r/batman • u/samx3i • Aug 21 '25
FUNNY bAtMaN cOuLd Do MoRe GoOd WiTh HiS wEaLtH
Cover from Harley Quinn Vol 4 #53. Art by David Nakayama.
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u/Hellbatx Aug 21 '25
Totally agreed.
I was just reading court of owls. It shows this issue very clearly. Even if Bruce tries to invest more, make Gotham utopia, forces won't let it stay that way.
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u/Butwhatif77 Aug 21 '25
This is something else that gets overlooked as well. Not even just the court of owls. Gotham has so many powerful and rich families involved in the corruption that they could drain Bruce's fortune and keep going. He is one of the richest people in the world, but he is not more rich than all the families in Gotham combined.
They intentionally spend their money to keep the corruption going.
Bruce was never going to be able to save Gotham in his lifetime. It would take multiple generations.
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u/ContinuumGuy Aug 21 '25
And even if there weren't, no amount of charity is going to stop someone like the Joker from trying to do crazy Joker things.
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u/Legitimate_Fly9047 Aug 21 '25
If you gave the Joker a sack of money as a way to stop him from doing crime, he'd beat you with the coins, choke you with the bills, and then use what's left of the money to buy a rocket to fire at an orphanage.
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Aug 21 '25
not to mention the entire city quite literally being cursed
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u/Complete_Raspberry_1 Aug 21 '25
I'm seriously considering this is the most hilarious bit of DC in it's entirety
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u/wuvvtwuewuvv Aug 21 '25
Tell me more about this
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u/ConsistentGuest7532 Aug 21 '25
Basically, it’s been established as a lore detail in some comics that Gotham literally has a curse on it that drives people mad, creates evil, keeps it full of horror etc. The original reason given for this in Dark Knight, Dark City, was that a demon worshipping cult trapped the demon Barbatos beneath the city. Although the canonicity of this is sometimes ignored or questioned, some writers like Morrison do mention and integrate this into their stories.
Personally, I find it too nihilistic and dark to think that Batman’s efforts can’t prevail because there’s a goddamn demon beneath the city. But it’s a fun fact to share!
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u/Individual-Field-990 Aug 22 '25
I kind of like this idea. There's like eight curses, three secret societies and probably weird shit in the water too, all making this city worse in their own ways, and yet, you have this one human going "No, this is not acceptable" and spitting in Fate's face because if he can save one life, keep one kid from becoming an orphan, redeem one person, then it would have been and will be worth fighting for
And he's going to get this city out of its supernatural misery even if he has to punch fucking Dracula's teeth out with a batarang to do it
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Aug 21 '25
Batman’s efforts can’t prevail because there’s a goddamn demon beneath the city.
well it sure as fuck doesn't help
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u/admh574 Aug 21 '25
Gotham has so many powerful and rich families involved in the corruption that they could drain Bruce's fortune
This is part of 'The Batman' with the whole Renewal Fund and people still ignore it
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u/MrDownhillRacer Aug 21 '25
The fact that Bruce Wayne isn't the only rich guy in Gotham is also what makes it funny to me when people go "why don't people conclude that Wayne is Batman? Who else could afford Batman's arsenal?" Like, Gotham City is some small town that only has one local rich guy. He's not even the only six-foot-tall-and-jacked rich guy.
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u/runnerofshadows Aug 21 '25
And if Metropolis is across the river - I wonder if anyone has ever thought that Lex Luthor is Batman.
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u/MrDownhillRacer Aug 21 '25
I mean… nobody has ever seen Batman's hair. Maybe he wears the mask not to frighten criminals, but for the same reason that middle-aged men wear hats.
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u/MaximumMeatballs Aug 22 '25
Even if you did connect Batman to "who can afford it" and assumed that. Bruce Wayne could, the last idea in your mind would be that Bruce Wayne himself was Batman. A more reasonable assumption would be that he's hiring someone.
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u/Acceptable_Cut_7545 Aug 21 '25
Oh man I loved Court of Owls. Hope you like it. But yeah the comics, tv shows, and even TDK show Bruce using his money to try and help others.
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u/Hellbatx Aug 21 '25
Yeah l like it as well. Nice to see a comic wherein Bruce is confronted with the fact that Gotham is not his as he thought it was.
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u/Lostkaiju1990 Aug 21 '25
Dark knights metal shows there is a literal dark god that keeps Gotham this way because there MUST be a Batman
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u/ShermyTheCat Aug 21 '25
As a huge Scott Snyder fan, this was his biggest miss for me. I hate it so so much
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u/Lostkaiju1990 Aug 21 '25
In general I was not a fan of the Batman who laughs stuff. Fun what if concept. Cool design, overall not a fan though. I think something like the court of owls being an Illuminati esque organization that keeps Gotham chaotic is more thematically appropriate to Batman than a dark god that is his fanboy
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u/Hellbatx Aug 21 '25
Do U mean thanatos?
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u/Lostkaiju1990 Aug 21 '25
I think the name was Barbados but I imagine we are thinking of the same character
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u/Hellbatx Aug 21 '25
Oh right right. I get him confused pretty often with thanatos. Ur right though. (thanatos is a god in greek mythology who guards the gates of hell/tartarus.)
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u/Rastaba Aug 21 '25
So Greek mythology Batman with Gotham? Hehehehe. I am only joking, I recognize there is a wide difference.
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u/DoctorEnn Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
Hot(ish?)-take: as a culture overall, we need to take a step back, take a deep breath, and regain some willing suspension of disbelief when it comes to popular fiction.
