A Geek History of Time - Episode 83 - Batman through the Ages Part V

Episode Date: November 28, 2020

BELLS Blow in her face and she'll follow you anywhere. You are destroying the Constitution of the United States may God have mercy on your souls. Good day. Yes. It's a very sad thing. We could be sad if we just elected the right white man to power. That's creepy but that's a different category of creepy. Zizuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz There's a plan of what fucking truth that matters, try and get it. Like with most episodes I can bring him back to wrestling. Right, well he's got other people who work for him who also do things.

And they can use mutate, kill and size into smaller worlds after all. Fuck you. I still don't give a shit about getting fake property in a fantasy game. This is a geek history of time. Where we connect an artery to the real world. My name is Ed Blalock. I'm a world history teacher with a side-order of remedial reading here in Northern California. And I'm trying to figure out as we talk right now how I'm going to get away with introducing graphic novels into my canned curriculum. I have ideas.

Okay, I'm sure you do, and we need to talk about them, but that's what's on my mind right now, taking my job and tying it to my passion. How about you? I'm Damien Harmony. I am a Latin teacher up here in a beautiful burning up in fire, Northern California. Oh, we're not burning up as such as we were a couple of weeks ago. Come on. Very good point. The multi million acre fires have all been, you know, 90 something percent contained. Or just burned out because they ran out of fuel.

One of the two. Same same same. Yeah yeah. Same this. Burnt burned out and contained it's the same thing right. So I actually I have harbored the fantasy of having textbooks but also when we eventually have textbooks that weren't made like when I was still in high school. The dark night returns?

Yeah. I think our youngest textbook that we have for Latin at least is 1995. That's our youngest one. Now in fairness, nothing has changed in the language. It is exactly, exactly. Exactly. But where in terror is a thing? Well, yeah.

And I would love to order. There is a wonderful set of graphic novels called the Olympiads that is just so good to read. But I'll put that in the recommendations toward the end. But I would love to order stuff like that and have kids read the story of Troy. Like there's a wonderful one about the story of Troy and there's a wonderful one about the Odyssey. And I'm like, I would like that. I would like that a lot. Or if I ever taught World History again, by the way, textbook for World History is as old as my teaching career because I used it as a student teacher. I would love for us to get a class set of Berlin, the graphic novel. We did for Persepolis. We actually found money for doing Persepolis and it was beautiful. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, Persepolis.

Persepolis, yeah. I'm a little bit impressed that you managed to get that approved. I mean, just because it's overtly political. Yeah, but it's in Iran, so it's okay. Yeah, I agree. So anyway, that's me and that's what I do. Why are you so interested in graphic novels?

Is there a particular one you got in mind? Well, yeah, actually several. But of course, we've now spent the last four episodes because this is me, we've spent the last four episodes talking about the history of Batman comics as opposed to the national regional politics of professional wrestling, which, you know, is your doctoral, you know, thesis for podcast purposes. And if one were to hazard a guess, I bet you people would lose money betting on which

one was the older medium. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Absolutely. Think it was. Yeah. Yeah. It totally. Think it. Yeah. And it turns out, folks, go back to season one and you'll learn a thing or eight from from Damien about the history of wrestling and find out, no, no no no no son you're wrong. Yeah. Um, but yeah, so I have graphic novels on my mind because we're we're now coasting into the point where I feel comfortable handing the Batman saga off to you to talk about movies. You mean the baton?

Oh, you know, it's a funny trend. Like last episode, I ain't even mad. No, well done. Thank you. Thank you. Because, you know, today, tonight, in this episode, I want to talk about the other, the other major work, again, of the 80s, that I think is

critically important for understanding the development of the 80s, that I think is critically important for understanding the development of the characters in the Batman mythos into who they are today. Okay. And into the themes and the ideas and just the development of the narrative, because last episode we talked about the Dark Knight and Frank Miller. Frank toxic masculinity. And we talked about year zero, which was.

Yeah, it was nice to see Batman being incompetent for once. Yeah, well, yeah, briefly. But yes. And, and the all, all of the stuff that that got introduced into the mythos or as you very skillfully pointed out, it's not really that it got introduced, it just got made blatant. Yeah.

Miller took stuff that was kind of sub-rosa and made it Rosa. Like, no, no, let's talk about this. Let's talk about the fact that Alfred being not a say to a massive skit owner ever suit is going to look at a teenager showing up wanting to be another Robin and go, you know, yeah, there's just let me take you to the boys and girls club and you can play pool. This is bad. Yeah, or basketball or whatever. But yeah, this this is a bad idea. Right. And and you're kind of nuts for thinking of it.

Well, then see, that's cool for a kid to be exclusively nuts, but for Batman to be like, yeah, all right, it's given a toss. Like, that's where I liked that Alfred was like, all right, I'm out, I'm done. Yeah, peace, done. Yeah, bye-bye. So, and of course, I mean, they're, they're have, they're have since then been incidents in the comics where Alfred has, you know, walked away left. Sure.

Taking a break said, I can't, I can't be around for this knowledge and stuff, but because it's comics and status quo is God, you know, he always comes back. Yeah, but you know the first time we really see him Raising a really serious objection to to this obsession of Bruce Wayne's really having agency quite honestly On some level, you know and yeah, and and and then of course since then on some level, you know? And yeah, and then of course since then, in other media, we've now seen, you know, the development of the characters now turned into, you know, in the Nolan film, the first Nolan film, he tells a story to Bruce that,

or was it the first one? No, it was the second one. Yeah. The second one talking about some end just wanna see the first one. No, it was the second one. Second one, talking about some men just wanna see the world burned. The lead into that line is a story about him being in Burma. Yes. With clearly in a military capacity,

but maybe not in the British army. Maybe he was a mercenary of some kind. And you're like, right, wait, hold on. And then there have been other stories moderately in which it's pretty clear he has some kind of special forces military kind of background Which I would point out Jarvis was the butler for iron man and Jarvis was in the royal Air Force I think but he knew how to box. He was a really good boxer. And I remember Alfred at some point punches out Superman and throws him out of the back cave. Yes.

