC is Harley Quinn, whose whole vibe (pansexual bazooka graffiti?) is way more contemporary than the angry man with a butler. My own favorite piece of Bat-lore this past decade was Gotham , a garish nightmare soap that compellingly suggested Bruce Wayne is the worst part of his own mythology. How did we get here, and where are we going? Is Batman evolving past Batman?

Several thousand hours of my life have been spent reading, watching, or playing Batman in one form or another. This makes me embarrassingly uninformed in the context of terrestrial geekdom, so I can't pretend any unusual expertise. In fairness, Batman has been around long enough to disprove any expert opinion. Best to avoid definitive statements. Something in the canon always disproves something else in the canon, just like the Bible or the Constitution.

The films are a relatively small part of the legacy, in terms of pure intake hours. Yet their importance is obvious. Their stylistic decisions trickled down to other blockbusters, throughout the superhero genre, and into daily life. Bats are objectively disgusting animals, but I'm not sure the average person even sees the word "bat" without silently adding "-man" on the end.

In that vast history, West's Batman makes a strange place to start. It's a hoot, produced in a short burst. The seams show: Stock footage, obvious stuntmen. A climactic fistfight atop the pre-atomic submarine looks choreographed on-the-fly: What a fun day in the big water tank! Cheapness isn't always a virtue, and Martinson's framing is dangerously multicam. The Batman-Catwoman date is the best part of the movie, but the act loses that thread, and depends way too much on Meredith's clowning.

Still, nobody mentions murdered parents. The plot hinges on an "instant whiskey maker" which dehydrates humans into dust. A shark attacks, and explodes. The heroes get rescued from certain torpedo death by what Robin soberly calls "the nobility of the almost-human porpoise." (Ward gets all the best lines. The Riddler riddles, "What weighs six ounces, sits in a tree, and is very dangerous?" Robin misses no beat: "A sparrow with a machine gun!") As the Dynamic Duo drive their Batboat into open ocean, you spot the propellers of the camera helicopter filming them, and it's awesome. Will this character ever feel so weightless again? Is breeziness a lost virtue? It took half a century to make another proper Bat-comedy, and that one was built on computers, cost $80 million, and still aimed for post-ironic feels. In 1966, you could still drive up to a wharf in Santa Barbara, draw arched eyebrows on a bright blue mask, have a few laughs, and call it a Batman movie.

So the '66 Batman 's contribution is crucial, and proof that there really might be nothing funnier than a rich man wearing Bat ears. The same year saw the release of Django , Tokyo Drifter , Persona , Seconds , Blowup , and The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly . These were old traditions exploded, sexy and violent and out there. Did it feel like a new revolution every week? Batman sits square in that company, the proverbial middle manager at the acid test. (An early salute from an ethnically Irish police force suggests darkness on the edge of crazytown; it's basically the mid-60s LAPD waving hi to their Bat-buddy, which should terrify anyone who knows anything about the mid-60s LAPD.) But West and Ward were at the same wild cinematic party, and its achievements grew more singular as genre history turned against it. "We were the movie serials of the 1930s and 1940s done against a fun-house background," West declares in his memoir. A decade later, Star Wars went the other direction , reimagining the old serials with religious awe. We have so many cathedrals lately, and I miss the funhouse.

Back to the Batcave is very entertaining, by the way, and essential reading for fans curious about the Bat-grind. West is so funny about his costume's sheer impossibility: abrasive tights, mask so hot someone had to hairdryer sweat off him between takes. He had no peripheral vision. "It didn't take long for me to figure out how not to get choked by the cape." Don't you love that phrase, how not to get choked by the cape ? And West summons his own Hollywood once upon a time, recalling years in an apartment by the beach with his dog (plus occasional motorcycle-dad visits with the kids). "In those days, Malibu was uncrowded and a lot of fun," he writes. "It wasn't tacky, a house on every square foot of beachfront; it didn't reek of new money, just mystique, a sense of fun and freedom and youth." Is he only writing about the California coastline? The first Batman movie is fun and free. Now we're crowded.

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Bruce Wayne

Bruce Wayne is the only son of the late Thomas and the late Martha Wayne and the heir to the Wayne fortune. After his parents were mugged and murdered by a masked gunman , Bruce began to question the inner workings of Gotham and along with his allies sought to uncover the corruption destroying the city and get to the reason behind his parents' murder.

Ra's al Ghul had inspired Bruce to achieve his higher purpose, leading to him seeking training to become Gotham's protector, a role he would continue to fulfill years later, bringing Ra's' prediction of Gotham's Dark Knight to fruition.

• 1.1 Early life
• 1.2 Death of Bruce's parents
• 1.3 Inner workings of Gotham
• 1.4.1 Captured by Theo Galavan
• 1.4.2 Confronting his parents' killer
• 1.4.3 Living on the streets
• 1.4.4 Investigating Pinewood Farms
• 1.4.5 Investigating the Court of Owls
• 1.4.6 Alliance with the Whisper Gang
• 1.5 Jerome's Return
• 1.6 Training with the Sensei
• 1.7 Return to Gotham
• 1.8.1 Going Down A Dark Path
• 1.8.2 Finding his true calling
• 1.9 Meeting Jeremiah Valeska
• 1.10 No Man's Land
• 1.11 A Dark Knight Rises
• 2 Personality
• 3 Physical appearance
• 4 Abilities
• 5.1 Former equipment
• 7.1 Season 1
• 7.2 Season 2
• 7.3 Season 3
• 7.4 Season 4
• 7.5 Season 5
• 9 Behind the scenes
• 10 References

Biography [ ]

Early life [ ].

Bruce was born to Thomas and Martha Wayne. Bruce's parents celebrated his second birthday by going camping in a forest. He and his father climbed a tree and ate oranges, while his mother sang to herself while building a fire. Bruce and his father had a yearly tradition of taking a hike, placing rocks at the top of a peak, and watching the sunrise in the morning. Whenever he gets sick, his mother would stay with him and read to him until he fell asleep. On his seventh birthday, about fifty kids came over to celebrate, but Bruce was off outside on his own, obsessed with the bright red wagon that his father gave him as a present. He spent the whole day in the garden collecting rocks with his wagon, and when he was asked by Alfred what he was going to do with them Bruce told him "I'm gonna build a home for my wagon, a secret place, that only I know about". When he was seven years old, he rowed his boat in the middle of a storm and it greatly frightened his father and Alfred. When he came back, his father cried tears of joy and hugged him. [citation needed]

Death of Bruce's parents [ ]

Bruce kneeling at his parent's dead bodies screaming.

After leaving the theater after seeing The Mark of Zorro at the Monarch Theatre [1] , Bruce and his parents were mugged by a disguised, armed man. Although both Thomas and Martha gave the mugger what he wanted without any trouble, the mugger killed both of them in front of Bruce before running off. Bruce was left screaming over his parent's lifeless bodies. When police arrived on the scene, Bruce was comforted by Detective Jim Gordon , who promised to find the killer. Bruce was then taken home by his family's butler, Alfred Pennyworth . Gordon and his partner Harvey Bullock were able to kill the man that supposedly murdered the Waynes, and Bruce thanked Gordon when they met again at his parents' funeral.

Later, Gordon arrived at Wayne Manor and confessed to Bruce that the man everyone had thought murdered his parents been framed, but asked that he stay quiet about it so that he could find the real killer. Bruce agreed to this as he was glad his parent's killer was still alive, as he wanted to see him again. [2]

In his quest to conquer fear, Bruce tried to test himself by holding his hand over a lit candle, attempting to resist the physical pain. He was caught by Alfred Pennyworth while doing so and attempted to hide his hand behind his back before showing Alfred and being harshly yelled at. Bruce was then comforted by Alfred after the butler realized his mistake of yelling at him. He later arrived in the middle of a conversation between Detective Gordon and Alfred, as the butler had summoned him to the Manor in an attempt to convince him to talk some sense into Bruce, who hadn't been sleeping, and was imposing physical harm upon himself. After Gordon suggested he talk to someone to help him cope with his parent's death, Bruce refused, asking the detective whether talking to someone helped him deal with the horrible things he had seen during the war he had served in. Though Gordon attempted to lie, Bruce knew otherwise, calling him a "terrible liar". Ending the conversation, Bruce offered to give money to the homeless children of Gotham, who had been kidnapped and later rescued by Gordon and Bullock . Detective Gordon however, explained that wasn't how it worked, and that they needed someone who cared about them as Alfred did for Bruce. Still wanting to help, Bruce offered to buy them all new clothes, as they looked "awfully ragged". [3]

At Wayne Manor , Bruce was pestered by Alfred Pennyworth, who in an attempt to have some fun with him, started a play sword fight between the two, using wooden canes. After beating the butler, as he had repeatedly told him to stop, Bruce accidentally knocked over the police files of his parent's deaths. They were discovered by Alfred when he picked them up off the floor and questioned Bruce as to why he would want to look at them, as they were horrible and would give him nightmares. Bruce explained he was searching for clues within the files, attempting to find anything that could deduce the identity of his parent's killers. He was later berated by Alfred for refusing to eat anything, though he later ate while watching the news about the recent capture of the vigilante known as The Balloonman . [4]

Bruce discussed the recent developments of Arkham Asylum with Detective Gordon , and the gang war brewing because of it. He sought to help Gordon intending not to let his parents' dreams die with them, as they had fought for years to get a new Asylum opened. He later awakened from a nightmare of his parents' murder and continued to look through files pertaining to the Arkham Plant, hoping to find a connection between the recent murders of the councilmen and his parents' death. Bruce requested that Alfred gave him any other files related to it. Bruce later watched the news in horror as Mayor James announced what would be done with the Arkham Plant. The Arkham Asylum would be reopened as his parents had hoped, but the Plant had been secretly split between Maroni and Falcone to Bruce's dismay. This led Bruce to believe that everything his parents had worked for was falling into the hands of criminals, before being reminded by Gordon, that he was still alive and that it wasn't too late for everything to be fixed. [5]

Inner workings of Gotham [ ]

Bruce later questioned how Gotham City worked, as he was troubled by the fact that the Falcone and Maroni crime families each got substantial pieces of the Arkham Project. He later agreed to go to the Wayne Enterprises charitable ball intending to question the board members about Arkham Asylum , after deducing from several files pertaining to the project that the company most likely gave Falcone and Maroni their shares in the Arkham Project. He later met with Molly Mathis of Wayne Enterprises' Middle Management, about the several irregularities he found within the Arkham deal. Soon after, former biochemist Stan Potolsky revealed to the attendants of the ball that he had created the drug Viper for WellZyn , which was a subsidiary of Wayne Enterprises. Despite Mathis telling him otherwise, Bruce later discovered she was the onsite liaison between the two companies, leading him to believe otherwise. [6]