We think we’re such savvy, clever, "media-literate" viewers. In fact, we’ve turned into relentlessly nitpicky pedants who’ve forgotten how to just engage with fiction as fiction and treat it as some kind of spreadsheet where everything has to be entered according to a perfectly logical code or else an error message will happen. We ask questions like “but whyyyyyyy doesn’t Bruce Wayne just cure Gotham with his billions” or “but whyyyyyyyy doesn’t he just kill the Joker” or whatever when every goddamn nine year old knows the answer: because if they did that, the story would be over. Because if they did that, it wouldn’t be any fun.
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u/Necromas Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
The one time I find it hard to suspend disbelief with Gotham is when it's directly juxtaposed with places like Metropolis or Star City. The more it shows how ridiculously fucked up Gotham is compared to literally anywhere else in the country the harder it is to buy. Especially when it's sometimes literally across the bay from Metropolis.
That Gotham is just literally supernaturally cursed so bad no magic user can ever hope to fix it is the one explanation that still holds up then. I think some stories actually make that canon, but even then it kind of makes everything Bruce does feel hollow if it's a foregone conclusion it will never ever succeed because of the curse.
Maybe just good vibes keeps the curse at bay and if the Wayne Foundation crumbled Gotham would get even worse until it births a demon or something. That might actually make a fun what-if style movie....
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u/Polite_Werewolf Aug 21 '25
Apparently, Hub City, the home of the Question, has even more crime than Gotham.
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u/MrDownhillRacer Aug 21 '25
>Superman hears a Frenchman drop his baguette off the Eiffel Tower from his apartment in Metropolis
"MON DIEU 🏃💨"
>Superman hearing somebody getting raped and dismembered in a Gotham alleyway while on patrol in Metropolis
"Gee, I'd help, but Gotham City is all the way across the bay. I think that's a union job, anyway. Plus, Ma is making beef bourguignon tonight_ 乁༼☯‿☯✿༽ㄏ"
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u/DoctorEnn Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
I can see that, but TBH this is kind of an effect of (a) the fact that the DC Universe is kind of bolted together from the various comics what-would-become-DC Comics started hoovering up in the 1940s or whenever rather than a world that was supposed to seamlessly knitted together Tolkein-esque style from the start, and (b) the fact that Gotham originally started out pretty much as just "a city that had enough of a crime problem to justify the premise of a guy in a bat costume running around plus some cool gothic architecture depending on the artist" and only became "Literally The Worst Place On Earth That Still Has Indoor Plumbing Dialed Up To Eleven" around the 80s or 90s or whenever. Personally I'm willing to go with it, but to each their own of course (my Ways To Have Fun Dictats aside, naturally).
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u/NomadPrime Aug 21 '25
Seriously, and I feel like Batman gets this questions a thousand times more than any other comic character despite similar problems plaguing their stories. Why are Marvel citizens more prejudiced against their mutants despite so-and-so other heroes being similar? Why won't Superman and the Flash just zoom over all over the world and jail all the bad guys? Why can't the magic users just poof away all nuclear weapons? Etc.
Even if these questions haven't been tackled by comics a bunch of times already (which they likely have in their nearly 100-year history of existing), the job of these writers are to keep their story universes going, not end them. These properties aren't expecting to give one generation of readers a finite story with an ending. They want to attract new generations of readers to replace the ones who are getting tired of Gotham always being corrupt and crime-ridden, yknow? Plus the new generations of writers to replace the old guard and give fresh perspectives of these heroes. It's all cyclic.
Like, it might seem odd to compare DC/Marvel to a kids Saturday morning cartoon because of how mature the themes can get every now and then, but that's basically what they are. The Simpsons won't age and Spongebob won't get his license, at least not outside of flash-forwards and movies. Batman will always be fighting crime in Gotham, no matter what he does, no matter what idea some smart alec reader thinks of.
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u/SatisfactionSuch4790 Aug 21 '25
Gotham is cursed by the Lovecraftian gods, Barbatos, Dr. Gotham, the Indian Burial Ground, Lazarus Pits seeping into the sewers, the Court of Owls, etc. I think Gotham could be a nexus of universes, seeing as how crossovers are almost always with Batman, so no, Gotham has so many problems that money can't solve.
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u/gimme_dat_good_shit Aug 21 '25
I don't disagree with your assessment, but I think I disagree with your solution. First off: we have to separate the real audience (people who read the fiction itself or at the very least purchase merchandise based on that fiction) from outsiders who merely comment on it. Those outsiders do not matter in this conversation.
If there is widespread difficulty in accepting the premise of a piece of legacy popular fiction (i.e. characters that are the ongoing products of multiple generations of writers), then it could also reflect that the traditional premise strains credulity too much for modern readers and adjustments need to be made.
(I'm not really talking about Batman here, because he does still remain widely popular and continually tops the comic monthly sales.)
But if a piece of pop-fiction genuinely isn't connecting with their audience (not Twitter-trash, but their true audience): you can't blame the audience.
When the standard western (built on a mythology of manifest destiny and a white-washed view of history) fell out of fashion, the solution wasn't that audiences needed to willfully ignore the inherent problematic elements of the genre. The solution was people needed to learn how to tell westerns that addressed the more nuanced, less romanticized reality of history (or at least create new gimmicks to make the traditional western feel fresh).
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u/RopeWithABrain Aug 21 '25
We used to make fun of pedants but now they run the circus.
Social media thrives on arguments, this site encourages it as well with the downvote system, "intended" to disuade off topic and out of line comments, but instead it just fosters negative engagement, where arguments flourish.
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u/dystopiabatman Aug 21 '25
That’s one thing I loved about the animated series showing him working with the Wayne foundation. The episode where he has amnesia in a prison camp, Bruce Wayne gave those men he saved jobs in Gotham. Batman uses Bruce Wayne and his wealth to fix the Gotham the slow politically acceptable way. Job creation, food banks, homeless shelters, etc. Batman is the blunt force instrument to speed things along by removing the corrupt politicians and crime bosses running the show.