Yes. On his blue bud. Well, no, his red butt actually. That part is red. But his butt is red. But anyway, so yeah. So Superman is a mandrel. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah. And I just completely got taken off track by the Alfred is the moral center. And he has his own life.

Yeah. I'll forget. Yeah. And, and, you know, up until those newer stories, you know, there's a very pivotal storyline from the comics. I want to say it was in the 90s where there's a massive earthquake and Gotham winds up being cut off from aid. And Batman disappears and we don't know where he's gone. man disappears and we don't know where he's gone. And Alfred winds up becoming a, there's a story in that series dedicated to what Alfred is doing during this whole time. And he is, he talks about having a theater background. And so his backstory has evolved with the times, you know, similarly, but that is the first place that we really see him take a hard line telling Bruce, you crazy.

Yeah, and again, he's no longer just a tool of Bruce's. Yeah, yeah, and in that series, by saying to Bruce, you crazy, he is bringing up another one of the themes that after that shows up repeatedly is that is Batman really any less crazy than any of the people he keeps capturing and locking up in Arkham. Yeah, and again, this is, we're not quite in the 90s where it's the age of the anti-hero and therefore having non-absolute good guys. But we are getting there. And I think in many ways this starts to feed that.

Well, this, I'm going to say that this is the precursor at the very, very, very leading edge of the wave. Yeah. I think version of it, as you look to say. Yeah, it is kind of the or version. The dark night is the template that gives other comics creators the freedom to go fully anti heroic with other characters. Yeah, yeah, I don't really like. Yeah. Go ahead. Like I don't remember when cable was introduced in the X-Men. But, you know, as a, as a, you know, Lee field, you know, pouches everywhere.

No feet. No feet. Lee field, you know, pouches everywhere. No feet. No feet. Weird, weird skinny ass ankles for such a muscular individual. You know, yeah, like all of all of all of that guys heroes skip leg day. Like what? No, they don't because their quads are insanely outbound. they don't because their quads are insanely outbound. Okay. Point. They skip. They skip leg day below the knee. Yeah. Now cable shows up as a newborn infant in 86. So that doesn't count though.

But he is, he first shows up in March of 90. So there you go. Yeah, with the unions. So there you go. And he shows up. And he shows up. And he shows up as being the, you know, grizzled dude from the future into hero. Yeah.

Yeah. So there you go. And I think I think Miller created, you know, he was the one who dug the first groove for for everybody else to go into with that. And what you were saying at the end of our last episode about everybody being cynical at the end of Vietnam, and I would, I would add Watergate, the Iran, the first of the Iran hostage crisis, then the Iran contrast scandal. And and everything else like I there's such a long list of shit we could mention. Oh yeah. That cynicism is a big part of the reason

that we see the anti heroes of the Bronze Age of comics, you know, in the 90s when all of that happens. Yeah, I would agree. And, you know, and in the 80s is where we see like the dark night, as I mentioned, is very much a deconstruction of a lot of the tropes of the Batman mythos, which is part of where that, oh, I'm going to take this subtext and make a text stuff comes from, you know, Batman defeating a gang then becoming the leader of the gang because he's a charismatic strong figure replacing the charismatic strong figure who had been the leader of that force, which is in so much saline, it fucking hurts. Well, and again, that's a thing that keeps happening in comic lore because like I said last time, Storm beats Callisto who is in charge of the more locks.

And she is, it's not so much she's a charismatic force who replaces a charismatic force. She is broken in several ways and she takes advantage of the other person being broken emotionally. Okay, there's even a quote. I forget what it said, but it was essentially like you, you know, it kind of like, you know, you thought that you were darkness, but I'm, you know, it's that same kind of you thought you were bad. Yeah. Yeah. But, you know, what's your face storm does the same thing. Yeah, but you know what's your face storm does the same thing so yeah Yeah, and the the the the venom quote not venom Bane call from from the Nolan films, you know, you think you're darkness, right? I didn't see I didn't see the life day until I was a man, you know kind of kind of think

Same same Z's. Yeah. Yeah. And, and so, you know, so much of Batman's lore, again, is nowadays, what isn't a response to the 66 Batman series is a response to the Dark Knight. And the Dark Knight was itself a response to the 66 Batman series. And so, you know, these are these incredibly seminal kind of works for the whole mythology. And, you know, the last one that I really want to spend some real time talking about before we get into talking about the movies. You know, I talked about how the Dark Knight

is where we see, I think, the really the first time that this idea of this karmic entanglement between Batman and the Joker, where they become synonymous with each other. Yeah, they don't say one without the other. They become the two halves of the of the killing joke. Okay, and that's not Alan, no, that's Alan Moore, right? That's Alan Moore. Okay, no longer talking about Miller. Okay.

I mean, we're probably gonna mention it once or twice again, because Frank Miller, but this is Alan Moore writing Batman comics. Okay. And you can't really talk about Alan Moore without talking about Watchman. Yeah. Because if anybody who isn't a comic book nerd

recognizes the name Alan Moore, most likely Watchman is what they're gonna recognize it from. Oh, yeah. Or they're gonna recognize it from Leave Extradinary Gentlemen, which he didn't want his name attached to when the movie got made. Yeah, well, yeah, it was kind of a crap fest,

but yeah, I thought it was an entertaining crap fest, but you know, that's just so And and you know talk about watchman for a second one of the things that struck me Literally just as we were about to start, you know talking about all of this is Part of what I was going to bring up is part of what I was going to bring up, what I was going to say, that there are themes in the Dark Knight that are, that to my mind were taken from watchmen.

But it actually turns out Dark Knight predates watchmen by several months. It doesn't mean he was an in development of both of those things though. Well no, it's true, but I think what it more is, is an indication that there was something going on in the Zidgeist. Because again, Miller portrays Superman, who is this God like hero, right? As as being a tool of, you know, the, the, the, the US government of, of United States national interests and, and all of that. Right. Right. And in Watchman, we have Dr. Manhattan, who is the entire reason why in that universe, the United States one Vietnam. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

And I think. Well, first off, the United States one Vietnam. So it's an alternate history. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The fuck?

