How important is the colour of your skin when it comes to fictional characters?

While the production of Matt Reeves’s The Batman is still underway and has, as of now, moved into post, there is some lamenting in the social media regarding the casting (in German and Austrian social media, at least). Most of the people are - wrongly - complaining about Robert Pattinson as Bruce Wayne/Batman, but some are also making borderline racist remarks about Catwoman and Commissioner Gordon. You see, both characters are played by BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color), namely Zoe Kravitz (Selina Kyle) and Jeffrey Wright (James Gordon).

To say it bluntly, this is bullshit

The complaints basically claim that these actors shouldn’t portray those characters, since they are originally white. To say it bluntly, this is bullshit. Besides the fact that these are fictional characters, there have been a number of POC-portrayals of Catwoman. In Frank Miller’s Batman: Year One, it is very much implied that Selina Kyle (In Miller’s version, the antihero started off as an ex-prostitute) is of African-American descend, even though in its sequels by Geoff Loeb, The Long Halloween and Dark Victory, the character is Caucasian again.

In other media, there have been African-American Catwomen before. The third season of Batman from the 60s, starring Adam West and Burt Ward, had Eartha Kitt playing Catwoman. And she was apparently a fan favourite. The rotten 2004 film-adaptation of Catwoman was starring Halle Berry as “Patience Phillips” aka Catwoman. Despite her name not being Selina Kyle, she nonetheless was Catwoman. (It is implied that the film could take place in the same universe as Burton’s and Schumacher’s Batman-tetralogy, since we see a picture of Michelle Pfeifer’s Selina Kyle/Catwoman).

The dark-skinned knight

But this leads to another, more intriguing question: Can Batman ever be black? Like the other characters, he is a fictional American hero, drawn and coloured. His secret identity is that of billionaire Bruce Wayne, a somewhat reclusive CEO and philanthropist, living with his butler Alfred, and sometimes with a young ward, Dick Grayson or Jason Todd, in his manor. This is Batman, but he is also so much more, he is a symbol, as it was said in Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins. Therefore, he is “more than just a man, a legend”. As it stands, there have been several people who have done the mantle and cowl of the bat. There was Jean-Paul Valley, ex-Robin Dick Grayson, Terry McGinnis, Bruce Wayne’s son Damien, ex-commissioner Jim Gordon and many more. All of them white. But there have been two black incarnations. But both of these people were alternate universe-versions or replacements, but none of them is the original incarnation, none of them is Bruce Wayne.

Therefore, I will have to change the parameters of my question:

Can Bruce Wayne ever be black?

In short: Yes, I think he can and I think he really should be.

But since you came here to learn about why, here is the long answer: Diversity for me also means that anybody could be anyone, could portray anyone. PoC, women and immigrants should have the same possibilities to shape the world. Having Batman be a black guy but not being Bruce Wayne, wouldn’t serve unity, but segregation in my opinion.

The “proper” DC-universe, which has already gone through several incarnations, will probably keep going and keep having a caucasian Bruce Wayne, but there is always the possibility of other earths in this DC multiverse. There, a BIPOC Bruce Wayne could suit up and don the mantle of the Bat, while being a reclusive billionaire philanthropist.

The more “mainstream”-approach, however, would be film and or TV.

It is possible that we came close to having a black Bruce Wayne in film once too. Darren Aronofsky was once attached to a Batman-film, years before Christopher Nolan redefined the caped crusader for modern audiences. Using a script co-written by Frank Miller, who wrote The Dark Knight Returns (and later became a right-wing lunatic), the story would have been loosely adapted from Millers Batman: Year One. Bruce Wayne was living on the streets and work in Big Al’s car repair shop. because he would not have yet accepted his legacy. The media would call him “The Bat-Man”. While it is never directly stated that this bold incarnation of Batman would be played by an BIPOC-actor, it does incorporate some aspects of Wayne Williams’ origin. And to be honest, it wouldn’t be so far-fetched given such a bold reimagination of the superhero. 