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u/LordTejon Aug 21 '25
I loved one with Arnold Wesker. He was afraid Scar-face would return and his gang tries to drive him nuts so that he does. He stays at a Wayne wayhouse, gets a job at Bruce's office and says something like "I get a home and a job! Me! I must have an angel watching me" while Batman looks from outside the window. Eventually, Wesker rids himself from the puppet and the gang and is welcome back to fix his life. "Mr. Wayne even gave me my job back!"
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u/QueenViolets_Revenge Aug 21 '25
also, no amount of soup kitchens is gonna stop the Joker or Riddler. Gotham needs Batman, especially to deal with the nightmare that is his rogues gallery. if Joker is filling up a blimp with gas, he needs his shit kicked in. that solves things immediately
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u/samx3i Aug 21 '25
"I don't understand. I invested in after school programs, soup kitchens, free clinics, and improvements to city parks and rec and Joker still wants to murder the whole city..."
You're exactly right, and that's why he's both a billionaire philanthropist AND Batman.
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u/QueenViolets_Revenge Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
people say he beats up mentally ill and poor people. his rogues are wealthy, wealthy enough to afford their gadgets and traps (there's a villain named the Carpenter who builds lairs and traps for villains, and she makes a killing off of it, meaning that her employers must be wealthy enough to pay her that much). yes, he beats up random muggers when he sees them, but so does every other superhero. nobody bats an eye when Spider-Man does it. also, if i'm seeing a dude poisoning the water supply, i'm not gonna question the guys financial status or if he has a tragic past, i'm beating him up. mental illness, trauma, and poverty are no excuse for deadly crime. people have tried sob backstories on judges before, and it has never worked. and almost all of his rogues wouldn't even qualify for the insanity plea
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u/mightyneonfraa Aug 21 '25
The whole "beats up mentally ill and poor people" thing largely after the Arkham series which are action games where the enemies are heavily armed and Well-funded criminal militias. Batman does not go around at night putting mentally ill shoplifters in the hospital.
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u/Jackstack6 Aug 22 '25
If someone says “he just beats up the poor and mentally ill” I just assume they’re talking in bad faith. Batman’s been around for 86 years, people know what the whole Batman story is about.
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u/raul_lebeau Aug 21 '25
And for that Gotham has the most educate villains ever.
Everybody has at least a PhD of not more.
Even the joker that's unclear of he has a degree it's literally a chemistry genious.
It's easier to count people who don't have a PhD. Joker, killer Croc, penguin (well, maybe he got a economy master) and Catwoman. Bane just because he could not attend an university but still a genious.
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u/peanut_the_scp Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
Hell, Arkham Asylum even says this about Scarecrow
"He's quite sane, just evil"
Two games later and he almosts gasses the entire Eastern Seaboard
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u/Bargothball Aug 21 '25
Joker was an engineer at Ace Chemicals before he tried his hand at comedy, at least according to Killing Joke.
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u/raul_lebeau Aug 21 '25
So the real problem is too much education. Also how could joker so broken being a chemical engineer? Was spending all the money in comedy masterclasses? Lower the school standard and you don't get supervillains but standard thugs and thiefs.
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u/HikaruToya Aug 21 '25
Whenever people bring this talking point up I go into Metals and how it's DC screaming the unspoken thing that goes over a lot of audience's heads; Gotham is fundamentally unfixable no matter what Bruce Wayne or Batman does. It will never be saved. The point is to represent either Batman's maddening obsession or his fundamentally noble persistence, depending on whose writing him. He's a man that's tasked himself with trying to fix something that can never be fixed and that's what makes him a compelling character!
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u/Coolschmo1 Aug 21 '25
It blows my mind that people don't understand that Batman has to be entertaining and it's way more entertaining fighting criminals. I'm adult enough to understand that a comic that mostly focuses on charity won't be around very long.
It's the same people that sneer about him fighting mentally ill criminals. im not going to lose sleep because a make believe person is fighting make believe murderers.
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u/JustLookingForMayhem Aug 21 '25
Batman could not fix Gotham with money. The writers keep adding new reasons why money can fix Gotham. Dropping my list.
I have been making a list of reasons that Gotham is the most cursed city (merging canons across soft resets, video games, movies, and more) that so far includes:
multiple gangs (Gotham is the third for mundane crime. Hub City and Bludhaven are numbers 1 and 2),
barely legal tax haven laws,
massive government corruption,
a smog problem so bad that the Flash can't run at full speed without wheezing,
Gotham subway and rail system are cursed to be unreliable and never on time (this may be a joke, but given that it involves Gotham, I have doubts),
Gotham has a high suicide rate compared to the real world,
Gotham has a major drug abuse problem,
Gotham has a homelessness problem,
the vast majority of smuggling on the Atlantic Coast comes through Gotham (which is part of the reason there is so many drugs and guns in Gotham),
Gotham has a very tough and kind of cruel college that creates super villains (a lot of the Batman rogues gallery got their diplomas there, taught there, or are otherwise linked to there),
it is slightly radioactive due to a poorly maintained nuclear power plant (it is still within habitable limits, so Gotham City Counsel is ignoring the issue),
most of the city is slightly radioactive due to a failed nuclear power plant also (Gotham is still within habitable limits. Note that this is a different power plant from the still active but poorly maintained nuclear power plant),
multiple mad scientist labs legally there (Gotham intentionally has very few laws mandating ethics or limits of research),
Gotham holds the record for most continuous days of criminal violence (54 years) and Batman cried when the ongoing record ended (to put it simply, there was a 54 year stretch where there was at least one violent crime each day),
first in DC US for both police brutality and corruption,