Well, in that comic, the United States one in Vietnam. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I don't mean here. No. It's quite the opposite. But like, yeah, in, so put in in, in, in, in the Watchman universe, of course, because of dr. Manhattan

The vietcong never stood a chance right and and north vietnames the NVA never stood a chance and so You know Vietnam was unified under a you know Western supported capitalist government. As Jesus intended. As yes. And that is a line that would be said by the comedian in dripping tones of acid. And so there's this theme going on of this, you know, God-like figures who are out of touch enough with issues on the ground to become the tools of government. Okay. Get what I'm saying.

I do. I do. I do. They are what I forget the writer would call, what the writer's name was, would call useful idiots on some level. Yeah. That, you know, two Miller Superman is the big blue boy scout

who's gonna follow orders because William is the elected president of the United States? So, you know, and more's more's portrayal of Dr. Manhattan is more nuanced in that no no he's just so powerful that like he's a loop of it all. He's a he's a loop of it all and okay, the idea here is if we end the work quickly, if you were people are going to die, so I'm going to end the work quickly by vaporizing, you know, half the population. I gotta do this all the problem, you know, because the math checks out. Yeah, well, he's been so stripped of his humanity and Superman is also not human by virtue of the fact that he's an alien but also by virtue of the fact that he's so powerful

how could he possibly understand what's going on with us? Yeah, yeah. This really reminds me of that thing that you post every year right around this time of Superman and Batman talking about each other to the respective dates. Oh, yeah. From the most recent comics of just the last couple of years, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And what's interesting there is that is now the comics coming around again full circle

from Miller, kind of responding to Miller. It's going to say they're reacting to it again. Yeah, yeah, with a more positive view of everybody involved, I think. Like these two hands can overcome these differences. The differences are still there, but they can be braided together at least. Yeah, yeah, the differences, well, one, the differences are still there, but each of them, I think this is an important thing, is in Miller's universe, there's no room for empathy. That's a really good point.

Miller's whole ethos is so wrapped up in in machismo. Right. That that there there is not empathizing. And and you know, for those of you who you know aren't my friends on Facebook who are listening to this, the the bit that that Damian is referring to is is a wonderful piece out of DC comics in just the last couple of years, in the events leading up to Batman's marriage to Catwoman or Bruce Wayne's marriage to Selena Kyle, which spoiler alert didn't actually wind up happening unfortunately to the infuriation of a great many fans myself included

because you know, it's lazy writing not to have it happen, but anyway, where Batman and in wrestling, in wrestling, we call that overswarving. There you go. You're just not going to pay this off ever really. Yeah. You know, oh, somebody else came out and broke up the match. Great.

Okay. We'll never actually have this result. Never actually going to get an end. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just like commit. Yeah. So Robert Aspirin made, has made the same set of mistakes with the myth series and his novels. It's like, oh my god, have, have some of your characters actually grow and develop for God's sake, please.

for God's sake, please. Pay some. So, yeah, like, come on. But anyway, we're getting off the subject. The bit that the Damien is referring to is Batman and Catwoman are breaking into a building. Let's not put too much point on it. And Superman and Lois Lane are getting into the same building from the ground floor. And there's this wonderful bit of parallel conversation happening as each of them is talking. So Batman is talking to Catwoman. Superman is talking to Lois Lane. And each of them is talking about the other one. And you know, Batman says, you

know, he's the survivor of a Holocaust. He never, he never knew his parents. I, I had parents, you know, I, I, I lost them, but you know, I, I had parents. I didn't, I'm not totally alone in the universe. And then we cut over to Superman saying, you know, he watched his parents murdered in front of him. Right. You know, I had, I had Monpah. Kent. You know, Kent. And, you know, I was raised in a house where I was always loved and I was always nurtured

and he grew up in a mansion that was by himself. That was empty. It was empty. You know, the only with memories. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah, and they go back and forth. And each of them ends up with the closing statement before they wind up running into

it, literally running into each other. They have the closing statement, he's a better man than I am. Mm-hmm. And then there's a wonderful moment they step out of the elevator and they stare at each other in the hallway. Right. And there's one panel of dead silence as they stare at each other. And then Lois Lane steps forward and goes, you must be cat woman. Hi, I'm Lois Lane. Lovely to meet you. There's a bit. no, there's a part before that though that really was my favorite part of the whole thing. Oh, yeah. And where Batman looks at me is you took the elevator.

And it's just so, that to me is a crystallization of everything having to do with the difference between the two of them. And Superman's response is, well, to come in on this floor, I'd have to break a window. Right. And it's just, it's, it's, it's, with great power,

it comes great respect for a property. But, if only, but like, but the fact that, you know, Batman is means to an end. And Superman is, no, there's a right way to do it. And Batman is, he had the power to snuff out the world was pinky if he wanted to. And he doesn't. And it's because Batman is like looking at the power

as they means. And Superman is looking at the power as a responsibility of like, you know, and so Batman is like, he cannot comprehend of someone having that power and not using it. Yeah. Yeah. And so to me, that's the point.

Or he does comprehend it, but he recognizes how impossible it would be for him. Right. Not to. Right. Well, and there you go. Yeah. Clark was raised with love. Yeah.

Batman was raised with wealth. Yeah. Yeah. And so anyway, that's that's that's the bit. And and you know, like if you if you listened to the last episode, you you can tell already any number of points where that like wildly diverges from Miller's characterization of both of them. Yes. Well, like you said, that whole thing is just an exercise in empathy. They're literally imagining the other one's situation as being worse than their own. Yeah. Yeah. And that the other one came up in that and therefore he's better than they are. Yeah. Like, there's a lot of layers of empathy going on there. Yeah. Yeah. So, and of the two of them, the one who has a line before they actually run into each other in the elevator, you know, it's Bruce Wayne, who has the line saying, I mean,

there's no way we could actually ever really be friends. Yeah, because, you know, he's a God, like how, how could that even be a thing? Yeah, friends kind of have to be equals is his idea. Yeah, yeah. And then, you know, the the the ending of it kind of winds up actually being very heartwarming where you figure out, no, no, they really are in in a very in a very meaningful, very well written, very very masculine. Like I look at that whole arc and their conversation

and the back and forth between them and I'm like, oh my God, on a smaller scale, without the three color comics elements, I've seen this same shit with my own friends. Sure. Like it is truly a really well done picture of supportive masculine friendship and it's amazing. And so Frank Miller could never write that because there just doesn't exist in his universe. Like I kind of wonder what kind of friendships he has because wow. kind of friendships he has because wow. Yeah.