While watching the news about the recent killings of the firstborn children of Gotham's wealthier citizens, Bruce refused to leave Gotham to go to the lake house, as Alfred suggested. As Bruce was under the mindset that there was still work to be done with his investigations of Wayne Enterprises and the murderer of his parents, he also noted that there was no one to take him from, furthering his reasoning for staying. [7]

Bruce was later introduced to Renee Montoya and Crispus Allen by Jim Gordon after it was revealed that he didn't kill Oswald Cobblepot as he was instructed to do, and was on the run from the Falcone crime family . It was explained by Gordon that he didn't know whether he'd be able to keep his promise of finding Bruce's parents killer as he had promised. Bruce got frustrated towards Gordon when he attempted to treat him like a child by not being specific about what he had done, and why he expected to die. He was then guaranteed by Detective Gordon that he could trust Allen and Montoya if anything happened to him, though he would try to work it out. Bruce embraced Gordon before he left. [8]

Despite his protest, Bruce was soon forced to re-enroll in Anders Preparatory Academy by Alfred, who thought he needed to be around children his own age. Later, while reading a book outside of the school, Bruce was approached and greeted by Tommy Elliot who questioned him about his parent's death, asking several questions, which prompted Bruce to leave for class. While walking attempting to leave the school, walking on a stairwell, Bruce was once more taunted by Tommy, who purposely got Bruce's name wrong, though Bruce corrected him. After mentioning Bruce's deceased mother, Bruce slapped Tommy, getting beat up by the latter because of this. Alfred asked Bruce what had happened when he came outside, to which Bruce explained the situation. Taking Bruce to Tommy Elliot's house for revenge, Alfred also gave him his father's watch to use as a knuckle duster. Knocking on Elliot's door, Bruce told him that the two of them had unfinished business, proceeding to beat him, until being stopped by Alfred. Bruce then left with Alfred, selecting pizza for dinner for the night. Later on at Wayne Manor, Bruce asked Alfred whether he could teach him to fight, which Alfred told him that he could. [9]

Bruce was later brought a sketch of his parent's murderer by Jim Gordon as described by Selina Kyle . He was asked by Gordon whether or not he recognized the man, which Bruce didn't. Afterward, Bruce agreed to let Kyle stay at Wayne Manor, despite Alfred's protests, as she needed a safe place to stay, and was their best shot at finding out who had killed Bruce's parents. Bruce later offended Selina by asking her about her parents, catching her later attempting to leave through the window, apologizing if making her talk about her family upset her. Afterward, Bruce was asked whether he had ever kissed a girl and whether he wanted to. Struggling to find an answer, Bruce was retrieved by Alfred, as it was time for his studies. Bruce later continued his training, trying to develop self-discipline and willpower, but was told by Selina that it wouldn't work, as, on the streets of Gotham, one needed to be mean and ruthless, which Bruce wasn't. The two later had a food fight, after Selina threw a donut at Bruce, telling him that if he could hit her with a piece of food, she'd let him kiss her. [10]

Bruce and Selina were later forced to flee Wayne Manor, after an assassin was let into the residence by Alfred, posing as a woman who had been an accident. Leaving the manor, Bruce followed Selina into Gotham City, the latter who had convinced him that the assassin was there for him and not her. In the city, Bruce made his way to a payphone, and while attempting to call Alfred, he was forced to flee after Selina, who revealed that the assassin was there to kill her, and not him, and she had only told him so so that the two could hang out a while longer. After having made his way to a rooftop following Kyle, Bruce had to jump over to another roof, almost falling, though he was saved by Selina. Proving that he had earned the right to hang out with her, Bruce was taken to the Flea , a mall of sorts for street kids, there getting a change of clothes, and encountering Ivy Pepper before leaving for The Factory with Selina. At the factory, Bruce witnessed as Selina attempted to sell several items she had stolen from his home to her fence, Clyde , though after he offered prices that were extremely lower than what the items were actually worth, the two attempted to leave. However, the two were prevented from doing so by Clyde, who threatened to poke Bruce's eyes out, if Selina didn't cooperate with him. Being locked into a room with Selina, the two later escaped after Selina knocked out one of Larissa Diaz 's men who had come in. Afterward, Bruce distracted Diaz long enough for Selina to make her escape, though after being caught the assassin he was warned not to mistake bravery for common sense. Bruce was then discovered by Alfred, and the two embraced. Bruce was later visited by Selina at Wayne Manor, who wanted to properly say goodbye, also returning the items she had stolen from the residence, all except one. He was then kissed by Kyle, who left, and when Alfred came in the room questioning as to who he'd been talking to, Bruce lied telling him that he had been thinking out loud. [11]

Leaving Gotham for Switzerland for several weeks afterward, Bruce had Alfred drive him around in search of Selina. Getting out of the car, Bruce pleaded with Alfred to allow him to circle around the block once, and then they would go home. While on the street, Bruce once more encountered Ivy Pepper, who he asked to pass along the message to Selina that he was looking for her, though Pepper only agreed after Bruce had Alfred give her twenty bucks. While playing chess by himself at Wayne Manor, he was interrupted by Selina who had arrived there after receiving his message. Giving her a snow globe that was reminiscent of the town he and Alfred had stayed in, Bruce followed by attempting to let Selina live at the Manor, in exchange for Kyle helping him find the man who killed his parents, though Bruce was told by Kyle that she hadn't seen his parents' killers, and had only said that to get out of juvie. He was later discovered by Alfred in tears, and after a pep talk of sorts from the latter, Bruce was determined to find other leads. [12]

Bruce was later visited by Detective Gordon who told him that Selina had revealed to him that she had lied about seeing the face of the killer of Bruce's parents, to which Bruce agreed that she had told him the same thing. Though Gordon persisted that it didn't put them back at square one, Bruce released Gordon from his promise of finding his parent's killer, as he'd pursue the matter on his own. [13]

Even though his father was no longer alive, Bruce decided to continue the yearly tradition the two had of hiking, rejecting Alfred's offers to come with him. After angrily walking down the hill from his campsite, Bruce fell and sprained his ankle. Struggling to get back up to the campsite, when he finally did, he discovered Alfred, who had been there for over an hour. After being helped up by Alfred, the two stayed the night, with Bruce watching the sunrise as he did with his father. [14]

Bruce was told by Alfred that Wayne Enterprises had called to confirm his meeting with the board of directors. Though Alfred was hesitant about him going, Bruce reiterated that he had made up his mind about the situation. During his meeting with the board, Bruce questioned the directors about underworld involvement in the Arkham project and chemical warfare manufacturing within WellZyn . Though the board of directors said they would look into them, one of the members mentioned to Bruce that he hadn't brought up any points with actual proof behind them, prompting Bruce to tell them that he hadn't told them all that he knew and that he hoped that they did look into the issues, as he'd bring them up at the next shareholders meeting, with possible legal action. [15]

After Reginald Payne tracked down Alfred, and Bruce walked in on the two talking, he insisted that Reggie stays with them a few days. Coming into the manner after training, Bruce ran into Reggie and the two sparred, though Alfred put a stop to it. Bruce later brought up a bottle of wine and listened to the two tell stories. He seemingly excused himself to bed when Reggie stepped out of line, taunting Alfred, but waited outside of the door, listening to the rest of their conversation. Later that night, Bruce discovered Alfred bleeding in his father's study, after having been stabbed by Reggie, immediately trying to stop the loss of blood, and calling for help. [16]

At the hospital, Bruce was brought a bagel by the visiting Detective Gordon. When they were questioned as to who had stabbed Alfred, Bruce initially was going to reveal Reggie's identity to Gordon, though he followed Alfred's lead, when the butler interrupted him, with Alfred later telling him that he was going to track down Reggie himself, though Bruce ordered him back to bed. Later, Bruce was visited by Selina Kyle who he revealed to his suspicion that Reggie had been sent to spy on him and Alfred by Wayne Enterprises, and that he planned on tracking down Reggie, as he could find out who specifically sent him, from the latter. Though Selina offered to help, Bruce rejected her offer on the account of not wanting anyone else to get hurt because of him. [17]

At Wayne Manor, Bruce was visited by Gordon, who knew he and Alfred had lied about not knowing the identity of the man who had stabbed Alfred, though Bruce denied it. Putting together that Alfred wanted to go after the man himself, Bruce was warned by Gordon to stay out of it, as it wasn't his fight. He later visited every gun range in search of Reggie, after learning from Alfred that, that was where he was most likely to be. After searching to no avail, Bruce went to Selina for assistance, with the two finding him at a shooting gallery. There, Bruce questioned Reggie as to who had sent him, with Selina threatening to drop Reggie's "medicine" out of the window if he didn't tell them. After threading to tell Bunderslaw that Bruce was onto him, Bruce witnessed Selina push Reggie out of the window to his death, when the latter attempted to grab his bag from the windowsill. [18]

Bruce later plotted with Selina to get the key to Bunderslaw's safe, as every executive of Wayne Enterprises had one, and any secrets that he had, would be in there. Deciding to attend the Wayne Enterprises charity ball with Selina, Bruce was able to get her close enough to Bunderslaw so that she could steal his key. [19]

During a tour of Wayne Enterprises, Bruce excuses himself to go to the bathroom, though instead pulls the building's fire alarm. As everyone exited the building, Bruce made his way into Bunderslaw's office, finding his safe and unlocking it, though there was nothing in it. Afterward, he was confronted by Bunderslaw himself, who had been expecting him. Bruce's suspicions were confirmed by Bunderslaw, who also revealed that Bruce's father and grandfather had also known about the illegal activities going on in Wayne Enterprises, and originally came in with his secret files demanding justice, though he came to understand the reality of the business world. Though Bruce argued against this, Bunderslaw begged him to reconsider, as he had an opportunity to the blessed life his parents had wanted for him. The pair's conversation was interrupted by Lucius Fox , who came in looking for Bruce, as a public relations person was frantically searching for him. Before leaving Wayne Enterprise, Bruce was told by Lucius that his father was a true stoic, who kept his best self-hidden and that he wasn't the man the company thought he was. He later revealed this, and the circumstances of Reggie's death to Alfred at Wayne Manor. [20] Two weeks later, Bruce tore apart his father's study looking for evidence of his secret life. In the midst of giving up, Bruce remembered Lucius Fox had called his father a stoic, bringing Marcus Aurelius to mind, a Roman Emperor who was also a stoic. Opening a book about him, Bruce discovered a remote in the back of the book, and after a quick debate with Alfred on whether or not to press it, Bruce did so, which revealed a secret passageway behind the fireplace. [21]

