Legend Becoming Myth

Hey internet, it's been awhile. Yeah, I know. I'm lazy, I'm a loser, yada yada.  But I'm back, and I have something I want to talk about. Myth. Neil Gaiman was once asked why he spends his prodigious talent writing fairytales and myths like Sandman and American Gods, and he responded, "Because myths have power." The academics around him at this conference nodded agreeably, but didn't believe him. They were more interested in the sociological implications of the myths. They seemed to view them as "dead cold things that had no longer anything to do with any of us." Instead of delivering the lecture he was invited to this conference to deliver, Gaiman read a retelling of Snow White that he had written from the perspective of the Wicked Queen. People there called it one of the strongest and most disturbing stories they had ever heard, and they described the experience as "Drinking something that they thought was coffee, but found that someone had laced it with wasabi or blood." None of the things in the story were new ideas, though they were put in an unfamiliar format. These themes and archetypes survive and continue to move people because there is something particularly potent about them. Something that gnaws at our souls and whispers the hint of answers to a question we desperately want to know. Again he told them, "These stories have power," and he walked out of the room. The man is my hero.

And he was right. This is something that's been bouncing around in my head for the better part of a year now, with my Oxford classes on Tolkien and King Arthur, a class I took on fairy tales last semester, and the thesis I want to write on superheroes. To go into all the ideas involved there would take WAY too much time, so instead I want to talk about how myth relates something else. I want to talk about Batman.

I love superheroes in general, but Batman has always been my favorite. Once when I was 5, Jeremy, one of my best friends, called Batman Butt-man and told me that the Ninja Turtles were better than the Caped Crusader. Though this was (and still is) one of my favorite people in the world, I seriously considered terminating our friendship then and there. Thankfully, I did not. Later, he discovered Batman Beyond on Kid's WB and decided that Batman was pretty cool after all, and he reformed his ways. Childhood silliness aside, there is something really powerful about these stories, and to this day I cannot get enough. The Dark Knight Returns is my favorite comic book, and it is up there with the best books I have ever read. 

I saw The Dark Knight Rises the other night, and I've been having some great discussions on facebook about the movie and about myths. This whole article was originally a comment on a post from a friend's wall, but I thought that it was a bit lengthy for facebook. I needed to start blogging again anyway, so I decided to do a post instead. The post in question was on my friend Sean's (not me, another guy) wall. Sean had issues with the movie. He thought it was an anti-climactic end to the series. He thought that the way that they treated Bane as a second fiddle to Talia Al Ghul diluted his dark aura, and while good, Bane did not live up to the powerful performance that Ledger gave as the Joker. He thought the plot was too complex, he thought the burial scene was over the top, and he thought that the movie was basically a re-hash of the ideas from the previous two films. He and he and I had bantered about it on my friend Brittani's status, and I think I made a decent case for the film, but there were some questions left unanswered. A mutual friend posted this article on Sean's wall, which said a lot of what I wanted to say.

http://io9.com/5927630/nolans-batman-trilogy-a-unique-achievement-in-myth+making

 The rest of this is the would be my response to article in question. I agree almost completely with this article. This is possible the best and most cohesive movie trilogy I've ever seen. Is this installment quite as good as The Dark Knight? No. Dark Knight was a pretty damn good movie, and the second movie in a good trilogy is usually the best because it's the climax: Terminator 2, The Empire Strikes Back, The Bourne Supremacy, etc. Indiana Jones and Attack of the Clones are the exceptions to this rule, but I digress. 