He creates, anytime he creates anything, it's a truly bleak universe. If you read Sin City, like, sorry. Right, right. Okay, so Alan Moore, so this episode, we're talking about Alan Moore.

And in Watchman, mm-hmm. You know, he thoroughly deconstructs superhero comics just right here across the bull. Yeah. Um, and, and in V for vendetta, he takes three color hero comic tropes and applies them to politics. Yeah. And anti-fascism and anarchism and all of that. And kind of winds up philosophically, he winds up with a dog's breakfast, but it's a really entertaining story to read a long way. And so he he wound up in 87. Mm-hmm. Uh, he signed on with DC to do the killing joke. Mm-hmm. And, um, the killing joke is really important,

not because of Batman, but because of the Joker. The killing joke is a, is a, is a, is a Joker story in which Batman has a part. So just real quick, because I know in Marvel, there's a thing that what do they call continuity. So that's clearly not a thing here, because you said that Joker broke his own neck to fuck over Batman in the tunnel of love. Well, okay, remember that in that's that's in in the universe of the dark night, which post crisis, post crisis that was determined to be earth.

I don't remember what? Okay, so so Marvel has Earth 616 and earth whatever whatever whatever You know and and so there are else world's stories and there are one-if stories and there's a lot kind of stuff DC Didn't actually come up with the idea of doing any of that until the mid 80s Or late 80s. I'm trying to, anyway. So DC has had multiple attempts to try to make all of their continuity tie together. OK.

Because like if you go back through the history of, I'm just going to pick a character, not really at random, if you look at the history of green lantern. Uh-huh. Originally green lantern was a magical hero. And then Hal Jordan showed up as kind of the second green lantern and he gets his powers from a science fictiony source of the power ring from the guardians and all that.

And so to eventually try to make their continuity unified, the DC's editorial board came up with the idea of crisis on infinite earths in which a number of people died. And universes literally collided and got mashed together and stuff happened. And then within another couple of years they had to do it again because their continuity had gone back to being the cock principle. Yeah. And so the thing is, and this is part of the reason why I too, and primarily a Marvel fan now, they're just there's like, if you try to apply continuity to DC, you're kind of trying to you're you're you're pushing you're trying to

push rope, like it's just sure, yeah, you're going to have you're going to have a little success, but it's just eventually it's all going to fall apart like you you just you can't make it work. My step is used to talk about Marvel and DC and he said there's one thing that he and I both agreed on with that and it was that DC had. And you and I have talked about this too, in our episode as they were Greek gods, DC had interesting villains and God-like superheroes. Yes. Or I would go even further in, you and I would say, probably, archetypical superheroes. Yes, very much. Whereas Marvel had very highly powered villains and really interesting heroes with real flaws and problems.

Yeah. And therein lies the main difference. The other one, my stepdad always used to say is DC never understands history. Marvel understands its history. And it's like, that's pretty true up until bankruptcy almost killed them in the 90s. Yeah, by and large. But yeah, that's a pretty, pretty true thing to say. And so, yeah, the continuity being history, it would make sense to DC as weak with that. Yeah. And the thing is, like from the get-go, the dark night storyline was not, was clear because it was very clearly set in the modern day.

It was clearly supposed to be commentary on current events. Sure. supposed to be commentary on current events. It was never really part of the canonical timeline. It was kind of an elseworld story, kind of from the very beginning. It's kind of the way the editorial board at DC saw it. the way the editorial board at DC saw it. And so Alan Moore came in and he had the idea that he really wanted to explore the Joker. So he came up with this idea of the killing joke. And again, one of the things that Moore is really good at doing. This is kind of where his genius lies, is

he's really, really good at recognizing the tropes and deconstructing them or analyzing them or juggling with them or whatever, but he's really good at taking these, whatever these ideas are, these themes, and figuring out, okay, well, what if we take that and we mess with it? Right. And he's a brilliantly creative mind in doing that for all of my other opinions about the man.

He is very good at doing that. And so he came in and his idea was, you know, I wanna look at like, okay, how exactly did we wind up with the Joker? Like what leads to somebody being this guy? Again, deconstruction, deconstruction yeah and so the storyline the bare bones explanation of the storyline is the Joker decides that he's going to break Commissioner Gordon and the Joker is convinced, and the Joker is convinced that all it takes is one bad day.

Because in a series of flashbacks throughout the killing joke, we learn that that's what happened to him. That is just one bad day. One catastrophically bad day. What year is this? Uh 87. Killing joke is 87. Okay.

Okay, 87 into 88. I'm just thinking in terms of, um, I mean, Alan Moore's British. Yeah. And he absolutely saw one bad day when Margaret Thatcher got elected. I mean, Alan Moore's British. Yeah. And he absolutely saw one bad day when Margaret Thatcher got elected. Sorry, actually, I got to back up. It's March of 88. Oh, 88.

Okay. But I'm also just thinking in terms of he's doing DC. So he's got to be somewhat in meshed in American culture. And I just, I keep thinking of evangelical televangelism and how they have a cataclysmic view of Christianity. Yeah. So it's kind of makes sense that that one bad day, you know.

