10 Incredibly Dark Batman Moments To Haunt Your Dreams
8. The Death Of The Waynes
From: Various The beginning of the end and the end of the beginning for young Bruce Wayne, suddenly orphaned after a botched mugging attempt. This one has topped more than a few of Batman's greatest hits lists as a - perhaps "the" - defining moment in the origin of the hero. And as with most famous moments in comic book history, the death of Thomas and Martha Wayne has been subject to numerous retellings, inversions, and retrospective portrayals over the years. Initially, the murderer was an unknown phantom, and Batman's quest to find the killer seemed almost hopeless. The mugger then got a name - "Joe Chill" - in Batman #47 (1948), and appeared in most subsequent retellings as the man indirectly responsible for Batman's existence, though of course one notable exception is Tim Burton's first Batman film, in which Jack Napier does the shooting before going on to become the Joker. The implications and impact of this moment are immeasurable for Bruce, and if it was his haunted dreams we're talking about here, this would easily take the #1 spot for darkest moment. For readers, the image is just as enduring and it is precisely because these reiterations haunting Bruce are brought up again and again. The best example of this is on the last page of Detective Comics #439, at the culmination of a story called "Night of the Stalker". What does Bruce do when he arrives home after a long, mostly-successful night of crimefighting? He bursts into tears. I'll quote the final lines here, because Steve Englehart perfectly captures the ever-haunting presence of the death of the Waynes.
"As he lifts the cowl from his drawn face, his eyes automatically riseand suddenly, sorrow explodes within him. Time heals all wounds, they say - and, in truth, Bruce Wayne long ago learned to live with the agonizing fact of his parents' demise. But when he thinks of the boy crime left sobbing on the street at dusk - and the other boy crime left sobbing before the Batman's vengeance hours later - he remembers a third boy crime left sobbing so many years ago, and in this gray-lit, lonely tower, for this single moment in infinity he is that boy again."