The true merit of Nolan's last entry in the trilogy (though a fine film in its own right) is in the way that it incorporates the ideas of the first two. There are questions left unanswered that Bruce has to deal with, and the way that Nolan sets up the arch in Bruce's development throughout the three is staggering. Joseph Campbell would have had a field day. I had Batman Begins in my mind when I saw TDKR and after watching the first movie again, I am astounded at how cohesive the trilogy is and how much it centers on the idea of becoming a legend. In the scene where Bruce is inducted into the League of Shadows, Ra's tells him that he can't fight crime as a mortal man. He has to become an idea. A legend. If he can master fear, he can become incorruptible; he can become everlasting. These three things are the mind, soul, and body of legend. While he and Ra's disagree on the application of the principle, Bruce takes this lesson to heart, and the whole stinking trilogy revolves around it, around the Batman myth.

The first movie is about the fear part. Ra's tells him that if he wants criminals to fear him, Bruce has to master his own fear. It's no coincidence that the "super villain" he fights is the Scarecrow in this movie.  Bruce becomes Batman to do what Bruce can't. He conquers his own fear of bats and turns it into a weapon. He becomes a legend that operates outside the constraints of a corporeal existence and the constraints of a corrupt system that is bound to the same limitations of corrupt mortal men. He is now a symbol of hope to the oppressed and a symbol of fear to the oppressors. There's a line where he's interrogating a corrupt cop who swear's to God that he's telling the truth. That isn't good enough for Bats. He says, "Swear to me!" He is literally putting the fear of God into these people, or rather a god. He is now perceived as a semi-divine force that acts as a surrogate protective deity for the city. He is Gotham's mythology. However, in mythology all divine births have a cost–– death. We see it in the stories of the Olympians, in the Death of Baldyr, and especially in what Tolkien called the archmyth or "true myth," Christianity. If Batman is to be born into this world as the title (Batman Begins) suggests, Bruce Wayne must die. 

 Bruce sacrifices his own reputation and indeed his own everyday life to do Batman's work. He disappears for 7 years to train himself to become Batman, during which he is pronounced dead. When he comes back to Gotham, he pretends to be a spoiled rich playboy to throw off suspicion, sleeping around with movie stars, acting like a drunken idiot at high society parties, and generally trashing his family's respected name. He now wears a mask constantly, whether it's the cowl or the playboy's sleazy grin. The prince of Gotham, as he once was, is no more. Rachel tells him that Bruce  Wayne's face is now a mask and Batman's cowl is his real face. You know what? She's right. Bruce Wayne, the real Bruce Wayne, is dead until Batman's work is done. 

This leads us to part two, concerned with the other two facets of Ra's definition of legend: incorruptible and everlasting. Batman is now a successfully employed symbol, and he is striking down organized crime right and left. But Bruce has become pre-occupied with the legacy Batman will leave and life after the cowl. The problem is, although Batman is a symbol, the man under the cowl is still a mortal man, and he can't do this forever. He thinks that Harvey Dent can be the lasting change that cleans up Gotham, a white knight to replace the dark one. The problem is that Dent is not a symbol. Dent is not a myth. He is human being, and like any human he can be killed or corrupted. Worse, he's a politician, which makes the corrupting that much easier.

Enter the Joker. The Joker is convinced that society's laws and morals are a bad joke and that everyone is just as insane and evil as he is, and he wants to prove it by corrupting Gotham's two heroes: Dent and Batman. It works with Dent, who becomes two-face and nearly murders Jim Gordon and his family. But he admits (gleefully) that Batman is incorruptible. He refuses to violate his moral code, regardless of the cost, and he proves to the joker that Gotham's people can put other people's lives before their own. But Gordon and Bruce decide that Batman is "not the hero that Gotham needs," though he is "the hero it deserves." They decide Dent will be a better symbol for Gotham, and Batman sacrifices his reputation so that Harvey's can endure. As a result, the Dent act is passed, and Gotham cleans up her streets. Batman agrees to be hated and hunted, "because he can take it." He's an idea, after all. He can endure much more than a normal man. in a very Christ-like way, he absorbs Harvey's guilt into himself so that Gotham can prevail. The Dark Knight falls so that the memory of the White Knight can take his place. Except now Batman is dead, and with Rachel gone, Buce thinks he really has no life to return to. Batman and Bruce Wayne are both dead. As Alfred tells him, Bruce hangs up the cowl, but never goes back to his normal life. He's a recluse operating in limbo.