Yeah. And, and, and he, he was looking at this as, you know, again, we wind up looking at the, and, and because this is 88, and dark night had been each 60 to 87, there, there is a level of response to the dark night in that. Again, the dark night introduced this idea of the two of them being somehow comically connected. And so now, when Moore is looking at this and going, well, you know, what are they, what are they having common? How, how are they like each other? You know, what are, what are the similarities here? And again, another thing that, that, you, another thing that we see kind of maybe not for the first time, but made explicit for the first time in The Dark Knight is the idea that Batman is just as crazy

Better controlled right and let the villains the fights. Yeah And so More wants to try to show the similarities and the differences between them. And so, you know, we find out over the course of the course of the story that, you know, the Joker started out being, you know, he's a chemical engineer who quits his job to become a stand-up comic and he fails miserably. Like horribly and he's not and he's married, he's gonna prick wife. I'm sorry, hey, on a second, I just would like to point out that no stand-up comic quits their job to do stand up comedy.

Like we don't, we don't do that. Like, because that doesn't pay. Speaking speaking speaking with some personal experience. Yes, I gotta keep a roof over my head. I got children to feed. I'm not quitting my job. Right. Yeah.

Well, okay. So, so Alan or bad understanding there, but okay. Did not do his research. Or, or, or alternatively, maybe he did do his research and he's trying to point out that, you know, the Joker was kind of an idiot and a loser to begin with. Okay. Fair enough. Poor poor judgment.

You could have done that just by virtue of the idea that he started doing stand-up comedy, though. Like, he doesn't have to quit his job to show these natives. Yeah, well, yeah, but he really wants to drive the point home, right? So anyway, he quit his job, so now he's unemployed and he's a failure as a comic, so now he's got to figure out a way to support his pregnant wife. So he makes an agreement that he's going to help a couple of crooks get through the chemical plant where he used to work so that they can rob the facility next door.

Okay. Okay. And he finds out over the course of the plant, Okay, okay. And he finds out over the course of the planning of this, of this heist, he gets, he the correct essentially threatened his life force him to go along with him. And they want to try to, you know, implicate him as being the mastermind behind the whole thing. So they force him to dawn the red hood, who is a villain villainous character shows up elsewhere in Batman mythology.

And there's a gunfight. The two criminals wind up being killed. The engineer are poor, you know, a feller gets confronted by Batman. And he winds up jumping into a waste pond to get away from Batman, gets swept through a pipe, and discovers that the chemicals have permanently disfigured him. It's in his been bleach white. His lips have been dyed permanently red, and his hair is emerald green. Right.

They're right off the bat. I kind of want to know what set of chemicals could have that specific set of... Multi-colored, biological, multicolored kind of effects, but okay, three color comics will roll with it. Your hair is keratin or whatnot, so maybe that interacts differently than your skin does and your lips are a sphincter. So, well, okay, I can see the idea that, you know, if your lips were

permanently somehow damaged badly enough, they might be ret, but virtue of, you know, the amount of blood flow involved, the start tissue, like I mean, I can see that see that but like how does that happen and not wind up flensing the skin off the rest of your face Yeah, you know So we're over three color like comics the point is he is secondary colors. Therefore he's evil. Yes. Yeah, well, yeah Yeah, yeah getting getting back to that that theme that keeps coming up. Yeah Yeah, yeah, getting back to that theme that keeps coming up. Yeah. And so he looks in a mirror realizes that he's now been permanently, permanently maimed, you know, disfigured by this.

Jokes on him. He's lost his, yes, the jokes on him, he's lost his family, he's lost everything. And he snaps. And this, and this, and this is the birth of the Joker. Okay. And there is, there is an iconic panel done in shades of black and white and shades of purple. uh, staring at the reader with his, with his gloved hands in his hair, just cackling. And the background is just the letter up for, uh, I've seen that. Yep. I've seen that. Usually on edge, uh, edgy comics t-shirts. Yeah. Yes.

Yeah. Yeah. Sending the signal. I'm an edge lord. Yes. Yeah. So. So that's, that's the backstory we learned about the Joker. Well, the Joker wants to now, over the course of the story of the killing joke, he wants to do the same thing to Gordon.

Now, why Gordon and not Batman? Well, because if he shatters Batman, he doesn't have anybody to be counter to. Okay. Gordon is the system. Oh, see. Yeah, yeah. Whereas he and Batman, again, they have this. I actually, the word you teach world religions a lot more indebted than I ever do. Yeah. Yeah. Would it actually be a darmic dance?

Like aren't they kind of following their dharma in their constant struggle? Yeah. Okay. I think so. Yeah. I think, yeah. That's, yeah. Just to say that their comically tied is kind of incorrect.

It would be more dharma. Yeah. Okay. So anyway, their darmically tied. Well, incorrect. It wouldn't be more dharma. Yeah, okay. So anyway, they're darmically tied. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, they're they're rollin' the cosmos. They're they're acting out. And so, um, so what he what, winds up using a handgun with a very specially underloaded bullet. Now the idea originally was his plan originally was that he assumed Gordon would come to the door and he'd shoot Gordon and the idea was to paralyze Gordon. Well, instead of that, Barbara Gordon shows up.

Right. Back to him. And he shoots her. Paralyzed. Paralyzed. Very famously, the bullet lodges in her spine, which was supposed to do to her father. Lodges in her spine leaves her paralyzed. And then the Joker kidnaps

Gordon cages him in in the freak show and Doses him it's not it's not explicitly stated. It's pretty clearly hinted that he heavily doses him up with with Psychotropic drugs, right? And then and then psychologically tortures him and Part of what he does is he forces him to view projected photos of Barbara having Ben shot lying on the floor of the house naked. And it is very, very strongly implied that Barbara us sexually assaulted. And the idea of all of this for the Joker is that he's trying to break Gordon, that he's trying to inflict on Gordon the same psychotic break he had to prove, to prove that all it takes for anybody is one bad day. And I would, so what if, just, what if at the end of the day,

he's like, oh shit, it didn't work. Well, I guess I got to try a different bad day then. Like, like, did he start off like with, like, it ratcheted down some, like he put gum in his hair while he was sleeping, like, like, he found a kid named Alexander and just tested all this shit out on him first. And he's like, okay, I think I've got the formula. I've got to step it up and actually. I like it.

The terrible no good day. You know, very bad day. But like, what if Gordon doesn't break on this day? Does Joker be like, all right, fine, fuck. Now who are we gonna paralyze and rape and show him pictures of? Because clearly his own daughter ain't enough. So. So like, what are we gonna paralyze and rape and and show him pictures of because clearly his own daughter ain't enough so. So like what are we gonna do?