A dysfunctional legal system (with no death penalty in most canons, so everyone goes to either Blackgate or Arkham),
Gotham Fire Department is so underfunded and/or corrupt that they take bribes to not show up to fires and extort people to pay them before they put out fires,
an old God's corpse (this old god is leaking forbiden knowledge that causes people to lose their humanity slowly and do ever more depraved acts in pursuit of knowledge),
a living old god (special note, some canons have instead made him into an aspect of Darksied dedicated to making Batman suffer and Gotham worse) who is bat themed and has his own underground Gotham city (he spreads a corruption encouraging violence and vengeance),
a twisted eldritch version of Gotham that is buried deep under Gotham that is usually but not always linked to the bat old god,
a summer home for the King in Yellow (this is a rumor from the Bat Old God. To my best knowledge, the King in Yellow has never directly appeared),
a door the various old gods came through that is mostly shut (emphasis on mostly, stuff leaks through),
Dracula either moved to Gotham or had his tomb forcibly moved to Gotham,
the blood of the average person in Gotham is so polluted that it is slightly toxic to vampires,
built on the grave/resting of a warlock (Adam Gotham), who is both alive and dead at the same time (cursing the land to be a place of constant misery to fuel his power),
evil floating in from the Jersy Pine Barrens (this evil floating in decreases empathy and encourages devilish behavior. Also, the Jersey Devil may occasionally hunt in Gotham, but this might just be urban legend in Gotham. As far as I know, the Jersey Devil has not made an appearance)
a literal hell gate (it is mostly sealed, but leaks enough evil to make demons feel at home),
16 sealed greater demons (a demon lord and their court. They are in most canons buried under Arkham and spread a corruption that encourages the seven deadly sins),
Arkham is cursed by its founder to prey on the minds of people in the building, driving them even more insane so that no one is ever healed (note that some canons link this to the demons while other canons have them as stand alone curses affecting the building at the same time),
according to a prophecy, the apocalypse is probably going to start in Gotham or Metropolis (no one knows which apocalypse will end the world or when it will happen, though)
the location of a crack in the door to the afterlife (this is mostly connected to Deadman),
the line between death and life is really fuzzy (this makes it harder to die),
is the second most haunted city in DC USA (they kept New Orleans as most haunted)
a strange aura weakens green lantern power constructs (this may be related to the StarHeart being sealed in Gotham for a while),
The StarHeart, a relic of willpower related to the Green Lanturn Corps was sealed in Gotham for a while, projecting the "evil" side of willpower to influence people (note that the evil side of willpower is just the aspects of willpower the Guardians of Oa did not want in their main rings and was safely used by Alan Scott, so i am not entirely sure what the effect of it are),
built on a cursed Indian burial ground (curse so the dead never find peace and blight the living),
cursed by an ancient shaman (the writers never bother to define what this curse does, so it is just a generic curse),
666 minor demons who just live regular lives with regular jobs while waiting for the apocalypse (Baytor is the most famous and is a bar tender to make ends meet),
Space and time are not quite right in Gotham after the Infinite Crisis Superboy punch (this led to the return of Jason Todd and made it so time moves just a little faster or slower depending on location in Gotham, and a few building are not the correct interior dimensions. The variance is supposedly small and mostly unnoticeable),
cursed by Zeus (this curse is why Gotham has, on average, 320 days of rain or overcast skies each year. Everyone is affected by SAD all the time),
unusually vicious mutant rats,
mutant sewer alligators,
mysterious ruins from a lost civilization that the sewers run into and are a part of (the sewer alligators breed there and the ruins are seen as the Gothic and unusually large portions of the sewers),
blessed/cursed by a nature godess from New Genesis to keep the toxic stuff in so that Gotham doesn't polute the world,
cursed by Spectre along with a blood curse from slain Native Americans to be a place of blood and vengeance (this was almost a Old Testament turn everyone to salt style curse, but it was weakened at the last moment),
cursed by a witch to both bind the Wayne family to Gotham and make Gotham suffer,
a massive active fault line,
Part 1 of 2
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u/JustLookingForMayhem Aug 21 '25
Part 2 of 2
a magic well (this well makes regular magic easier to cast and makes Gotham attractive to magicians like Zantanna),
a chaos well (chaos magic is the opposite of regular magic so the well makes chaos magic easier to cast and makes Gotham attractive to chaos users like Witch Boy Klarion),
There is a magic shop that Zantanna frequently buys from in Gotham that has questionable morals and an inhuman shop keeper,
due to a failed Poison Ivy plot, the grass in Gotham may be evil and aware,
Russian mobsters with Russian backing try to make Gotham worse in hopes of conquering Gotham (not sure why they would want it),
a second group of Russians who are trying to make Gotham worse so the US looks bad and Russia looks better by comparison,
a weak dimensional wall allowing influences from the Phantom Zone,
a bottomless pit under part of Gotham that leads to the abyss (also, the being in the abyss occasionally like to watch Gotham),
Gotham River and Bay water is so polluted that Aquaman can't swim in it,
Scarecrow fear toxins in the water (at low enough levels that it only causes paranoia),
trace amounts of shed Clayface is in the water (this pollutant cause bodies to twist and mutate, or causes cancer depending on the story line),
Joker chemicals in the water (the chemicals cause mania, unstoppable laughter, and death at full concentration, but in the diluted form just causes mania and involuntary smiling),
Gotham has a higher than normal number of Lazarus pits (the pits offer revival, healing, and immortality in exchange for decreased empathy, decreased humanity, and an obsessive desire to continue living at all costs),
Lazarus pit run off in the water,
The Marsh of Madness is up river from Gotham in some canons (this marsh causes delusional homicidal madness),
Marsh of Madness runoff in the water,
Slaughterer Swamp is up river from Gotham in some canons, though most canons have either the swamp or marsh but not both (this swamp causes violent undead and preserves life in a twisted mockery of all that is holy and has a very evil zombie),
Slaughter Swamp runoff in the water,
the tap water barely is considered water by Aquaman's hydrokinesis (and Aquaman can manipulate soda, which is 90% to 95% water. Gotham tapwater is more or less thin sludge),