Finding his father's secret room [ ]

Upon traveling to the passageway Bruce and Alfred stumbled upon a steel door with only a keypad barring them from the entrance. After many tries, Bruce couldn't get the code right to his dismay. In the middle of his attempts, Gordon showed up to Wayne Manor to announce his firing and how in order for him to return to GCPD to solve The Wayne Murders, he has to do a favor for Penguin and is honor-bound not to do it. Enraged, Bruce told him that in order to do something right, one has to be prepared to do something ugly first, prompting Gordon to take up the favor. Taking his own advice, Bruce smashed the keypad and prepared to make a homemade fertilizer bomb to blow the door open. Alfred catches wind of this and tries to stop him only for Bruce to tell him, to make him tea if he refuses to help. Alfred instead advises him, that in order to blow the door open he needs more fertilizer and containers to do so. When they finished making the bomb, they successfully blew the door open. Inside the room, they find among most things, a workplace with an advanced computer, weaponry, bulletproof vests, Newspaper clippings, and a desk. On the desk, Bruce discovered a letter addressed to him from his father. Bruce reads through it realizing that Thomas wrote it as a precaution, should he end up dying. Thomas through the letter tells Bruce that he cannot have happiness and truth and must choose between the two, strongly suggesting the former unless Bruce finds a true calling. [22]

Bruce decided to look through his father's computer to find any secrets regarding Wayne Enterprises. Alfred, disgusted at all the violence brought to them along with the arsenal Thomas had at his disposal, promptly smashes the computer despite Bruce's protests. Angry at him, Bruce fired Alfred which devastates them both. When Bruce realizes that Alfred was just trying to protect him, he goes to the train station to rehire him in exchange for further training. In exchange, Bruce agrees to go back to school and do what Alfred says when he says it. Bruce agrees to the conditions, though demands that Alfred finds a way to fix the computer. [23]

Days later, Bruce and Alfred attended the Gotham Children's Hospital Gala, much to Bruce's reluctance. There Bruce and Alfred met Leslie Thompkins, and later Bruce encountered Selina who attended the event to score quick cash grabs. When he asks if she'd like to stay and watch the magician hosting the events, she refused regarding her thievery as work. The Magician, Rudolfo appears and asks for Bruce as his volunteer. He reluctantly goes on stage where he's subjected to the sawing in half trick, said trick scaring Alfred half to death before it turns out to be fake. As Bruce leaves the stage, Rudolfo kills Deputy Mayor Kane with a throwing knife revealing himself and his assistant to be Jerome Valeska and Barbara Kean . The duo promptly holds the gala hostage while Alfred protects Bruce from more of Jerome's thugs. Bruce spots Selina fleeing and gives chase. Selina helps him escape through a passageway, but Bruce refuses to let anything happen to Alfred and runs back for him. He hides behind the curtains while Jerome makes his demands before Jerome demands that Bruce comes out from hiding lest Alfred dies. Bruce was about to, before being stopped by Gordon, but he doesn't want Alfred dead. Gordon lets him go and Bruce makes his presence known. When Alfred berates Bruce, Bruce tells him there's a gun in his jacket and Gordon is behind the curtain. Alfred manages to get and conceal the gun before Jerome holds Bruce at knifepoint. Gordon comes busting in prompting a standoff between Gordon, Alfred, and Jerome. The standoff ends when Theo Galavan kills Jerome saving Bruce reuniting him with Alfred. When all is over Alfred notices Gordon with Lee and accuses Bruce of knowing, which he denies. [24]

After Bruce makes good on his promise returning to school, he gets into the car and is informed by Alfred that Galavan has invited him to dinner. Bruce, appreciative of Theo saving his life, agrees to attend. Alfred then makes good on his own promise to train Bruce by handing him gym clothes and telling him to run from school to Wayne Manor. Bruce later meets Theo at the restaurant to thank him, and Theo in turn, remarks on the lack of progress made in the Wayne murder. While they talk Bruce notices a blonde girl playing around on a fountain outside. Theo taking notice introduces her as Silver St. Cloud , his niece, and ward who also lost her parents. Theo noticing his attraction to her also brings up that soon, Silver would be attending the same school as Bruce further prompting him to get to know her. [25]

At Wayne Manor in Thomas' lair, Alfred and Bruce had a sparring session, in which Alfred told him to him that his enemies would fight dirty, putting Bruce in a chokehold. Bruce then bit Alfred to free himself and voiced his impatience for Lucius Fox to repair his father's computer, as he was ready to begin. However, Bruce was told by Alfred that he'd tell him when he was ready, and though Bruce emphasized that he was, Alfred proved otherwise hitting him in the nose, after distracting him with the information that Silver St. Cloud had called to invite him to dinner at her house. hat night at the Galavan's penthouse, Bruce had dinner with the Galavan family, and Tabitha commented on how cute he and Silver were. Later, Theo confessed to Bruce, that he was aware that Bruce's father had been a good man, but despite that, bad things happened at Wayne Enterprise. Bruce was then told he was mature for his age and ready to handle the problems that were going on at Wayne Enterprises, though he would need some help. Theo then offered to be that person once he became Mayor. [26]

Bruce had Silver over to Wayne Manor and was surprised when Selina snuck in through the window. Silver then comes into the study, and Bruce introduces the two. Bruce then went to go tell Alfred to set another place at lunch for Selina, at the request of Silver. Later, Selina asks Bruce if he's really buying Silver's act, and then proceeds to insult her. Silver then leaves with tears in her eyes, and Selina tries to tell Bruce that Silver is bad news. However, Bruce, angry at what Selina had done, told her that he wanted her to leave. Bruce then told her that the entire time he had thought she was his friend, though she had no idea what that meant. Soon after, Bruce visited the Galavan's penthouse firstly encountering Theo, who complimented his moral compass and noted the similarities between the two. However, the two were interrupted when Silver arrives happy to see him again. [27]

Bruce later visits Galavan's home to meet with Theo. When he arrived he encountered Silver who kept him company before Theo arrived. In Theo's office, Bruce was asked by Theo that if he could have one dream come true, what it would be. Bruce confessed that it was to find and kill the murderer of his parents, and Theo then confessed that his greatest dream was to help the city and presented an opportunity for both to fulfill what they wanted. Theo then revealed to Bruce the illegal activities going on at Wayne Enterprises. Bruce vowed to Galavan that he would look into all of it, and stop whoever was responsible for the acts. However, Galavan told him he couldn't as Wayne Enterprises had a board that would kill to protect its secrets. Galavan then proposed to buy the shares Bruce controlled in his company in exchange for an envelope with the identity of the man who had killed Bruce's parents. Bruce later asks Alfred how many years would it take for him to gain the skills to take down the corruption at Wayne Enterprises. However, Alfred tells him that there wasn't a set timeline. Overwhelmed by the dilemma, Bruce tells Alfred about Galavan's proposal, and Alfred stresses that the proposal was extortion. However, Bruce told him he couldn't help but considered it because if Galavan could truly fix the corruption at Wayne Enterprises it was his moral duty to allow him to do so. Alfred then reminded Bruce that Wayne Enterprises wasn't his parent's legacy, but that he was. Bruce then began crying asking Alfred if he was wrong to just want it all to be over, and the latter embraced him. Later, Bruce and Alfred visited the Galavan penthouse for Bruce to sign over his shares of Wayne Enterprises, but at the last moment, Bruce refused to sign the documents. Suddenly, Gordon and the GCPD burst into the penthouse to arrest Galavan for kidnapping Mayor James, but before they did so, he threw the envelope with the Wayne's killer in the fire, leaving Bruce devastated. [28]

Bruce later invited Silver to Wayne Manor in an attempt to get information out of her. However, Alfred arrives dismissing Silver and thwarting Bruce's plan. However, before she leaves, Bruce is given a key to Silver's hotel room at the Kane Hotel . Afterward, Bruce and Alfred argue over Alfred dismissing Silver, and Bruce is forbidden by Alfred to see Silver as he could be jeopardized if he attempted to get information out of Silver. After Bruce refuses to listen to Alfred, he decides to become his jailer to prevent the latter from seeing Silver and pursuing Galavan's claims. Later, Bruce pretended to head for bed, saying goodnight to Alfred, but the butler reveals to having sent the taxi he called in secret away, and that he had also taken the key Silver had given him, without Bruce noticing. Despite that, Bruce decides not to give up to get the information Galavan had. The next day, Bruce tried to sneak out to see Silver. However, Selina Kyle appeared to prevent him from doing so, as unlike before, she had proof to back up her claims. [29] Bruce was then presented with a file that Selina had stolen indicating that Silver had been sent to spy on him and push him to sell his company. [30]

Bruce at the altar, as Creel prepared to kill him.

Bruce and Selina then hired The Knife to pretend to hold him and Silver hostage to get the truth out of the latter. Before hiding in a tree, Bruce was told by Selina that the best liars always told the truth. Later Bruce meets with Silver to ask her to tell Theo he was willing to pay for the best defense attorneys, seeing as his funds had been frozen if he agreed to give the name of the murderer of Bruce's parents. However Silver was hesitant to do so at first, however, Bruce said he'd believe whatever Galavan told her because it would come from her. Bruce then told her that he never met anyone like her, he trusted her with his life and felt tied to her, afterward kissing her. While leaving school, Bruce receives a call from Silver informing him that Theo had accepted his deal and had told her the name of his parent's killer. However seconds later at their agreed meeting site, The Knife appears in his van, having previously abducted Silver, and orders Bruce to get in or he would kill her. While being interrogated by The Knife, he pretends to takes Bruce to the back of the building to torture him, though while he does so, Bruce pretended to beg Silver to tell The Knife what she knows. Silver confesses to Bruce that her uncle never told her the name, and her mission was to keep him busy until Galavan was released. After The Knife gets Silver to reveal the Waynes' killer name, "M. Malone", Bruce and Selina appear to reveal that everything was staged to force her, to tell the truth. With Silver's true intentions exposed, Silver told Bruce her uncle would kill her when he discovered what had transpired, but Bruce chose to ignore her. Finally, Bruce was told by Silver that she believed what he had told her earlier outside the school and that he wasn't acting like himself, but Bruce told her she was wrong. Later at Wayne Manor, Bruce is commended by Selina for changing, and after she leaves Theo Galavan arrives to abduct him. [30]

Captured by Theo Galavan [ ]

