Scott Bukatman's Essay Boys In The Hood

Batman’s Hood In Scott Bukatman’s essay, “Boys in The Hood” he talks about how superheroes represent cities, how they hold their own as they move through them, and how their masks and costumes identify them. I would like to focus more on Batman’s Gotham City, his mask, and his movement along with the comic panels. Firstly Gotham City could be described as living in hell. Gotham City as a whole is like a dystopian society where criminals are bound to be found anywhere, and the streets are dark giving a gloomy, melancholic feeling. For example, the Bukatman’s essay reads, “stark angles creeping, creeping shadows, dense, crowded, airless, a random tangle of steel and concrete, as if Hell had erupted through the sidewalk and kept on growing”(181).

Bukatman remarks, “Superheroes preserve the order of the city but need not to submit to it. What they must do, however, is partake in movement” (176).This brings me the scene of the carnival in The Dark Knight Returns where Batman fights the joker in the house of mirrors (146). Batman is an aging old man where he is still agile enough to move quickly through the panels. The Joker comments, “He’s fast as ever” (146). His ability to weave in and out of panel’s shows the athleticism that batman possesses to avoid danger and harming the civilians. The mirror in that house might be breakable but batman surely is not. His body can withstand the pressure of being in tight situations and it demonstrates the guts and tenacity that he has. In summary, Gotham city is the perfect place for the Batman to reside in. Batman does not belong in a city filled with flowers and sunlight because; bats don’t belong in the light. He owns Gotham City with his trademark bat symbol laid out through buildings and skyscrapers. To add on, Bruce Wayne true identity is being the Batman and it’s an obsession that he cannot run away from. The ever movement of batman does enable him to adapt to any situation no matter the barrier set upon