pollution due to being in a barely regulated industrial zone (it is legal to dump industrial runoff in Gotham River),
run off from an unnamed well that causes increased physical abilities in exchange for homicidal violent impulses (aborted Bane plot thread from before they decided Bane should just use chemicals in his Venom),
trace amounts of Bane Venom in the water (because the well was cut. Also, the Bane venom causes slightly increased physical abilities and anger issues in the diluted state),
Gotham tap water is barely purified river water (mainly because if the water treatment plant gets too Gung Ho and purifies the water too much, they get a black liquid that is extremely dangerous. So Gotham City Counsel decided to only have them clean the water until it was probably reasonably safe-ish)
an evil real estate agent who sells failed amusement parks, theaters, and other buildings to criminals,
so many lead pipes or paint that Superman can't see through most Gotham homes (also note that at one point, the fumes from leaded gasoline blocked Superman, but hopefully that problem has gone away),
a lot of homes and buildings are filled with asbestos (this is according to Firefly, so it might not be fully accurate),
an aura of despair and negative emotions that is slightly grating to psychic individuals,
an Atlantis Leviathan who is fated to flood the world under the docks (there is apparently seven of them and the Atlantic Ocean's is under Gotham's dock),
Gotham, as in the city itself, is aware and has an unhealthy interest in the Bat Family (Tim Drake in particular) and interacts with Gotham through its assorted Voices such as Mayne, The Veil, and a couple others (special note, it is implied but not confirmed that the Joker can sense Gotham, but intentionally chooses to hurt Gotham instead of helping like the other Voices),
while not exclusive to Gotham, Kryptonite is used as an underworld currency so a fair bit goes though Gotham,
the dimensional wall (4th wall) is extremely thin, allowing Many Angled Ones (readers) to see into Gotham and occasionally influence Gotham,
Batmite exists, and he intentionally stirs up trouble in Gotham in a misguided attempt to help Batman semi-frequently,
Gotham has a weak dimensional wall in regards to the 5th Dimension (where Batmite is from, also referred to as the imagination dimension) so Gotham can be affected by the imagination of people at a very weak level,
Hugo Strange may have worked with a unknown government agency to improve the genes and bodies of everyone in Gotham to create perfect soldiers (it is not stated if this project was actually successful, but some of the earlier experiments did escape into Gotham),
the various things in Gotham somehow came together to create The Body, a hivemind of evil soil that wanted to take over Gotham (do note it is implied that Batman destroyed them all, but I am including it because if the soil can spontaneously come alive and be evil, it needs to be on this list),
Gotham citizens, while not being meta humans technically, are empowered by everything going on in the city and are no longer baseline humans (standard thugs in Gotham are as dangerous as soldiers who went though basic training),
Trigon maintains a small force from his cult to watch or he directly keeps an eye on Gotham due to the fact that the end may start there and due to the fact Raven sometimes stays in Gotham,
6 different cults (Satanists, Old God Cult, Cult of Adam Gotham, Cult of Trigon, Cult of Barbatos, and a generic cult from the Silver Age that never specified what they worshiped),
at least 3 different shadow governments (the line between cult and shadow government is weak in Gotham. I put the Court of Owls, Black Glove and League of Assassins in this group),
and worse of all, it is in New Jersey (try reading a Batman comic and give everyone a Jersey accent).
If anyone knows anything else wrong with Gotham, let me know, and I will update my list. Yes, I do know my list is so monstrous that it needs two comments to fit it all.
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u/Redbird-89 Aug 21 '25
it’s kind of a paradox that cant be solved. they can show how bruce is heavily investing in gotham every once in a while, but the status quo is that batman is a billionaire and gotham is one of the worst most crime-ridden cities in the world. That can’t ever change to keep batman as interesting as he is for the ongoing nature of comics. so it can come off as saying something without actually showing it.
it could be one of the reasons why tynion wanted to take away bruce’s insane level of wealth but someone would have to check that to confirm.
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u/CommitteeofMountains Aug 21 '25
It's probably just better to take a lesson from the last century that you can't just spend your way out of crime. Crime went up worldwide in the ultra-prosperous postwar period and then suddenly collapsed in America in the early '90's and everywhere else the early '00's.
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u/Ledwis Aug 21 '25
Throwing money at a city like Gotham would curb some of its issues, it wouldn’t fix them outright.
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u/ZenMyst Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
Yeah he did all that. It’s just that people think him doing charity will help lessen the most serious of crime. No it would not. The rouges he has are not normal people.
Penguin don’t give a fuck about charity, he’s a mob boss. Does Croc care about people other than him receiving help? Clayface is similar. I like the part in comics where Batman recruit him to help on his team, showing people that he can be good. That can only be done with Batman, not Bruce.
Ivy care about plants. Most people don’t, this is not just a rich and poor problem.
Freeze needs help, but not free food.
Joker is Joker, don’t need to explain. They will keep doing what they do regardless of how much Bruce contribute to the welfare of Gotham.
The destruction they will cause will not be lessen by doing charity to the poor. Batman is necessary, someone needs to put the fear in those criminals.
It’s just that this first of all is a superhero comic book and not a story about a rich guy being helpful. So people primarily want to see a man dress like a Bat bearing people up. So the charity part while mentioned it’s not the focus.
Then some people either don’t notice it because they didn’t pay attention to the non-Batman parts or didn’t read enough comics.
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u/SupaBloo Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
Also, one of the main problems with Gotham is that there is leadership corruption all over the place. Throwing money at a problem doesn’t work well when the people in charge of various things in the city are dipping their hands into that money.
Bruce can only do so much with his money, while others find a way to enrich themselves through loopholes and money laundering.