Bruce is brought to the Galavan's penthouse with a hood over his head, and his hands tied. Theo reveals his true name and tells Bruce about the events that had transpired between their two families. He then told Bruce of the prophecy that his family's patron saint promised, of the day when the blood of nine men of Gotham City and the Son of Gotham were slain by righteous hand to wash away the sins of the city. Father Creel then appeared to begin the preparations for the sacrifice so that at midnight, the Dumas family could finally be avenged. Afterward, Bruce was taken to a cell. He was later visited by Silver and reluctantly allows her to stay. The two had a conversation, and Silver eventually tries to break Bruce out, though the two are caught by Theo. Back in the cell, Bruce tells her he knew the entire thing was a ruse and denies having feelings for her, telling her that he pitied her. Near midnight, Bruce admits to Silver of not being scared of his imminent death that night because he'd soon be reunited with his parents. At that moment, Theo appeared outside the cell with the monks to escort him to the altar, however before leaving Bruce turns around to kiss Silver and confess his love for her to convince Theo that she had succeeded in her objective. Bruce is brought to the altar where several monks of the Order of St. Dumas recite the prophecy asking for the death of the Son of Gotham. Bruce was approached by Father Creel brandishing the ceremonial knife and sought to complete the ceremony, but Silver raises her voice in protest, interrupting it. Bruce is then rescued by Gordon, Alfred, Selina, Bullock, and Penguin who kill several of the monks and Father Creel. He is released by Alfred and Selina, and while leaving thanks them but tells the two he had a feasible escape plan. [31]

Confronting his parents' killer [ ]

Bruce was then forced by Alfred to spend a month in Switzerland. After returning, he had a discussion with Leslie Thompkins about his abduction. Bruce confessed that the situation made him feel alive and invigorated, and with ?a second chance at life, he was more determined than ever to find the murderer of his parents. Later in his father's lair, Bruce furiously hit a punching bag until Alfred arrived. Bruce then blamed Alfred for making them go to Switzerland, as they wasted a month they could have used to search for "M. Malone". However, the butler stops Bruce from hitting the punching bag and informed Bruce that one of his GCPD contacts had found a file on the killer, Patrick "Matches" Malone. After revealing that he planned to kill Malone when they found him, Alfred made it clear that he would do it himself as Bruce was too young to have a death on his conscious. Bruce initially rejected the idea, but eventually, Alfred made him accept the deal. Bruce later had Selina over to the manor, asking her to get him a gun. Selina does her best to convince him to change his mind because it would change him forever, but Bruce was counting on that. [32]

Bruce confronting Matches Malone.

Bruce met with Selina to give him the gun he had requested, with the latter warning that guns only served one purpose. Bruce then returned to Wayne Manor and Alfred told Bruce that to find Malone they were to visit a former associate of his nicknamed Cupcake, who spent ten years in Blackgate Penitentiary because of Matches. Alfred informed Bruce that Cupcake led a criminal gang known as The Mutants. Soon after, the two visited the place where Cupcake organized fights among his gang. Although Alfred asks Bruce not to say anything, Bruce revealed his identity and offered to pay him $ 50,000 in exchange for the whereabouts of Malone. Cupcake accepts the deal but also requires Alfred to fight him out of respect. Once defeated, Cupcake told Bruce to go see Jeri at the Celestial Gardens to find Malone, but right after, Alfred suddenly fainted due to Cupcake's blows from the fight. Later at the hospital, Alfred asks Bruce to do nothing till he recovered but once he goes unconscious, Bruce used the opportunity to go to the Celestial Gardens. After going to Celestial Gardens, Bruce met Jeri and she questioned him about his reasons for wanting to find Malone. After discovering the truth, she refused to reveal his whereabouts asking for a good reason. When justice and money didn't convince Jeri to do so, Bruce brings out the gun in his pocket but is unwilling to shoot her. After Bruce begins to leave, she finally decides to provide Malone's address in an attempt to intervene and play god. While leaving, Bruce encounters Gordon who tries to stop him, though the crowd grabs on to the latter on Jeri's orders, allowing Bruce to escape. Bruce later confronted Malone in his apartment, and although the latter didn't remember him at first, Bruce eventually jogs his memory. Despite threats from Bruce who threatened to shoot him, he refused to tell him who hired him, as the killer's code wasn't much, but it was all he had. When Bruce realizes that Malone wanted him to kill him, Malone confesses of being tired of committing so much evil in his life and not being punished. However, after considering it, Bruce decided not to kill him. Angrily, Malone reminds Bruce that he was a monster, but Bruce told him that although he wished he was a monster, he was just a man. He then drops the gun on the table and goes out into the hallway coming across Detective Gordon. At the same time, the two hear a gunshot of Malone committing suicide. Bruce later left Alfred a letter informing him he was going to live with Selina on the streets for a while to learn some things, and to honor his wishes not to bring him back. [33]

Living on the streets [ ]

Bruce was taken to a greenhouse where Ivy Pepper worked and informed that with Ivy's help, Selina intended on stealing Sonny Gilzean 's gang's money. After Bruce stated that he was not opposed to the idea, as it was stealing from criminals, Selina tells him that they were to wait, as Ivy put mushrooms in the gang's lunch, which would put them in a state of relaxed bliss. Bruce and Selina manage to steal money from the gang thanks to the gang members being drugged. Unfortunately, Sonny returns while they're in the middle of doing so, and catches the two attempting to flee with the money. Later, Bruce calls Sonny a coward for assaulting Selina after she cracked wise at him. Bruce was then beaten by Sunny, and remembering the advice of Alfred, Bruce takes a series of fierce punches from Sunny until Selina creates a distraction that gives him the chance to knock out Sunny and allow them to run away with the money in hand. Bruce's wounds were later tended to by Selina, and Bruce revealed that despite what Sonny did, he knew that he couldn't break him and that no one could. A month later, Bruce and Selina watched the announcement of Gordon's sentencing to Blackgate on television. [34]

Bruce conducting research on the streets.

Bruce and Selina stole a crook's money, and Bruce throws out some of the money into the streets, angering both the crook and Selina that Bruce was stupid enough to throw the money away. Later, Bruce takes Selina's jacket and sews the sleeve as she had ripped it. After she finds out, Selina thanks him and Gordon then arrives at their hideout. Bruce then stitched Gordon's wounds and called Alfred. The trio was brought back to Wayne Manor, and Bruce was present the next day when Gordon devised a plan to have Selina feed Captain Barnes false information so that Edward Nygma would lead him to the bodies of the people he had killed. Afterward, while Selina was taking a shower, Alfred told Bruce that Lucius had fixed his father's computer. However, Bruce was given the ultimatum of choosing the work, or Selina, as he wouldn't allow Bruce to put Selina's life in danger. Bruce decides not to go back to the city with Selina, though Selina takes it the wrong way, bidding a great life, and ending their friendship. [35]

Investigating Pinewood Farms [ ]

Bruce looked through his father's computer, and Alfred arrived down to the lair to inform him and Lucius that he had prepared a meal upstairs. However, on Thomas's calendar, Bruce discovers that he had scheduled a meeting with a woman named Karen Jennings about something called "Pinewood Farms" the same week he was killed. Wasting no time, Bruce and Alfred arrive at Karen's cabin in the woods where inside they are surprised to discover that Karen had a claw instead of a left hand due to an experiment. After Karen tells the two her backstory, Bruce then deduces that the program had been started up again, and demands that Karen takes him to the original Pinewood Farms facility. At the Pinewood facility, Bruce, Alfred, and Karen reach the building, but inside are chased by two assassins sent to capture Karen. Though they escaped, the police waited for the trio outside. At the GCPD, Bruce explained the situation to Captain Barnes, though he didn't like it. Barnes then orders that Karen is sent to Blackgate. At a diner, Bruce informs Gordon of what they had learned, and Gordon shares his suspicions that he suspected that the Philosopher was in charge of Pinewood, so he quickly begins to plan a way to prevent Karen from being sent to Blackgate since she was the only person who could identify him. After Bruce, Alfred, and Gordon hijack the truck, Karen tells Bruce that Thomas used to visit her frequently and treated her as if she were his daughter. However, she also reveals that his father was the one who initiated "Pinewood Farms", and although he had good intentions "The Philosopher" took advantage of him. Soon after, they were forced out of the truck as Victor Fries planted a trap for them. Though Gordon and Alfred tried to subdue Fries with their guns, they failed. Bruce was then embraced by Karen and witnessed her sacrifice to save them all, with Fries freezing her, then breaking her into pieces. Back at Wayne Manor, Bruce wonders how to move forward because Karen was the only lead they on identifying "The Philosopher". However, Lucius arrives with an important discovery after having sought scientists who had worked for Wayne Enterprises cross-referencing the words "Pinewood" and "philosopher". To the astonishment of the group, Fox showed them a photograph of the old Gotham cricket team where Thomas stood by his friend Hugo Strange, otherwise known as " The Philosopher". Bruce takes this discovery with extreme displeasure after discovering the fact that his father's death was ordered by one of his friends. [36]

Bruce was later informed by Gordon and Bullock that the evidence on Hugo Strange was not enough to imprison him. Annoyed by the bureaucracy of the situation, Bruce suggests that Gordon do the same thing to Strange as he did to Galavan, but Jim advises him not to take that route because he'd end up paying for it over and over again, as he did. Bruce later goes to a crime scene with Gordon and Bullock. Barnes approaches them and though Gordon asks to speak to him, he refuses at first, but Bruce insists and he gives Gordon three minutes to explain. Bruce later witnesses Azrael escaping from the GCPD officers who were shooting at him. At the GCPD, Bruce asks what Barnes plans to do about Strange, and Barnes tells him that he will assemble a Strike Force and call in all off-duty personnel. Barnes then told Bruce to stop meddling in matters that didn't concern him. Afterward, Gordon agrees with Barnes and tells Bruce to go home, as he couldn't make the moves he needed to make if he was worrying about Bruce. [37]

Bruce has Alfred drive him into the city to meet with Selina Kyle. On a rooftop, Bruce meets with Selina to find a way to get into Arkham to find incriminating evidence on Hugo Strange. Initially reluctant, Selina agrees to help him after realizing the possibility that Bridgit Pike was still alive, nevertheless, she decides to go alone. Bruce later arrives at Wayne Manor, and Alfred informs him that Galavan was coming for him. At Wayne Manor, Bruce and Alfred split up to make sure the house was secured. While doing so, Bruce finds a broken window. He later takes a sword off of the wall and throws it to Alfred when he saw the latter was battling Galavan in the study. However, Bruce flees, after Alfred is eventually defeated and thrown out of a window. Bruce runs into the car garage of the manor where he uses a car to bulldoze Azrael. Outside the manor, Azrael surprisingly stands unhurt and catches Bruce by the neck with a whip. But before he could kill Bruce with his sword, Gordon appears from behind him and shoots him with his gun, though it fails to kill him. Gordon, and Alfred who had limped his way to the front of the manor, then tended to Bruce. Afterward, Bruce witnessed Penguin and Butch arrive, and Butch shoots Theo who had gotten back up, with a rocket launcher, blowing him to smithereens. The two then leave, with Butch telling Bruce, Gordon, and Alfred good night. [38]