Right. And then like do you just see him at a drawing board of like shit crossed out and stuff like you know like a bunch of post-its or whatnot. Like if that bad day didn't work like. Yeah. Does he try again? Like. Well, he's really putting all his eggs in one basket for this. He really,

he really is. You know, it's where go home. I mean, it really is. Yeah. No, it is. And in this case, he goes home, home being arcom because because Gordon doesn't break and Gordon insists when Batman shows up, he insists to Batman know you got to capture him by the book. So we proved to him that he's wrong. Gotcha. And there's this moment that is simultaneously kind of amazing and really weird where Batman subdues him, breaks the news to him that you failed. And he tries to reach out and say,

look, we can, you know, if you want to get better, we can help you get better. And the Joker declined, saying it's too late for that. It's far too late. And he then tells a joke to Batman about two inmates in a lunatic asylum trying to escape. And they jump across an air gap in the roof and one of them jumps, the other ones too afraid to go. And the first one says, no, I'll tell you what, I'll shine my flashlight across. And if you fall, the flashlight will stop you. And the one who's because they're escaping

from it. And the silence, yeah, who who nuts. And, and the one who's afraid to jump says, well, what do you think I am crazy? You're going to turn it off way across. Okay. And, and, and, and, and, and, and does last. Good. And the police show up and they arrest the Joker. And, and so, you know, we, we have, there's, I mean, there's an awful lot to unpack here. Yeah. But, you you know a big part of what more was was trying to Trying to emphasize Was there's there's there's a commonality of some level of experience between Batman and the Joker mm-hmm and and you know they've both undergone These you know terribly traumatic kind of events and it events and it's about how the two of them

have responded. Yeah, it's response to trauma. Yeah, and they're both Jeff Klock, literary critic, comic correct, pointed out that both Batman and the Joker are creations of a random and tragic one bad day. Yes. Bad man responds by forging meaning from the random tragedy, whereas the Joker reflects the absurdity of life and all of its random injustice. Yeah, I mean, as soon as you said by trying to forge meaning from it, I was thinking like, and Joker's response is to strip meaning from everything else.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's to try to add that to both of them. That's both of them. There, there, what's the word I'm looking there?

Not just an MO, it's like they're, well, the reason for being for them, their mission in life becomes those two separate things. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and, you know, one of the kind of important things to point out, one of the things that's very strong about Moore's storytelling here is throughout the whole story, it's really clear that the Joker is a desperately unreliable narrator.

Shocking. He, he as much as says, sometimes I remember it one way, sometimes another, if I'm gonna have a past, I prefer it to be multiple choice. Oh. You know, and it really is. And here's the thing, this is why I wanted to make sure to bring this up to T to T you off to talk about the movies. Yeah, yeah. Because this story, like every

time we see the Joker after this, there are elements of this story in his characterization. Yes. Like Nicholson's Joker. you know, elements of this in him, and everything we see after that. And this is again, very much a response to the 1966 TV series, the Joker there, and right now I'm forgetting the actor's name. Uh, oh Jesus,

and now you just made me forget. Caesar Romero. Caesar Romero, thank you. You know, Caesar Romero's, you know, he's, he's clearly kind of medicine, but mostly he's just kooky, you know, you know, villainous, villainous, you know, clown, as opposed to this character who is almost trying, like not almost, he's trying to be some kind of philosopher evangelist. He is a really poorly read version of Diogenies. Okay, yeah. You know, he is not, because Diogenies was, you know, here's how to increase your happiness.

That's not Joker, but his methodology is similar of being like, I'm going to subvert this system. Yeah. You know, D'Aginis lived in a world where people were trying to gather wealth. He rejected it completely. He is, I mean, he's, yeah, so he's D'Aginis. Whereas Batman is Aristotle. You've viewed appropriately enough viewed through a funhouse mirror. But yes, yeah, and Batman's Aristotle. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. Yeah. I like that. And so, yeah. So, you know, and the clearly, as you already pointed out, the Heath Ledger version of the Joker is like

heavily, heavily influenced by this. Right. You know, do you want to know how I got these scars? Right. Yeah. And he tells the story. Yeah. And he's a like, one of the best things about the writing in that film and one of the best things about

ledger's performance in that film is every time he tells a different story, he 110% buys it. Yes. Yeah. Like the sadness is there, the anger is there. All the immobility of the unfairness of that story. Yeah. Yeah, that's all there. And that's more, like that's that is that is more as more as damp on that character.

And the fact that in the mythology of the character ever since, the idea that these two characters is somehow, as you you brilliantly put it, that they're somehow darmically tied together, I mean, you know, every, every interpretation that we've seen since then has, has had this weird semi mystical, these two are these archetypes that are constantly, you know, at constantly at, you know, loggerheads kind of roll to it. And I think, again, we got to go back to Miller to kind of see that idea have its kind of earliest genesis. And now it's getting developed out

as we see more, you know, really doubling down on the idea of them being two sides of the same coin. Yeah. And then going forward into where we've seen them since then. And so now we're left with bad man developing into this, now he's been deconstructed and all of these tropes have been laid bare and we see that he's a rich guy who's spending an awful lot of his time beating up poor people and mentally ill. Right. You know, and we can't get away from like we can't make that not overt anymore. Yeah, like in the new, even in the new 52, there was actually a short storyline where there were a group of villains who were out to get Batman because they were, you know, second rate, third rate hoods who had been permanently disfigured or somehow, you know, maimed in the process. Yeah, in the process,

I'm taking them down. Like there was one of them who literally had a battering sticking out either side of his head. Oh, like the guy from the 1800s who had the rod in his dome. Yeah, yeah. And another one who literally had a boot print in his face. Oh, jeez. And this was the kind of villainous rejects who were getting used as the army by, it might have been hush. I'm trying to remember, but whatever villain it was, it was getting well together. They were all motivated by the fact that they were down on their luck poor schmucks who had been in the wrong place the wrong time and run into of all people

Batman when they were trying to do a stick up and left permanently maimed. Yeah, because he overreacts. Yeah, yeah, that's his thing. Yeah, yeah, there's no like, yeah, and so, you know, so now it's it's totally overt and and even even being played sort of for comedy. It's not really funny. Like yeah, yeah, I Really didn't enjoy that that storyline because it was like you're kind of trying to play this for comedy But it really makes bad man look like an asshole You know because in this context, he is one. Yeah.