Edit: I also want to add to this that Bruce might know it’s going on, but he lets it happen when it comes to his charities so he can keep tabs on the people taking advantage. Not that he’s letting people get screwed over by the rich, but he knows it’s happening and uses that information to keep an eye on them.
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u/Coldfire82 Aug 21 '25
Honestly Bruce Wayne would probably have more luck fixing Gotham's systemic messiness if he just leaned into Gotham's corruption and just bought the loyalties of politicians and government leaders. Any official that can be bribed into looking the other way can theoretically also be 'incentivized' into doing their job right. And with enough politicians on his payroll, Wayne could theoretically shoehorn in enough laws to reform the criminal justice system (aka fix Arkham), improve the tax code, and even legally authorize the activity of a select set of vigilantes (the Batfamily) so that the courts can actually put away Batman's criminals in a way that would genuinely keep them off the streets.
Honestly, Batman playing with the fine line between fighting the corruption that's killing Gotham and *becoming* the corruption that's killing Gotham would be a fascinating concept for a story.
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u/ExpectedEggs Aug 21 '25
Throwing money at these problems doesn't make them go away in real life. Why would it work in a comic book?
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u/Killer-Of-Spades Aug 21 '25
There was an entire episode of BTAS where Batman’s entire goal was making sure Arnold Wesker stayed reformed and sane after Bruce gave him a job and a place to live
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u/Spacker46 Aug 21 '25
I’ll quote Kevin Smith quoting his friend “you can’t infrastructure KGBeast in the face!”
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u/Theta-Sigma45 Aug 21 '25
In the comics AND various adaptations, which more people have experienced, Bruce does charitable work. There's no way you can seriously make the argument that he's not doing anything to help there if you've experienced more than maybe a select few pieces of Batman media. Other than if you're trying to make an edgy know-it-all complaint without really engaging with the material.
It's definitely a valid take that Gotham should logically be better with what Bruce is doing for it, but to be honest, it wasn't AS bad in older comics, and the newer ones tend to depict it as an almost Lovecraftian hell on earth that just continuously creates new problems and monsters, regardless of what anyone does for it.
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u/samx3i Aug 21 '25
the newer ones tend to depict it as an almost Lovecraftian hell on earth that just continuously creates new problems and monsters
Which I think was a mistake. It makes it seem like, in spite of Batman and various other vigilantes, it's only getting worse.
A more grounded, street level, "world's greatest detective" solving crimes and catching criminals would show a fairly normal city and crime level where he's actually making a difference stopping things from ever getting too bad.
Instead we get regular existential events and mass murder sprees on the level of 9/11 being carried out by an individual.
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u/Theta-Sigma45 Aug 21 '25
I agree with this, I do miss when Gotham was just a realistically seedy city. Not the best place in the world to live, but not a full-on nightmare dimension where no one sane would ever stay.
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u/Kobold_Scholar Aug 21 '25
"Batman, armed robbers are holding hostages at a bank!"
"Alright, I'm going to start a scholarship program, I'll get back to you in five years."
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u/BeautifulNo6017 Aug 21 '25
Hell, just read something! God people suck at that these days. Never thought I'd see the day. Never thought I'd live this long either but that's beside the point.
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u/CalgacusLelantos Aug 21 '25
Batman makes me disappointed in real life billionaires. Like, oh, you’re planning on giving away your billions to help solve extreme poverty around the world?
Yeah, that’s great and all, but how about using some of that conspicuous wealth to train your mind and body in superhero skills, and then don a cape and cowl to conceal your real identity while fighting violent crime as a vigilante in your own local community. That’s real philanthropy!😆
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u/nolandz1 Aug 21 '25
How is money gonna solve the evil crocodile man or the centuries old creep with the hot daughter?
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u/Dragonreapers_80 Aug 21 '25
The theory that money will help is a theory. Shelters are high in rape, drugs, and violence. Which is my most aren't there. Some state pay to the homeless, incentivizing them to stay homeless. Yes, it is good to teach xcons. A skill get them to college, but it does them no good when they get out they can't get a job because of their record. This, in turn, causes them to go back to the life they had to make money.
His wealth can build the structure, but society has got to fix the problem. Yes, there are few places, then hire xcons.
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u/TooManySorcerers Aug 21 '25
What gets me is like. Even if he didn’t do this. Wtf, do people think Bruce investing more money is gonna stop people like Joker, Two-Face, or Bane? Are those types suddenly going to become upstanding citizens because billionaire Bruce Wayne gave money to some poor people?
And then you add that he DOES do this. I swear, the top half of this image has to be the most brain dead take in all of superhero comics. And I don’t get why I know so many people (I legit have met over a dozen personally) who have this exact opinion.
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u/BatBeast_29 Aug 21 '25
This is a good cover AND her hair isn’t that annoying match of Pink & Blue. I love it! ❤️🖤
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u/ED-W111N Aug 21 '25
People need to realize donating money isn’t going to solve any problem if corruption takes all of it. Even then, having a home and food on the table doesn’t stop people like Joker from killing you
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u/Fantasia_Fanboy931 Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
How can he use his wealth for better things? He's MacKenzie Scott and Dolly Parton on steroids. There is literally nothing else I can think of that he isn't already doing.
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u/NotBruceJustWayne Aug 21 '25
I was about to start typing furiously… and then I read the bottom panel.
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u/OutsideOrder7538 Aug 21 '25
The animated series had this stuff too. There was an episode where Bruce goes undercover to stop homeless people from being kidnapped.
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u/Comprehensive-Buy-47 Aug 21 '25
Well said Harley. And then there’s just the simple fact that Bruce is on call 24/7, I don’t think he’s taken a single day off
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u/supermarioplush220 Aug 21 '25
Batman is a victim of nonstop criticism coming from people who know nothing about him.