Bruce waited on top of a rooftop for Selina, but after Ivy Pepper arrives instead, he realizes that Selina is in trouble. Bruce then went to the GCPD to inform Gordon that Professor Strange had Selina Kyle. At Wayne Manor, Bruce is berated by Alfred for involving Selina, who was now in danger because of him. However, Gordon and Lucius Fox decide to use this opportunity to infiltrate Arkham Asylum and find the secret laboratory where Hugo Strange was creating monsters. Given that, and despite Alfred's protest, Bruce decides to accompany Lucius announcing that he'd ask for a tour as the Wayne Foundation gave the Asylum money every year. Bruce and Alfred later parted ways, and Alfred gives Bruce his blessing to go, telling him that Thomas Wayne fought very hard for what he believed in, and he wouldn't stop Bruce from doing the same thing. Outside of Arkham Asylum, Bruce and Lucius met with Hugo Strange, and Bruce asks for a tour, using the fact that he supplied the Asylum with a quarter of their operating budget to get one. He then told Strange that he wanted to talk with him, while Lucius looked around. In Strange's office, Hugo confronted Bruce about the real reason he was there. The conversation eventually shifted to the murder of Bruce's parents, and Bruce and Hugo both agree that there was someone to blame for the killing. Bruce and Hugo then discussed Thomas Wayne, with Hugo telling Bruce that Thomas' moral principles were what got him and Martha killed. Strange eventually asks Bruce whether he would trade his moral principles for one more day with his parents. Bruce then accuses him of ordering his parents' murder. Although Hugo tried to warn him to turn back and make the choice his father didn't. After Bruce made it clear that he would do the same as his father, Strange ordered that Bruce, Gordon, and Lucius be taken. Bruce was then taken out of Strange's office, as he was being taken out of the office, Bruce demanded to know what Strange had done to Selina Kyle. Bruce was then locked into a room with Lucius Fox, and Edward Nygma soon announced his presence over a microphone. Nygma told Bruce and Lucius that Strange had tasked him with finding out how much they knew about what Strange had been up to, and who they had told. [39]

Bruce and Lucius were at the mercy of Edward Nygma, who tries to find out everything they knew about who ran Indian Hill. Lucius suggests the answer to Nygma's question was Hugo Strange, though Bruce gave the answer of Wayne Enterprises, which was correct. Nygma then asked them who ran Wayne Enterprises. However, Bruce and Lucius gave the wrong answer, prompting Nygma to activate the poison gas. While unconscious, Bruce has several flashbacks. He and Lucius later wake up in the same room as Jim. Bruce received an apology from Jim for making the oath to find his parent's killer in the past. Soon after, Selina Kyle arrives in the room, and having manipulated her Bruce apologizes and tells her to escape. However, he is told by Selina that she'd do as she liked and that she had Bruce wrapped around her finger. Bruce, Lucius, and Gordon are later rescued by Selina who had manipulated Firefly into a fight with Mr. Freeze. The group went into Arkham's cafeteria where they witnessed the fight. After Gordon and Lucius disarmed the bomb Strange had activated, Bruce and Selina later meet up with Alfred outside of Arkham. Gordon then tells communicates Bruce of his intention to leave the city to find Leslie. After that, Bruce tells Alfred of the secret council that controlled everything in Gotham, and that they were close to the ultimate truth. [40]

Investigating the Court of Owls [ ]

Bruce accompanied by Alfred then went to Switzerland for six months, with Bruce doing research into The Court of Owls and finding proof of their existence. Afterward, he returned to Gotham, and the next day confronted the board of directors of Wayne Enterprises giving them the ultimatum of allowing him to speak to the Court face to face within 24 hours or he would give his evidence to every news outlet in Gotham. That night, Bruce went into the study to find Alfred unconscious and then was abducted by Talon . [41]

Bruce is taken to the lair of the council representative Kathryn . After she removes her owl mask, Bruce recognizes her from events for Wayne Enterprises, as well as having visited the manor before. Bruce attempts to negotiate terms, even saying that if he dies his assets will be transferred to the federal government, meaning an investigation would be held at Wayne Enterprises, however, this doesn't phase Kathryn as she feels the organization she is with will be able to bear it. She then makes Bruce a proposal, to drop all investigations on the secret council and his parents' murder, in exchange for his life as well as his close friends and loved ones not sharing a horrible fate. After thinking it through, Bruce agrees to the conditions and is once again knocked out by the Talon and taken back to Wayne Enterprises.

Bruce is awakened by Alfred and describes to him the situation. Alfred deduces that the secret council has probably threatened Bruce with the lives of those close to him. Alfred begins to ponder that even though Bruce has agreed to seize all investigation into their activities, will they keep to their bargain.

Later on in the day they make light of the situation and discuss what Bruce will do with his spare time now that he won't be investigating them, with Alfred jokingly saying that he can take up dancing lessons. But the mood is destroyed when they hear a window breaking. Going to investigate, they are stunned when they come across a boy resembling Bruce who asks for their help. [42]

Bruce and Alfred gave Bruce's doppelganger food and what his name was, his name being Subject 514A or 'Five'. Five revealed that he was from Indian Hill and that he found Bruce by following Selina Kyle when he saw the two talking to one another. Bruce decided to allow Five to stay in Wayne Manor going against Alfred's pleas regarding why Hugo Strange would make a clone of Bruce and the chance that Five may have some connection to the Court of Owls.

The next morning, Bruce and Alfred are training with Five observing them. Bruce decides to let Five spar with Alfred, who then proceeds to teach Five boxing. When Alfred strikes Five they notice that he cannot feel any pain, Alfred strikes again only this time Five dodges all of Alfred's attacks with quick reflexes and displays superior hand-to-hand combat skills oppose to Alfred. Alfred and Bruce ask where Five learned how to fight he stated that he did not know, he may have learned at Indian Hill but if he had he could not remember. Later that evening Selina visits Bruce and tells him about Ivy possibly dying after falling down a storm drain.

The next day Bruce discovers that Five has cut his hair to make himself look more like Bruce and has stolen one of his cars. Bruce and Alfred search and eventually locate Five on the roof of Selina's apartment, angered by Fives' actions Bruce demands to know why Five has done what he has done. Five tells Bruce that he believed Bruce might hold the key to discovering who he really is but he does not, however, Five claims despite Bruce possessing vast wealth and anything a person could want he truly has nothing. Five tells Bruce and Alfred they will never see him again before jumping off the roof, Bruce and Alfred then watch as Five leaves Gotham unharmed by the height he has jumped.

A week later, Bruce visits Jim Gordon and hires him to be his private investigator to look into Ivy's whereabouts as a favor for Selina. Gordon decides to start their search at the GCPD, Gordon then tells Bruce its chivalrous of him to help Selina and asks how long they've been in a relationship.

Alliance with the Whisper Gang [ ]

Jerome's return [ ].

Bruce and Alfred are lighting candles in Wayne Manor after Gotham has been plunged into a city-wide blackout by the newly resurrected Jerome Valeska, suddenly Jerome and members of his cult arrive and hold the pair hostage. Jerome then proceeds to destroy the owl idol and tells Bruce that he plans to kill him as it was the last thing Jerome remembers planning to do. Bruce bides his time stating that his company keeps Gotham running and that if he's going to die there should be an audience. Jerome then takes Bruce and orders his followers to kill Alfred.

Bruce spares Jerome's life.

Jerome takes Bruce to a circus where he plans to execute him. Bruce witnesses Jerome and his followers torture & murder many citizens of Gotham. Bruce is then strapped to a stand where Jerome then plans to kill him with a cannon, however, Bruce removes a staple from his arm and uses it to pick his handcuffs and escapes. Jerome then follows Bruce into the hall of mirrors, Jerome shoots a mirror Bruce appears in, Bruce then tells Jerome he is going to pay for what he has done. Bruce catches Jerome off guard and tackles him from behind, the two engage in a fistfight though Jerome is not taking it seriously. Bruce bests him and beats him to the ground, Bruce then punches him repeatedly to the point where Jerome's face begins to fall off, Bruce refuses to kill Jerome and is narrowly saved by Jim and Bullock. [43]

Training with the Sensei [ ]

After re-encountering Selina, Bruce is kidnapped and replaced by his clone. Bruce awakens in a compound located in Nanda Parbat where there are snow covered mountains. Bruce demands to speak with the person in charge, a man named Sensei enters and tells Bruce they have much to do in little time. Sensei explains more that he controls the court of owls and that he needs Bruce's help. The Sensei then uses special acupuncture needles to send Bruce into his own mind and relive the memory of his parents' murder. Overwhelmed Bruce demands to know why the Sensei would do that to him and what he wants from Bruce. Sensei explains that he and the Court have tried to end crime and corruption in Gotham for years but have failed as people are afraid thus they cannot find hope. Sensei believes Bruce could be the protector Gotham needs, that he could be a symbol that opposes fear which will then save Gotham.

Bruce begins further training with the Sensei. The Sensei determines that Bruce's head isn't in it because he is still blocked by his parent's murder. The Shaman uses his special acupuncture needles to mentally condition Bruce to lock away his pain and rage in order to become the protector of Gotham. He succeeds in this task and is brought back to Gotham City by the Shaman. After returning to Gotham, the Shaman continues conditioning Bruce. However, Bruce is unwilling to part with the memory of his mother and is unable to condition him further. The Shaman then shows Bruce one of his own memories, in the memory, he shows Bruce the night he killed the member of the court who ordered the murder of his parents. The Shaman explains that he respected Bruce's parents for their leadership and dedication to restoring Gotham. The Shaman also tells Bruce that the Court has only ever been a tool used by the organization he truly works for and that is time for the court to answer for its crimes and failures to save the city.

Eventually, Bruce lets go of the memory of his mother and is fully conditioned, the Shaman tells Bruce that the Talons are conditioned the exact same way he is and that they must obey his every command. The Shaman then reveals that Bruce will do whatever he commands to which Bruce confirms he will.

Return to Gotham [ ]

The Sensei assembles a group of the court's high ranking members and finds them guilty for ordering the deaths of Thomas and Martha Wayne. The court members state that they had to eliminate Thomas as he threatened to expose them, Bruce, disgusted by this, demands to know if his mother deserved to die also. The Sensei then tells Bruce to order the Talons to execute the court members but he is unable to, the Sensei then gives the order himself.