Oh yeah. And so now we have, so every comic fan edge lord, wants to kind of try to point that out. And well, the Joker is really kind of right. You know, we have these assholes hanging around. Comic books were saying this stuff. And it's, and like my whole reason for wanting to bring this up

in the podcast in the first place was to point out that like, this is where we end up with this character. Because the original idea of the character was a guy who was standing up to corrupt cops and mobsters and in order to do that, he needed to be a gadget hero and to be a gadget hero. If so, facto, you need to be a millionaire. Right. And then, unfortunately, when you then deconstruct what all that means over the course of a whole

lot of years, and you get a memetic drift and drift and get everything else going on now you wind up with DC's You know answer to you know iron man, which is to say you know a a crypto fascist Rich guy who beats on the poor and mentally ill Well, I think I think this is what happens when you have mission creep and you also have an und, like this Batman is War on Crime.

Yeah. When you have War on Crime, who the fuck do you negotiate with to end the war? Like, you know, it's like War on Terror or War on Poverty. It's like, how do you know you won? Like, War on Drugs. How dooverty. It's like, how do you know you won? Like, War on drugs. How do you know you're more like, well, yeah.

It's weird declaring war on a concept. Like, how does that work? And like, you can't do that. Yeah, man is vengeance. You know, again, don't forget, and the night. And the night he's vengeance. Well, at least the night fucking ends though.

Like, vengeance doesn't, at least the night fucking ends though. Vengeance doesn't. There's daybreak. Yeah, you know, vengeance. We've seen in Conan, vengeance leaves you empty because when you get it, what do you do next? We've seen in the princess bride, you are empty afterwards. Well, luckily for Batman, he doesn't do a very good job. So he's always got vengeance. Like always. So, you know, he is, he is the guy from Memento, you know, John G killed my wife, that guy, who's just constantly recreating the puzzle so he can solve it again. So he has meaning in his life. And Batman is searching for meaning in the worst, externalized kind of way to make meaning, like you said, to forge meaning from the random shitty chance that his parents got killed out in front of watching Space Jam.

Nice. Yeah, because that's roughly, yeah, he'd be right around that age now. So I would like to just call out one more thing on that because I'm I feel like I'm on a bit of a role for that he he He cannot exist and this is why Joker is Carmichael or or darnically Link to him because Joker is always trying to ferment chaos

Yeah, and so you can never have, how do you know that job's done? And so, you know, the both of them have an unclear goal. Until you wind up in the cold death of the universe, there's no way of knowing. Yeah. Both of them have an unclear goal. And with an unclear goal, you can do it forever so that you can give your life meaning instead of going into some goddamn therapy. So yeah, and by the way, taking the money that you spend on another bat mobile, maybe,

maybe, I'm gonna go and win him here. Maybe, maybe, well, you know, I'm actually gonna go and win him here. Maybe, well, you know, I'm actually gonna go, gonna go one better than that. Give that money to the Gotham Unified School District. There you go. Just, you know, gonna plug for our own profession here. Like, maybe give that money to teachers.

Just put that money in a classroom. Or do a joke or didn't give away free money. Just don't gas people afterwards Yeah, hub hub hub hub a money money money. Who do you trust? It's time to play Who do you trust? hub hub hub a money money money. Who do you trust? I'm out here handing out free cash and Where is the Batman? He's at home washing his tights.

Washing his tights. Yeah. I don't know if there's ever been a movie role and we can talk about this in more detail when you got, but I don't know if there's ever been a movie role better suited to Jack Nicholson's bat shit crazy face. True. Then that. True. Yeah. Yeah. And he was in one floor with the kooku's nest. Yeah, I know. I know. And five easy pieces. Yeah, it's going to say between between that line and I want you to hold it between your knees. I'm like, I really don't know. Yeah. You know. So anyway, that is that is I'm that's I'm spent that's what I've got. Yeah done good

You've covered what 80 plus years of history. Yeah, I mean I Galloped over parts of it, but Brush saves time. Yeah, yeah, so Batman has gone from a Yeah. Yeah. So Batman has gone from a basically a detective who saw a crime, which is what people wanted to see in the 30s, to an establishment character who helps the police, which is what people wanted to see in the 50s and 60s. And then we kind of see him disappear from 60s through the 70s largely because comics are undergoing a real disinteresting time anyway and

then in the 80s It suddenly ramps up and gets really really gritty and then it's just an out grittying each other um, I love that verb out gritty Yeah, and, and then you, I mean, yeah, you get there. And then after that, everything has been a response to that. Yeah. Well, I, I, what, what I kind of want to say is it's like everybody wants to outgreet each other. And then we get to the Obama administration and we see empathy again. There you go. Yeah.

Yeah. We'll vertically, you know, a liberal about it. Like, you know, all of a sudden, all of a sudden we actually wanna see, you know, this character expressing some hope and some empathy and some, you know, other stuff. Yeah. So, you know, yeah, that's there. That's the thing. Yeah. Yeah. So, well, cool. Thank you. Oh, well, no, thank you for, you know, tolerating this whole, oh, I'ma get you back, because I'm a spent three episodes just on Joel Schumacher.

Holy shit. I'm kidding. I am kidding Joel Schumacher. Holy shit. I'm kidding. I am kidding. Nobody did that unsubscribe button. It's on Joel Schumacher. Well, okay, one and a half. Yeah. Because there's a lot to unpack with Schumacher.

I'm at this point. It's fun. Kidding. Yes. Wow. All right. But cool. So now now, you kind of already

went into it, but like what what do you what do you take away? What what what what what did you learn? What what do you think is important? I think Batman is what happens. I'm going to give an observation that I have actually two questions for you. Okay. I think Batman is what happens when you have an archetypical character pushed through time. Okay. And it ends up not holding true to the archetype because it clings so hard to the archetype.