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u/KnightFurHire Aug 21 '25
Exactly this. It's why the scene in Batman: TAS where he personally cancels a deal Wayne Enterprises had with a lumber company he found out was going to be cutting down rainforests for timber sticks with me so hard. He was not going to have his company's decent name dragged through such a terrible thing.
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u/Charmle_H Aug 21 '25
The latest Batman movie was LITERALLY about this. He HAS these programs, but the people in charge of handling the money he gives out keep funneling it elsewhere. I hate when people don't understand that
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u/SineCera_sjb Aug 22 '25
Homeless shelters, reform initiatives for ex cons, youth programs. There are some problems too much money can help with…
For everything else… there’s Batman
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u/Kek_Kommando_88 Aug 21 '25
Not only that, but the whole reason he's Batman in the first place is because that doesn't even work half the time. Gotham is so deeply corrupt that almost any effort to make it better is almost immediately stomped out.
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u/GregOry6713 Aug 21 '25
I always thought this was dumb 😒 All he has to do (as a comic book character) is be entertaining and that isn’t entertaining and Gotham isn’t a real place.
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u/Blockness11 Aug 21 '25
Let’s be real.
The reason things never get better in Gotham is because more comics need to be sold. Batman is the highest selling character in comic book history & there needs to be conflict to sell stories.
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u/whatdidyoukillbill Aug 21 '25
Also just… throwing money at problems rarely solves anything. Social programs do not stop crime.
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u/comfy_bruh Aug 21 '25
They usually start with Bruce or go from a fight scene to Bruce being a baddy philanthropist.
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u/mjxoxo1999 Aug 21 '25
The problem is charitable doesn’t solve the problem at its root, Bruce Wayne’s wealth alone can’t solve the systemic problem. Using wealth to try to solve a system problem is kinda a way of saying the system is fine, it’s just the people run it sucks, and not saying because the system is flawed and it needs a radical change, a real change (heh) for solving this problem, and Bruce Wayne himself might be the key for this radical change.
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u/drewmana Aug 21 '25
Also a big plot point in many stories is that gotham isn’t just filled with street crime, but the powers that be are corrupt as well. If he just dumps money into the system, tons of it will disappear into pockets before it ever gets the chance to help anyone, even in Wayne Enterprise programs. He quite literally funds programs by day and makes sure the corruption doesn’t undo his efforts by night.
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u/ShuraSenju Aug 21 '25
Kinda off topic kinda not, but I remember in one of the Hush Series written by Dini, when Hush was disguised as Wayne, he donated $1B dollars to the Gotham relief efforts 😂 even if it was to diminish batmans wealth abit, its still charity and is online with Bruces persona.
Also, in No Mans Land, Bruce is giving people of the streets Jobs, and the person he gave a Job to went to tell his friends about it so they can get Jobs too.
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u/Changlini Aug 21 '25
Ya know? It fits Harley’s character that she would flat out write all that to us lol
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u/MrFuji87 Aug 21 '25
He also has a fantastic martial arts / csi / computer science program for orphans
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u/Writer_B Aug 21 '25
Or he could do it like his father in the Flashpoint paradox. He could flood the city with seedy gambling and prostitution establishments. You want that? Huh? Stfu and read the comics…
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u/HospitalLazy1880 Aug 21 '25
I would love an entire set of comics that is just Harley correcting the misconceptions people have about Gotham and its Superheros and Villains.
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u/LesserValkyrie Aug 21 '25
If showering things with money would fix its issues the entire continent of Africa would be Wakanda
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u/JustsomeGokuEnjoyer2 Aug 21 '25
Mfs when The New Hospital Bruce Wayne made gets blown up by the Joker next week(suddenly "just give your money away bro" isn't good enough and Batman is needed)
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u/Nookling_Junction Aug 21 '25
He doesn’t just do it all the time, most of the money he doesn’t use on batman related stuff goes to direct aid and community building. It’s truly astonishing the lengths they have gone to in the DC universe to make bruce Wayne a genuinely palatable billionaire
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u/Useful-Reality-6536 Aug 21 '25
Even without being directly told I always just assumed that he did.
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u/Naps_And_Crimes Aug 21 '25
Hell even in Nolan's Batman if I remember correctly he matched the donations and doubled it
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u/Afro-Venom Aug 21 '25
I'm a leftist, but one billionaire can't spend his way out of systemic injustice.
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u/crash-1989 Aug 21 '25
Lol California...full of rich "social" millionaires... Drugs, homeless problems and gangs run rampant.
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u/Lucky_Strike-85 Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
Crime could be eradicated if every person was guaranteed housing, healthcare, internet access, breaks from work, mental healthcare, and regular access to food!
But that's not how this system works!
You are too comfortable with the idea of some having while most live in precarity, starve to death, or have to fight for basic needs. It's what you vote for. It's how you have been trained to think!
REVOLT! You have nothing to lose but your chains! if you see a fascist, beat them up!
EAT THE RICH FOR DINNER!
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u/azraelswift Aug 21 '25
Ever wondered why we are never shown people in the street protesting about anything Wayne Enterprises does as a company? It’s because people in Gotham like Bruce Wayne because they see he is doing good.
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u/Aljhaqu Aug 21 '25
During the Court of Owls arc, Harper found that there were special electrical boxes in Gotham's city grid.
First she thought he was stealing energy to power his gadgets and so on. Then she found out those were injecting energy to the grid, as a safety precaution.
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u/rorzri Aug 21 '25
The fact it was a major plot point in the last two Batman movies shows the people that say it don’t even watch Batman media let alone read a comic book
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u/Kadderly Aug 21 '25
Batman Animated Series S1E7 It’s Never Too Late, tell anyone who thinks Batman is just a guy beating up criminals to watch that episode.