Bruce is later approached by the Sensei in a safe house and he is asked about what he feels, Bruce tells the Sensei he is ashamed as he was unable to give the order to kill court members. Sensei tells Bruce he will have another chance, Hugo Strange enters the room with the bomb containing the Tetch virus. Sensei then tells Bruce that the one he truly serves believes Bruce to have a great destiny awaiting him and that when he detonates the bomb thousands will be infected and out of the ashes of Gotham's destruction a dark hero will rise - Bruce.

When the time comes to detonate the bomb, Alfred interrupts Bruce and the Sensei. Alfred tries to reason with Bruce, into not pressing the detonator whilst the Sensei urges him to do so. When Alfred points his pistol at the Sensei, Bruce intervenes and stands between the two mentors. The Sensei once again urges Bruce to push the button and then grabs Bruce, detonating the bomb himself. Alfred shoots the Sensei and Bruce runs over to the dying man telling him to 'Find the Yuyan Building. Find the demon's head. Fulfill your destiny'. The Sensei then dies leaving Bruce and Alfred alone watching from above as the bomb goes off.

Whilst the city is in chaos around them, due to the effect of the bomb, Bruce is in the GCPD interrogation room with Alfred trying to snap him out of his conditioning. Alfred tells Bruce how he loves him and that although the Sensei has taken away his pain, you can't have love without it. Bruce seems to be coming around when Detective Alvarez, under the influence of the Tetch virus, starts shooting up the GCPD headquarters, Alfred leaves the room to see what the commotion is, Bruce then sees a pen Alfred has left behind, picks the cuffs, and leaves the GCPD to find The Demon's Head.

Alfred and Lucius Fox follow Bruce through the streets as he makes his way to the Yuyan building. Upon entering Bruce meets a shadowed figure who asks what he is doing there. Bruce tells him he has been sent to find the Demon's head to which the figure replies he has succeeded.

The Demon's Head reveals himself to be Ra's Al Ghul and reiterates to prophesy that Bruce will save Gotham. Ra's also tells Bruce he did not succeed in his mission given to him by the Sensei due to the Sensei detonating the bomb, not Bruce. Bruce blames Alfred for distracting him to which Ra's says 'Not to worry, you can complete your mission now.' At which point 2 ninjas walk into the room and throw a beaten Alfred to the floor. Ra's tells Bruce he must kill Alfred to complete his training and take his place as his dark knight. Alfred again tells Bruce he loves him as he did back at the GCPD headquarters and tells Bruce he would do anything for him and if that means dying by his hand, he will. At this Bruce plunges a sword into Alfred's gut and as he does is immediately broken free from his conditioning and brainwashing due to the intense emotional pain.

Bruce runs to Alfred's aid when he hears Ra's Al Ghul compliment him on breaking out of his conditioning. Bruce swears he will never follow Ra's but Ra's replies his strength confirms he will. Bruce screams he will never due to being made to kill Alfred to which Ra's tell him to 'Use the waters' and vanishes leaving only his cloak. Bruce then notices the large well full of a glowing liquid in the center of the room and pours the water over Alfred's wound. The wound sizzles and seals shut and Alfred snaps awake. [44]

Bruce is encouraged to make his own decisions by Alfred and then becomes a masked vigilante. He saved a family from a goon in a dark alley and then climbed up, watching over Gotham from a rooftop. As Bruce gazes on a storm is heard nearing the city. [45]

Afterward, when Alfred left the hospital they both agreed that Bruce had to prepare for the day when Ra's Al Ghul returned. Alfred then supported Bruce's decision to continue his vigilante activities.

Protecting Gotham [ ]

Three months later, Bruce is standing on the top of the building when he hears a woman cry for help when she is being mugged. Bruce confronts the muggers telling them they have one chance to walk away, they attack him and he quickly defeats him. Bruce finds one of the licenses issued by Penguin allowing them to commit crime, Bruce leaves the scene unknown to him though Ra's Al Ghul is watching him from a distance.

Bruce returns to Wayne Manor and counsels with Alfred on how to turn Penguin's licensing of crime against, however, Alfred objects to this as it does not interest with Bruce preparing for Ra's Al Ghul's return. Instead, Alfred claims that Bruce is trying to complete multiple objectives at the same time, however, Bruce tells Alfred that he can prepare for Ra's returning to Gotham while also protecting the city.

Going Down A Dark Path [ ]

After hanging up the cowl, Bruce fell into a deep depression over the death of Ra's to the point where after reuniting with one of his old classmates, Grace Blomdhal, he met with Tommy Elliot once again and they went to a club to party, which Bruce purchased in order to grant them access and all three of them partied together until they got drunk. Bruce woke up with a hangover the next day and was confronted by Alfred, who attempted to remind him who he was before taking him out on the annual hike into the woods that the former would occasionally have with his father before he was killed. Alfred then told Bruce the story of how he and Thomas had first met in London before Bruce lied to Alfred about losing his rocks before stealing their sedan and driving back to Wayne Manor, ditching Alfred in the woods.

Afterward, Bruce invited his friends, including Tommy, over to Wayne Manor to party before Alfred returned and kicked everyone out of the house. However, Bruce ignored Alfred's attempts to communicate with him regarding what he was going through and ordered him to just be his butler. Soon after, Bruce began treating Alfred rudely by forcing him to clean up the mess he would usually make from partying hard. Alfred then attempted to organize a trip to Switzerland but the two of them got into a physical altercation that resulted in Alfred punching Bruce and bruising his face. Conceited, Bruce had his lawyer sign an emancipation paper that removed Alfred as his legal guardian before firing him from service and then heading out to another party. Bruce soon became an arrogant womanizing playboy and he encountered Selina in the Iceberg Lounge, which had been converted back to the Sirens following Cobblepot's imprisonment. Although his behavior confused her, she immediately saw through his actions and tried to call him out but he rebuffed her attempts.

Bruce looking up at a vision of his future.

Later on, Bruce woke up hungover in Wayne Manor and encountered Ivy, who had mutated into an older woman with new abilities. Ivy's obsession with plants and the fact that Wayne Enterprises was conducting "Project M," which involved the experimentation and deaths of several plants, ultimately led to her hypnotizing Bruce and forcing him to tell her everything about the project before poisoning him to give him a slow and painful death. Her drug caused Bruce to hallucinate Ra's al Ghul cutting off his face and giving it to another version of him who was more arrogant and rude, showing him what he had become in the past few months after hanging up the cowl. Bruce was then kidnapped by Alfred in the hallucination and was taken back to the same alley where his parents were killed, where he met a dark cloaked figure who claimed that the alley was where he was "born" before attacking Bruce and taking him to a cave. Bruce awakened there and was confronted by the dark figure once more, whom he almost immediately deduced was an older version of himself before the figure morphed into a swarm of bats and attacked Bruce. However, Gordon, who retrieved the antidote from Ivy after she kidnapped Lucius, successfully saved Bruce from being killed.

Bruce after his encounter with Ivy

Bruce then quietly told Gordon that he believed that his vision was real and that he was his "true-self" before informing Gordon that in the vision, he had a mustache, much to the latter's confusion. An apologetic Bruce then left Alfred a voicemail and he begged him to call him back.

Finding his true calling [ ]

Bruce grabs the mask made by Alfred, deciding to burn it. He later goes and visits his former butler and apologizes for his behavior. However Alfred tells him if he wants him back, he is going to have to prove that he changed. He later does at a Wayne Enterprises event. Making his parents happy with a speech to the people, but also to Alfred. Ivy later returns with soldiers coming in and crashing the party. Bruce hides but then finds that Alfred needs his help. Bruce sees a leftover mask and bulletproof vest on the ground he can use for a disguise and goes to save Alfred, who is now one of the hostages. Bruce messes with the lights, causing a distraction, and then takes down the hostage-takers. Bruce tries to take Alfred out of the building, but he interrupts Bruce's rescue to tell him that helping the people here is who he is. Bruce understands and pulls up his mask. He takes down one of the armed goons in the building, but then Gordon thinks Bruce is one of them when he sees Bruce in the mask. Bruce is chased by Gordon, but Bruce manages to escape. He then returns to Alfred, who stitches him up from his injuries he sustained in the fight. He decides to stay with Bruce, but wonders why he kept his identity a secret from Gordon. Bruce answers his question by saying he doesn't know.

Meeting Jeremiah Valeska [ ]

After Jerome breaks out of Arkham Asylum with Scarecrow (Jonathan Crane) and Mad Hatter (Jervis Tetch), Bruce pursues Jerome as he feels responsible for him. During his pursuit, he meets Jeremiah Valeska , Jerome's twin brother. However, unlike Jerome, Jeremiah is a sane and intelligent engineer. His energy project for Gotham makes Bruce interested in his work, which results in Bruce offering him funds through Wayne Enterprises to build the generators and introducing himself as his friend. After the generators were built, it is revealed that Jeremiah has been sprayed by Jerome's laughing gas, which has supposedly failed and has only caused mild cosmetic effects to Jeremiah. He also revealed to Bruce that the generators can also be used as bombs, in which all 52 of them are placed in different locations around Gotham City to create a maze.

Jeremiah plans to "bring the darkness out" of Bruce, the same way Jerome did to him, in order for them to be friends and work together in building a new Gotham. He decides to give him "one bad day", with the means of torturing Alfred, using Scarecrow's fear toxin and shooting Selina. However, the plan ultimately failed. With the help of a resurrected Ra's al Ghul, the bombs are moved to the bridges connecting Gotham to the mainland. In the end, Ra's al Ghul once again dies at the hands of Bruce and Barbara, with him telling the former to "become Gotham's Dark Knight". After the detonation, Gotham has officially been off-limits, with no citizen getting in or out of the city. Bruce decides to stay in the city, as he feels responsible for Jeremiah's doings.

No Man's Land [ ]

During Gotham's No Man's Land crisis, Bruce stays in the City despite its dangerous state to protect and fulfill his responsibility, as he blames himself for Gotham's destruction which was caused by Jeremiah and Ra's al Ghul. [7 ] However, during the course of this timeline, his relationship with Selina continues to improve despite going through ups and downs as usual. Later, he is attacked by Bane and Nyssa al Ghul , Ra's al Ghul's daughter, with the agenda to avenge her father who was killed by Bruce. [8 ] In order to delay the oncoming attack by Bane's forces, Bruce sacrifices his own assets by blowing up Wayne Tower . After Bruce, Jim Gordon, and the citizens of Gotham City win the battle against Bane and Nyssa, Bruce feels guilty and responsible for all the incidents that happened in the city. He comes to the decision to leave Gotham for good, accepting the unfortunate consequence of abandoning Selina, despite being in love with her.