Yes. I think that that's that. Yeah. On one level, that kind of doesn't jive, but on another level, that makes perfect sense. Yeah. And I think, I think you're right. I think I would modify that statement a little bit by saying, depending on which parts of the archetype you choose to hold on to, you wanted to be warping the archetype. Yes, yes, I think you're right. I think you're right. So, we never discussed kingdom come. No, and that's a damn shame because that came out in 96.

Yeah, and it's clearly a response to the not more, but Miller is clearly a response to Miller. Yes, because because now he is physically broken and relies on his tech and runs basically a police state and Gotham. Yes. And he's also not the main character of that whole story. I mean, the main character of that story is Superman's gone bat shit and she's an honest to save him. But it would have been kind of cool to just fold that in. I would love to hear his thoughts on it.

I think kingdom. Well, okay, kingdom come. Kingdom come has a lot of baggage. Because because kingdom come, I think, is a very big part of the Bronze Age because again, it was 90s. So there is this urge to, there's this, there's real serious urge to deconstruct and to, and in that case, it was deconstruction of the anti-heroes that were such a big part of the comics landscape at that time. And, you know, I think the role that Batman winds up playing there, I think my take on that is it goes back to what we talked about in the last episode about him being in the dark night specifically because that story is very clearly a sequel to the Dark Knight, like it's in that universe. Yes.

And in that universe, it's really clear that to an extent, Batman is the precursor to the you know, figures that drive the beginning of that whole story arc. And, and I don't remember who's responsible for Kingdom Come. I don't remember who was, who was writing it, who was doing it off the top of my head. But they, they were very clearly leaning into the interpretation of Batman as being the crypto fascist. And they were leaning into that, I think, because of the point they were trying to make about anti-heroism. Yeah, okay. It makes sense. It does.

And by the way, it's Mark Wade and Alex Ross, which is an interesting connection because I believe Alex Ross was working on Marvels at the same time, because it's very similar. I don't know if you ever saw Marvels. Yeah. Okay. So it's very similar paint style. It's very similar, but they're wildly different stories.

Like you said, you know, and, you know, yeah, it's just so very different. But yeah, okay. Okay. So what was your other question? That's one. Yeah, two. It keeps flitting in and out of my head, so unfortunately I've forgotten it.

I'll remember. Yeah, that's right. We've done more than enough here. And if it comes up while I'm discussing movies with you, then it's gonna be it. And one thing that didn't come up that I did actually kind of tag, but in the conversation drifted in other directions is the death of Jason Todd.

In 1988, in the midst of all of this gritty, dark, everything, the readers of Batman comics paid money, as you pointed out, in our conversation about this after the last recording session. Everybody dialed a 1900 number to vote whether Jason Todd was going to live or die. Yeah. And they voted to kill him. Yes. They paid money to kill a character. To kill a character to kill a a character and and

Again by the Joker Killed by the Joker with a crowbar and then and then dynamite yep and In in a weird echo of again What we find out happened in the very opening of, again, what we find out happened in the very opening of the Dark Knight, which was the Jason Todd had been killed by the Joker 10 years prior.

And the fans basically wound up turning that into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Oh wow, I didn't realize that there was that connection. And as an indication of the times, and again, when we're talking about the times, we're talking about that being, the 88 election would have been, well, that's Bush one. Right. And that's the tail end of the Reagan administration, Iran Contra, everything else that we talked about

that had turned everybody so terribly cynical. So there you go. Yeah, wow. That's... So we're gonna take a hero who is galvanized into becoming a hero by the trauma of watching his parents murdered in front of him and we're going to take his second sidekick and we're going to kill him in front of him. Right.

Right. So make him yet again impudent and yeah. Parallels to stop. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and, you know, take, take all of that, you know, uh, pent up trauma, yeah, and and and you know take take all of that, you know pent up Trauma crazy whatever all and and double down on it. So there you go like Jesus boy

Well when when I talk about Michael Keaton's Batman there will be tie-ins to that so okay. Yeah, awesome. So All right, um, you got anything you want to recommend us to read There will be tie-ins to that. So. Okay. Yeah. Awesome. So, all right. You got anything you want to recommend us to read? How about Squirrel to cleanse the palette? Hey, there you go.

Squirrel girl would be awesome. I'm very much in favor of that. Or the Kamala Khan Captain Marvel. Yes. Because that's an amazing set of stories and the characterization and that is absolutely incredible. What I am actually going to recommend though

and you'd hate it because it's very noir is I'm gonna recommend the Long Halloween which is the comic follow up to Batman Year One. Okay. And it's not Miller, it's other writers picking up where Miller left off. And has a early in his career detective Batman story, I think it is some of the best stuff anybody's written. Nice. Okay. So it's the long Halloween. Yeah, the long Halloween, the overarching villain is the calendar killer. Now, that sounds like one straight out of like the 19 early 1960s.

Except the calendar killer may or may not be affiliated with one of the two major crime families of Gotham and is committing murders, these known as the calendar killer because the murders all happen on holidays. Of course. So, there you go. Okay. Well, where can people find you on the social medias?

As ever, I can be found on TikTok and Instagram at EH Blalock and I can be found on Twitter. I'm sorry, I can be found on TikTok and Twitter as EH Blalock and on Instagram as MrBlalock. And if you want to yell at both of us simultaneously about something, we can be found at Geek History Time on the Twitter machine. And you, sir, can be found where. You can find me on Twitter and Instagram at duh-harmony. It's duh with two Hs in the middle there. And you can find me there. Feel free to also look me up on twitch.tv forward slash capital puns every Tuesday night at 8.30.

Because those things are going on. There's no way this episode will air by the time that I've got a show at the end of this month. So we'll see what happens next month. So. Sounds good. Yeah. So for a geek history of time, I'm Damien Harmony.

And I'm Ed Blaylock and and until next time, catch us, same bat time, same bat channel.