Marvel-aesque

There is this argument, that a black Batman/ Bruce Wayne would equal a “white Black Panther”. No. No it wouldn’t. The answer for that is, that some characters are un-interchangeably tied to their origin, background and nature. Black Panther was the very first black marvel-hero ever and debuted in 1966. (There is some confusion over which came first, the character or the party, or it is just a coincidence, as Stan Lee claimed). Black Panther is an African superhero and tackles political issues such as consequences of colonialization.

A successful example of the changing of a character’s ethnicity is Nick Fury. Samuel L Jackson is the actor portraying the head of SHIELD in the MCU and is the actor with the most appearances as the character in film and tv. Jackson was also the inspiration for the look of the comic character. That is, in the Ultimate universe. In the regular “616” Marvel-comic-universe, Nick Fury is a white man. And he has been portrayed on film before, in a 90s tv-movie starring David Hasselhoff. But that one is barely known.

The orphan(ed) superhero

One thing most superheroes have in common is that they have no parents. Bruce Wayne’s parents were shot right in front of him, Superman’s parents had sent him away to safety to Earth, before their entire planet was destroyed, and in some iterations his adoptive father Jonathan Kent died as well. They are orphans or at least semi-orphans. They are partly driven by guilt or a sense of responsibility. As an essay on that subject declares, the orphan makes for a perfect candidate as a superheroes. The reason for this is, that orphans do not have a certain past, they can be anyone, so they can also be and become a superhero. To quote The Dark Knight Rises: “A hero can be anyone. Even a man doing something as simple and reassuring as putting a coat around a young boy's shoulders to let him know that the world hadn't ended.” And since anyone can be a (super)hero, they can be of any skin-colour as well.

The politics of the bat

Some people also claim that politics and “(forced) diversity” should be left out of movies and entertainment. To those I must say that every piece of art is political and deals with the political in some way or another. Every movie has political themes and tones, and the Batman-movies are no different. “In our world and our political climate, every act is a political act,” (Batman vs Superman). The Dark Knight-trilogy, besides dealing with themes of trauma and pain, does also tackle issues like corruption, poverty, social negligence and economics. “Batman & Robin” is about  saving the earth with eco-terrorism, “Batman Forever” is about knowledge as abusive power and “Batman Returns” has a subplot about an election.

Even the existence of Batman itself is based in political events. The stock market crash and following world economic crisis lead to an increase of criminality. It was also the time of the Prohibition, the era which prohibited the production, distribution and consummation of alcohol, which gave rise to smugglers and other unlawful figures. The increase of criminal activities lead made way into the upcoming comics-industry, so that vigilantes like Batman, The Shadow, and Superman could beat up (and kill) criminals.

So yeah, characters like Batman have always been political.

So why hasn’t this happened yet?

This is a very difficult question to answer. In my opinion, there are several factors to consider. First and foremost: Money. Money rules the world, and it is the driving factor of how Hollywood and the movie industry works. A film must have an affordable budget and the studio must be sure that they have a hit, so they will not only get their money back, but earn a win as well. The casting of Batman-characters has always been controversial. People are concerned about the casting of Robert Pattinsion in The Batman, they were concerned about the casting of Ben Affleck as Batman (who had “redeemed” himself from being called a bad actor with his directorial films Argo (2012) and The Town (2010) prior to the casting). There were voices criticising Heath Ledger as the Joker before they even saw a single trailer for the film, and there have been petitions about removing Michael Keaton as Batman in Tim Burton’s Batman.

One other factor is probably racism and racial discrimination against African American leads. Many PoC-actors and actresses are still not seen as a crowd-attractor. As we have seen with this year’s Academy Awards, it is still extremely hard for African and Asian Americans to win “Best Leading Actor”-trophies. The last one to do so was Halle Berry for Monster’s Ball – in 2002.