A Dark Knight Rises [ ]

Bruce Wayne becomes the Dark Knight that; Ra's al Ghul had foresaw.

Ten years later, Bruce returned to Gotham as a crime-fighting vigilante wearing a bat-shaped suit. For several weeks he was thought to have assaulted the gangs downtown, causing no deaths; in the process. The gangs were unable to give a description of him and were ultimately only able to mention a growling voice.

On Monday, April 15, Bruce had checked up on Selina and watched her steal a diamond. Now going; by the name Dark Knight, he had saved James Gordon and his GCPD force from being blown to pieces; when he had warned them of the rigged explosives at a crime scene. He later had captured Oswald Cobblepot and Edward Nygma, and left them tied up for the police. He then had saved Jim and his daughter, Barbara Lee Gordon from Jeremiah Valeska, striking him through the hand with a bat-shaped boomerang from afar, and then knocking him out by throwing one at his head. He later met; with Selina upon a rooftop. Selina had recognized him and sobbed that; she didn't want him to protect her and that; she had wanted him. Bruce told her it was the only way and Selina had wanted to know what would happen now. Bruce said he didn’t know; but had assured her that; he would never leave Gotham again. He then told her to return the diamond; before leaving. Later, standing on a roof as Jim, Alfred and Harvey looked at him from afar, and Jim recognized him as a friend.

Personality [ ]

After the death of his parents, Bruce began to show erratic behavior, such as self-harm, [3] listening to heavy metal, drawing disturbing artwork, refusing to eat, and overall behaving recklessly, doing things such as climbing on top of the roof of the Wayne Mansion, burning himself, and cutting himself, as Alfred says to Jim in season 1. He is very serious, though also kind, caring, selfless, observant, and intelligent. He can sometimes be naive, but despite this, he can easily tell when someone is lying to him or when they are not telling him the entire truth. He shows a great deal of personal strength and maturity for his age. He loved both of his parents very much and becomes angry if anyone speaks ill of them, such as Tommy Elliot , who he physically assaulted after the latter taunted him about his parents' deaths, and disrespected his mother. [9]

Harboring leftover guilt from not doing anything when his parents were murdered, Bruce devoted all of his time and efforts towards finding clues that could be used to discover the identity of the man who killed his parents. Bruce has a strong moral compass to do what is right, showing a huge reprehension against the act of killing, calling the Balloonman a criminal because he did so [4] , and berating Selina Kyle for killing Reggie Payne , and telling her that he'd never cross that line. [19] Though Bruce later decided to kill Matches Malone as he had killed his parents, after realizing that Malone was just a man, Bruce realized that he couldn't murder, nor get revenge on evil. [33]

Bruce is shown to be courageous as he handed himself over to Jerome Valeska to bide Alfred's time to save himself from Jerome's followers and again when he attempted to save a citizen from being killed by Jerome. Bruce has also developed a strong sense of justice from investigating the reasons for the murder of his parents, the corruption in Gotham City , and Wayne Enterprises . Bruce's sense of justice is most notably shown when he takes it upon himself to fight and capture Jerome Valeska after he saw the latter murder innocent civilians.

In season 4, Bruce's personality has not changed; as he still retains his sense of justice and stubbornness, especially when it comes to Alfred discouraging him from becoming a vigilante, but recently his mental state has started begun to spiral after avenging his parents and killing Ra's al Ghul. Indeed; this dark path of his has induced Bruce to become an arrogant playboy and womanizer (because he does not want to come to terms with the fact that he has a dark side) a choice his parents most likely would've been most ashamed of and has even given up on his war on crime.

This dark path of his has caused most of his relationships to be destroyed. Most notably, firing Alfred and threatening to have him arrested when Alfred was trying to stop him from spiraling further.

But after being poisoned by Ivy, Bruce is able to see how corrupt he has become. He is gradually starting to learn how to accept his dark side within the rest of his personality. Bruce makes amends with Alfred by apologizing for his behavior and resumes his fight for justice as a vigilante.

Physical appearance [ ]

Bruce is a young Caucasian male, with dark brown hair. He is of a muscular build as of later episodes and is pretty average to tall for his age. He is found attractive by many girls, including Selina Kyle and Ivy Pepper , who both made comments implying they were physically attracted to him. [11]

Under Bruce's secret vigilante identity, he is used to dressing up in black clothes, wearing black pants, shoeing black shoes with his hands wrapped with black gloves and his body is wrapped with a black leather jacket while on his face, in order to hide his identity, he dons a black mask.

10 years later, Bruce uses a Nomex survival suit that; resembled a bat; with a cape that helped him glide through the air and a belt; with gadgets.

Abilities [ ]

• Peak of Human Physical Condition: Bruce was trained by both Alfred and the temple Shaman for a long period of time which has led to him being in excellent shape, possessing above-average levels of strength, speed, endurance, metabolism, and senses, but not at superhuman degree, after extensive training from Alfred and the Sensei, his natural muscle power is much greater than most teenagers of his age, he was able to overpower and beat down a full-grown thug using his combat abilities and focused strikes, his reaction time, maneuverability and counterattacks had profoundly increased as well, he could even dodge Selina Kyle's attacks as well as take down an armed thug, who was trying to rob a family, with incredible speed and ferocity, he was able to sense Selina Kyle's presence without looking behind himself (despite the fact that the former has excellent skills in stealth, by feeling the breeze she created when she came through his window) detect the Whisper Gang approaching, and smelled vinegar from another room in Selina's cup. His speed has been remarked on by Alfred and Harvey Bullock .
• Expert Stick-Fighter: Bruce has become an excellent stick-fighter in the martial art Escrima through his training with the temple Shaman. Bruce has excelled further in this training after the Shaman helped him conquer his rage thus making him more focused and capable of defeating his opponents, most notably a highly trained Talon , when he tried to rescue Jerome Valeska from his uncle Zachary Trumble , he defeated Lunkhead , a former circus strongman and a much larger opponent with a pool cue after a lengthy struggle, albeit with the assistance of Selina Kyle's intervention. In Bruce's youth, he engaged in makeshift swordfights with Alfred using wooden canes.
• Skilled Swordsman: Bruce is a skilled swordsman, having taken fencing classes while attending Anders Preparatory Academy .
• Master Marksman: Bruce is an expert marksman with throwing weapons, this is seen when he threw glass shards at a chemically altered madman attacking Alfred, as the Dark Knight, he can throw his batarangs with precision against Mr. J. He is also an expert in using his grappling gun to hold back Selina's hand when she attacked the Mutant gang leader.
• Free-Running/Acrobatics: After spending some time living on the streets, Bruce was able to jump from rooftop to rooftop with ease as well as perform advanced parkour maneuvers with excellent precision, stamina, and speed. He could also scale the building tops very easily. [46]
• Stealth/Infiltration/Escapology: Bruce possesses impressive stealth skills, as he was able to easily sneak out of GCPD headquarters without Jim Gordon hearing or noticing him. Bruce was capable of breaking into Blackgate Penitentiary without being detected. [47] He is also a highly capable escape artist, being able to flee a crime scene by blending with the shadows to appear invisible. He used his aptitude for stealth to surgically bring down a group of thugs raiding a clinic's medical supplies.
• Intimidation: As a vigilante, Bruce has begun using intimidation and individuals' fears; to get information and what he wants. Bruce did this to the crime licensing officer to get the list containing the names of all criminals in Gotham who had a license for crime. As the Dark Knight, Bruce commands a far more intimidating presence; to the point where most criminals fear him; even high profile criminals; such as Oswald Cobblepot and Edward Nygma respectively were visibly terrified of him in their first encounter.
• Expert Investigator: Bruce has become quite the investigator, as he has begun to take notice of even the smallest details, given as he was able to find out that Jim Gordon is dating someone just by looking at the lipstick on his coffee mug. During Pax Penguina , he successfully deduced the existence of Penguin's master list of crime licenses based on their numbers. As an adult; Bruce is an excellent investigator, even considered to be the world's greatest detective.
• Criminology: Due to spending years trying to understand the criminal psychology, Bruce has developed a deep knowledge of criminal mindsets and tactics.
• Expert Businessman: Bruce directs successfully Wayne Enterprise, one of the most prestigious companies in the world
• Skilled lockpick user: Bruce learned how to pick locks from Selina Kyle . He used his new technical skills to break into Karen Jennings ' residence.
• Archeology: Bruce was able to identify the Court of Owls insignia easily.
• Network: As the chairman, later the CEO of Wayne Enterprises , Bruce has access; to a nearly inexhaustible array of funds, technology, intelligence and other resources.
• Sewing: Bruce possesses sewing skills, as he was able to sew the sleeve of Selina's jacket. [48]
• Expert of Deception/Manipulator: Bruce is skilled in the art of deception and manipulation; as seen when he managed to hire Tom to get Malone's identity out of Silver St. Cloud . [30] . When he grew up, he was able to maintain his secret identity by acting like an irresponsable philanthropist.
• Expert Driver: Bruce is an excellent driver. He knows how to drive a car.
• Indomitable Will: Like Bruce's father, Thomas Wayne , he is certain his mission and has the courage to fight for what he believes in without error. Bruce has demonstrated incredible will-power as he was able to break through Sensei 's mind control a feat thought impossible, this act profoundly impressed the immortal Ra's.
• Wealth: Bruce is one of the most richest men in the world; which allows him to finance his crusade against evil.

Equipment [ ]

• Dark Knight suit : Bruce wears a protective suit as the Dark Knight; to hide his identity; when fighting crime. It was presumably designed; by Lucius Fox .
• Ballistic Implements : As the Dark Knight, Bruce uses mini boomerangs in the shape of a bat as his primary weapon.
• Utility Belt: As the Dark Knight, Bruce wears a belt designed to carry his gear when he is out fighting crime.
• Smoke Grenades : As the Dark Knight, Bruce uses smoke grenades in order to help make quick exits.

Former equipment [ ]

• Vigilante suit : Bruce wore a suit as a vigilante, to hide his identity from his enemies; when he went out fighting crime, the suit he wore was little more than a jacket along with a ski mask. Bruce later abandoned this suit, for a military-like suit that; he receives from Lucius Fox.
• Grapple Gun : Bruce used a grapple gun, which he used to break into Blackgate. He later used a more portable grapple gun to stop Selina from killing the Mutant Gang Leader.
• M84 Stun Grenade: Bruce used a stun grenade against Talon during a heist attempt at the Court of Owls safehouse.
• Mustang : Bruce drove a car with a V8 5-liter 460 horsepower engine. The car is painted matte black to make the car reflective and very difficult to see at night. The car is also 100% bulletproof, as it was able to survive two bullet shots from a gun by Alfred.
• Night Vision Goggles: Lucius made a pair of night vision goggles for Bruce that allowed him to see when the power was out at the Hospital. However, they are sensitive to light; as seen when he was overwhelmed when the lights came back on.