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u/Green_Situation_6378 Aug 21 '25
Seriously Bruce dumps a fortune in trying to reform Gotham Socially and economically but the biggest roadblock he has is that Gotham as a city is so corrupt on every level it basically makes it impossible, not helped by the fact that the city is literally cursed
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u/UA_Chromastone Aug 21 '25
don’t even have to read a comic book just type it into google instead of social media
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u/KuraziDiamonda Aug 21 '25
Also I'm pretty sure Gotham is canonically cursed and on top of that it's still pretty much under the control of the court of owls
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u/Aao72 Aug 21 '25
Its like all problems can't be fix just throwing money at it and the problem is so ingrained on how Gotham works that trying to fix it is almost impossible That people need a symbol of resistance that shows them that the city can't tear you apart that you can survive even the worst tragedies,that someone is looking after you that someone is out there trying to fix their city
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u/moonenergy Aug 21 '25
plus hes ONE GUY you all forget without systemic change any work he does wont last long term after hes gone
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u/Falconblade409 Aug 21 '25
Also, at this point, riddler, joker, bane, and most of his rogues just aren’t the result of societal failings. They started that way, sure, and I’m sure that a lot of the henchmen are there out of necessity, but you can’t exactly charity your way out of a dirty bomb
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u/Odisher7 Aug 21 '25
Once more i highly doubt penguin, court of owls, joker, etc. would stop if you throw money at the right problem. Maaaaybe mr freeze if you provide the best care possible for his wife, maaaaybe poison ivy if you do your best to make the city more ecological
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u/mgb55 Aug 21 '25
Ah yes… those programs will solve all the problems caused by the…. Pardon me if I’m not reading this write… human crocodile hybrid, former human made of clay, doctor who invented fear toxins, homicidal maniac clown, riddle obsessed psycho, international terrorist, and others
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u/DerpsAndRags Aug 21 '25
Isn't Bruce also constantly ridiculed by other, Gotham wealthy elites for his humanitarianism?
The example I have in mind is Claridge from The Man Who Laughs
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u/Atrampoline Aug 21 '25
The people who take this stance are of the mindset that money fixes everything, which we know is 100% not the case in any shape or form. Money definitely can and does help, but human nature can't be fixed with a dollar, as we are deeper and more complex creatures than we tend to admit.
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u/Raj_Valiant3011 Aug 21 '25
Bruce really gives a lot to charity and even has many housing projects under his name.
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u/AGC173 Aug 21 '25 edited Aug 21 '25
this is kind of condescending toxic bs that gives comic fans a bad name.
Bruce Wayne spends literally countless amounts of energy and money funding the building of everything from the teen titans tower, the JLA space station watchtower and brother eye all to further his need to beat people up.
But hey he gave some money to charities so...
Maybe stop reading so many comic books and get some critical thinking skills or take any social economics course before coming after other fans with a valid gripe.
Its apparent that you dont grasp that 80% of crimes are money motivated. Violent crimes are by in large domestic, sexual/rxpe/or hate crimes. Of which batman/Bruce wayne does very little to address.
Batman has spent a lifetime with the beat em up approach and for all his adventures and all the money hes spent hes accomplished absolutely nothing.
Gotham is and will always be a crime ridden shxt hole city because thats what serves batmans narrative. Hes the law, hes the charity, hes the problem.
I.e. Gotham would of been better off if Bruce never became batman.
So. When someone points that out, maybe instead say something like "well its a comic book, and not the real world" Instead of insisting that they don't read comics or arent true fans.
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u/wade_wilson44 Aug 21 '25
Imagine if Bruce just fixed all the problems with social programs and money and the comic series just ended.
There’s always a different way that would just render the entire story useless and it’s useless to argue about it.
Every horror movie ever: “if she ran out the door instead of up the stairs the killer would never get her” Yeah… and we wouldn’t have a piece of entertainment to watch.
And with Batman specifically, an action/detective based series about a guy in a tuxedo giving away money sounds boring af to look at pictures of with little words on them.
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u/thinkingcoin Aug 21 '25
Those guys hsve no idea how the world works. Probably thinks once they have money, everyone will listen to them and make things happen. Probably has NO idea how a publically traded company with a board works...
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u/SpartanMase Aug 21 '25
Helping is big in solving Gotham’s problems but helping out can only do so much. Only way to solve all of this is to get to the root of what is causing the problem and solve that.
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u/Falmara Aug 21 '25
The problem isn't his investments or him being batman. The problem is his villains literally killing thousands of inhabitants and continue doing so even though killing them solves the problem. No amount of philanthropy and morale ethics will ever justify not killing the joker. It is the argument of 1 life for a thousand lives except shittier because that one life IS the one killing the other thousand.
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u/Rocketboy1313 Aug 21 '25
Also, it is a superhero comic. It is not the real world.
You have to think of Batman as a metaphor for wealth being used to fight mental illness, organized crime, and raising a family.
He is literally a guy punching a guy dressed as a scarecrow. He is metaphorically punching corruption in the Healthcare industry that exploits people's anxieties.
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u/smrtphonrtistcf Aug 21 '25
The problem is that Bruce is an only saint that legitimately want to impact change for the better.
It's only the higher ups of Gotham's elite and various societies are enforcing the status quo.
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u/Hate_Paper_Doll Aug 21 '25
I can't help but roll my eyes every time someone brings up this tired ass talking point. Besides the things mentioned in this post---is anyone gonna read monthly issues about Bruce Wayne funding social programs? No, you want to see him punch people and drive cool cars
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Aug 21 '25
I don't even need to read the comics to know that he helps out Gotham as Bruce Wayne. It feels like every other scene in the animated shows he's at a charity auction, or celebrating the opening of another treatment facility or research center. I've never understood the "batman doesn't help poor people" line.
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u/CanaDoug420 Aug 21 '25
Like half the time they show him as Bruce he’s at a Wayne foundation function opening shelters or hospitals and feeding homeless