Leaked e-mails from the Sony-hack in 2014 showed that people were not convinced that Oscar-winners like Denzel Washington (Training Day, Malcolm X) would attract huge crowds in Europe. There are still many prejudices to overcome when it comes to African Americans as leading actors, left alone them playing superheroes. That is why this should change. There needs to be more courage for the risk.

Conclusio

Bruce Wayne’s skin colour isn’t tied to any geographical or political topic. He is American, but he was also portrayed by a British-actor in the Dark Knight-trilogy (Christian Bale is Welsh). Another British actor recently portrayed the Man of Steel. When there are cases, in which the nationality of the actor isn’t that important, why should the ethnicity, sexuality, gender or else matter so much?

I do hope that one day, a clever casting director will bring more diversity into the superhero-films by not relying on what’s the source material’s character’s skin tone.

Wait, there have been black Batman before?

In the current DC-event-series “Future State”, a possible dark and gritty future of the DC-universe in which America has become a police-state, Tim Fox, the estranged son of Batman-ally Lucious Fox (played in the Dark Knight-trilogy by Morgan Freeman), is Batman.

And then there is Stan Lee. Not that he was ever Batman, but the Marvel-legend did write for DC once and reimagined its biggest superheroes. So he created the character of “Wayne Williams”, an African American wrestler who dons the mantle of Batman to avenge his parents’ death. These two are possibly the only known African-American Batmen, as of now.

DC-Comics: Detective Comics, one of the largest comic publishers, established in 1934. Its greatest rival is Marvel comics (Spider-Man, Iron man, X-Men and co). DC is the home of Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, and co.

Batman: A fictional superhero from US-comic-publisher Detective Comics, aka DC. Created by Bill Finger and Bob Kane in 1939, the “caped crusader” is the vigilante persona of millionaire/ billionaire Bruce Wayne, who fight crime and corruption because he had to witness the murder of his parents by a crook named Joe Chill. Batman is a martial arts expert, “the world’s greatest detective”, a philanthropist and he fights villains like the Joker, The Riddler, Two-Face, and mob bosses. He has allies and a large adopted family, including Robin the Boy Wonder, Batgirl, his butler Alfred Pennyworth, police commissioner Jim Gordon, thief and cat-burgler Selina Kyle aka Catwoman and more. He operates in Gotham City. There are several movies and TV-shows about him, the latest instalment will be called “The Batman” and is directed by Matt Reeves.

Catwoman: The catburglar Selina Kyle started off as a villain of Batman but has since become a frienemy and love-interest to the caped crusader. She knows martial arts and loves to steal things. While there has been another Catwoman in the comics, her former sidekick Holly Robinson, Selina Kyle pretty much stays the one and only Catwoman. In the 2004-filmadaptation of “Catwoman”, Halle Berry played the solely for the film created character “Patience Philipps” who becomes the titular character. 

Black Panther: A marvel-superhero. King T’Challa of the fictional African nation of Wakanda is also the country’s protector and superhero “Black Panther”.

Stan Lee: A comic-book writer. He mainly worked for Marvel, and co-created many beloved heroes like Spider-Man. He also has got a lot of cameos in comic-book movies based on his creations.

Frank Miller: A comic-book writer. He created “The Dark Knight Returns”, which is somewhat of the bible of dark & gritty Batman stories. He also wrote “300”, “Sin City” and has since become a rightwing nutjob.

Darren Aronowsky: A filmmaker and auteur-director. He made cinematic masterpieces like “Requiem for a dream”, “Black Swan”, “Pi” and “The Wrestler”.. (Probably the sponsor of your nightmares and spiritual awakenings).

Christopher Nolan: A filmmaker and auteur-director. He directed the Batman-reboot-trilogy known as “The Dark Knight-Trilogy”, and also other cinematic masterpieces like “Interstellar”, “Inception”, “Memento” and “Dunkirk”.