Gallery [ ]

Main Article: Bruce Wayne/Gallery

Appearances [ ]

• In February 2019, it was stated by Stephens that Batman would be featured all throughout the episode and not just in the final scene, "The last episode is one scene in the timeline of the rest of the season, and then the rest of the episode is in the future. It almost feels in a weird way like another pilot." [53] However, Batman ultimately wasn't shown until the final shot of the episode (as originally planned).
• According to Stephens, it was planned to not show Batman until the final frame since Season 1 because the series is told from the eyes of Jim Gordon. [54]
• Batman uses David Mazouz's face and voice, but he is physically played by Mikhail Mudrik . [55]
• The show's Batman costume is described by showrunner Danny Cannon as a "highlight reel" of all the best Batsuits from the comics. They originally asked Warner Bros. Pictures to borrow one of the Batman costumes from the films , but they declined. [56]
• David Mazouz practiced developing his Batman voice long before the finale was filmed. [56]
• Bruce is a fan of Deliverance. [3]
• Bruce's favorite animals are owls. [57]
• As of " Mad City: The Gentle Art of Making Enemies ", Bruce has taken an oath never to kill, which foreshadows him becoming Batman. However, Bruce later breaks this oath by killing Ra's al Ghul .
• It has been revealed by Chris Chalk in an interview in January 2018 that by the end of season four, Bruce will be eighteen years old. He celebrated his eighteenth birthday in the episode " That's Entertainment ".
• Although initially being slightly older than his character, in the last two seasons David Mazouz (16/17) is younger than Bruce (18/19).
• Bruce's birthday being February 19, might be a reference to the DC comics, in which Bruce's birthday is also February 19. [citation needed] Coincidentally, David Mazouz 's birthday falls on February 19.
• Bruce has so far had three known love interests, as are listed in order; Selina Kyle , Silver St. Cloud , and Grace Blomdhal .
• This appears to have started after the Order of St. Dumas made an attempt on his life, as he was still going to school at the time.
• The scene in " A Dark Knight: A Beautiful Darkness " in which Bruce has an encounter with his future self could be a reference to the pivotal storyline moment in which Bruce is inspired to create his Batman persona after having an encounter with a flock of bats.
• Bruce is right-handed.
• The way that Bruce stealthy sneaks away from Jim Gordon in GCPD without him hearing or seeing him do so in " Pax Penguina " is a reference to how Batman stealthily sneaks away from Gordon in traditional Batman lore. In the episode " Pena Dura ", Bruce also vanishes in a very similar fashion after a conversation with Harvey Bullock.
• Bruce is often seen wearing a dark coat throughout No Man's Land in Season 5 . As confirmed by Gotham writer Tze Chun , this costume piece is based on the coat Bruce Wayne used to wear in the 1987 comic book story arc Batman: Year One by Frank Miller. [58]
• Bruce hates magicians. [59]
• As of the No Man's Land event, after the death of Tabitha Galavan, he shared something in common with Silver St. Cloud, they are both the last survivors of their families.
• Bruce's favorite food is, or at least was grilled cheese and Branston pickle sandwich. [60]
• This coincides with the comics, wherein most incarnations, Bruce becomes Batman at 29. (In Pre-Crisis, and the New 52.)
• Bruce is 12 in season 1 [61] , 13 in the beginning of season 2 [62] and 14(?) in the second half [63] .
• Throughout the entire series, Bruce has never been called "Batman" directly or indirectly; but Ra's al Ghul has called Bruce the "Dark Knight".
• Bruno Heller expressed interest in David Mazouz reprising the role of Bruce Wayne/Batman in the television series Pennyworth , although its cancellation stopped any of this happening. [64]

Behind the scenes [ ]

• In the DC comics, Bruce Wayne was created by artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger and first appeared in Detective Comics #27 (May 1939). Originally referred to as "the Bat-Man" and still referred to at times as "the Batman", the character is additionally known as "the Caped Crusader", "the Dark Knight", and "the World's Greatest Detective", among other titles. Batman became a very popular character soon after his introduction and gained his own comic book title, Batman , in 1940. An American cultural icon, Batman has been licensed and adapted into a variety of media, from radio to television and film, and appears on a variety of merchandise sold all over the world such as toys and video games. The character has also intrigued psychiatrists with many trying to understand the character's psyche.
• Like in season 4, Bruce has fought as a vigilante prior to becoming Batman in other media. In the 1993 animated movie Batman: Mask of the Phantasm , he fought criminals whilst donning a black outfit and balaclava (similar to the attire he wore when beginning his vigilante work at the end of season 3), and in the comics, in the 1950s Bruce was the original Robin. He was also shown to fight in a black outfit prior to becoming Batman in the Year One comic as well as in the film Batman Begins .
• In the DC comics, Bruce puts up a fake façade of him being an arrogant playboy and womanizer; in order to avoid other individuals from suspecting that he is Batman.

References [ ]

• 1 Jerome Valeska
• 2 Jeremiah Valeska
• 3 Barbara Kean

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fclake New Member

I saw The Dark Knight. What is the yacht that Wayne is on with the russian ballet? Is it c.g. or is it real? Where can I find pics? Thanks all!!

Maria B New Member

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_t...een_in_the_Dark_Knight_Where_can_I_find_a_pic Looks like it is the magic of film.

Loren Schweizer YF Associate Writer

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Hands-On: Rolex GMT-Master II 126710GRNR ‘Bruce Wayne’ Watch For 2024

According to Rolex , the theme behind 2024’s latest version of the famed GMT-Master II is “the harmony of contrasts.” This poetic-sounding statement is indeed an inherent contradiction. Harmonious things are not by nature supposed to contrast. Though it is true that when you examine the small details, there are, indeed, examples of highly harmonious things with high contrast. Rolex does not elaborate further. So is a typical artistically intellectual opener for a Swiss luxury watch whose practical contribution to watchmaking is the introduction of gray and steel together in the Rolex GMT-Master II 126710GRNR . It comes in two styles, either on a three-link Rolex Oyster bracelet or on a Rolex Jubilee bracelet.

The GMT-Master II 126710GRNR builds upon two similar models that were released by Rolex last year, offering the same watch but in an all-OysterSteel (Rolex’s own metal alloy formulation based on 904L steel) case. In 2023 Rolex introduced the GMT-Master II in all gold (reference 126718GRNR) as well as a two-tone steel and gold model (reference 126713GRNR) . Both of these watches were intended to bring back a classic Rolex GMT-Master look but for the latest generation GMT-Master II case and movement configuration. The novel “tweak” was to offer something different in the bezel in the form of a two-tone black and gray bezel, as opposed to all black as was previously available in the last generation versions of these Rolex GMT-Master II watches. The black and gray Cerachrom ceramic bezels were so subtle in their contrast when matched with gold that it was frankly hard to notice that the bezel was two different colors much of the time. By contrast (just using Rolex’s chosen word of the year again), when paired with an all-steel case, the color difference between the upper black and lower gray sections of the Cerachrom bezel becomes much more visually apparent.

Photos by Ed Rhee

Last year, Rolex enthusiasts nicknamed this black and gray bezel color combination the “Bruce Wayne.” I think they were just going with the Batman theme because the blue and black bezel version of the same watch is also commonly referred to by the enthusiast community as “The Batman.” I don’t know what is particularly Bruce Wayne-y about this color combination, but perhaps black and gray are simply not a particularly noteworthy color combination. Visually this is one of the most subtle “colored” watches that Rolex makes. At a glance, it almost looks like the cousin Rolex Submariner watch that, in classic form, is a much more monochromatic watch than the GMT-Master II 162710GRNR. According to Rolex, this particular set of subtle GMT-Master II watches do fill a hole in the product catalog. This watch is for people who don’t want a black and white watch, but who also feel that blue is simply too much color for them. Personally, while I admire the GMT-Master II 162710GRNR for being a beautiful classic timepiece that is impeccably made, this color combination leaves me emotionally cold. This is very much intended to be a severely conservative watch amidst a brand that is already among the industry’s most conservative.

Rolex often trickles down new parts or technology starting with higher-priced gold models and then moving “down” to steel. So it makes sense that the gray and black ceramic bezel started with availability in watches with gold, and are now available in all steel versions. That Rolex is offering both bracelet options is also nice, although there is a slight cost difference between them – which Rolex has an explanation for but really they should be the same price right? Nothing else other than the bezel and green-colored GMT hand is new for this version of the GMT-Master II 126710. The OysterSteel case is 40mm wide with 100 meters of water resistance and is among the most comfortable-wearing sports watches in the world.

Inside the Rolex GMT-Master II 126710 is the in-house Rolex caliber 3285 automatic movement. Featuring Rolex’s latest mechanical movement technology, the 3285 is extremely accurate to within two seconds per day and includes both COSC Chronometer certification and Rolex’s more intensive Superlative Chronometer certification. The movement features the time, date, and a second time zone via a 24-hour hand. The movement features a quick-adjust for the main time’s hour hand, given that this type of GMT is designed as a true traveler’s watch. Many people consider the GMT-Master II the world’s most versatile sports watch given its functionality, style, and overall poise. If only a little bit of green is the most color you can handle, this might be the version for you.

There is no winner between the Oyster and Jubilee bracelet options. The Oyster is going to look a bit sportier and the Jubilee is going to look a bit dressier. The deployants are different on each, but depending on your lifestyle there is no clear winner between the two. I think, for that reason, Rolex decided to offer the same watch on two bracelets – something it doesn’t really do all the time. Both watch and bracelet pairings have the same reference numbers, although as I mentioned the price is a bit different. Where does Rolex go from here with the GMT-Master II after black and gray? That is hard to say because, frankly, Rolex is in a good position with the GMT-Master II in terms of popularity, sales, and updates. Rolex has other models to focus on right now that deserve novelty and attention, so it would surprise me if there was too much more novelty in GMT-Master II for a while. That is unless Rolex believes there is yet another hole to fill in the collection. Price for the black and gray ceramic bezel Rolex GMT-Master II 126710GRNR watch is $10,700 USD on the Oyster bracelet and $10,900 USD on the Jubilee bracelet. Learn more at the Rolex website .