Also, as the third movie shows us, the sacrifice wasn't enough. Something is still rotten in the state of Gotham. Though things have gotten better, the foundation of that improvement is a lie, and the new symbol they have chosen is still a man, even though he's dead. Bane proves that this foundation that they've built, like Dent's reputation, is all to easily destroyed, and that politics are still just as dirty as they were, though there aren't as many thugs on the street. They've been replaced by corporate crooks like Dagget. The system is still human and flawed. Gotham still needs something that can transcend society's limitations if it is to get any better. Batman worked because he wasn't just limited flesh and blood Bruce Wayne. "He could be anyone," Bruce tells Blake. "That was the point." Like all myths, he is general, archetypal. Something like that is stronger than the face of one man. Gotham needs Batman again, but Batman is gone, even when Bruce puts the cape back on.

When Bruce fights Bane, Bane tells him that he is a fool to think that he is strong because he feels no fear of death. He tells him, without fear, there is no hope. Without hope, Bruce cannot match the desire or the ferocity of Bane, and the other man in the mask breaks him. Wait a second. Fear. . . wait, that was important in the first movie, right? Bruce had to master his fear. But in this movie he is not mastering his fear. He has none to master. Alfred tells him that he wants the end to come. He wants to die. So what were those three parts of legend? 1) Mastery of fear. This is gone with Bruce's fear of his own mortality). 2) Incorruptibility. He has tarnished his name for Harvey and allowed the symbol of Batman to become corrupted). 3). Everlastingness. Bane has broken him and left him to die as he watches his city burn.

All three precepts of his legendary status have been shot to hell. The legend of Batman is no more, until Bane leaves him in the pit. Bane inadvertently hands Bruce the keys to the gates of Hell by restoring his reputation (so that he could muddy Dent's and turn the people against the law) and by telling him that his lack of fear (and subsequently his lack of hope) is his weakness. Bruce rediscovers his hope and his fear of losing that hope, and Batman rises from the pit of Hell, reborn. Now he can beat Bane. Now he can save Gotham. After defeating Bane and Talia, he attains the final part of the legendary staus–– the everlasting part. Catwoman tells him that he can leave, that he's given the city everything already. He tells her, "Not everything. Not yet." But he knows that he will. Once again, Batman has to sacrifice himself for the city, but this time he has to give up not his reputation, but his life. Sort of. 

As far as the rest of the world knows, Batman dies in the explosion. He is now Gotham's messiah. It's a baptism by fire and water through which Bruce and Batman die to be born again, now as separate entities. Blake asks Gordon if he had any idea who the Dark Knight was, he tells him, "I know. He was the Batman." The idea of Batman has now separated itself completely from Bruce's flesh-and-blood body. The Batman myth is now indestructible, incorruptible, everlasting. Bruce has his "clean slate" that he begins with Selina, while Batman becomes the symbol for justice and sacrifice that Dent never could be. The hero Gotham didn't deserve, but needed. He's no longer limited to a flesh and blood mortal form of a man, even in the academic sense. He's a legend, an idea, now a thousand times more powerful than he was when it was only Bruce Wayne under the cowl. When Bruce passes the torch to Blake, or Robin (loved the reference), who carries on the physical work of Batman, he is ensuring that the Dark Knight will live forever. He is now a myth. 

Holy crap, Nolan. That's a lot of crap to pack into the subtext. And I'm not even scratching the surface. But to create a cohesive line of thought about something as gargantuan as myth and legend and say this much this well in three films. . . what an achievement.

Was this movie as good as The Dark Knight? Probably not. I don't care though. These three films are a collective work of art. By themselves, they're good movies, but together they are something that has never been done by any superhero movie, or any trilogy for that matter. I have never seen a trilogy that investigates one theme so thoroughly or works so cohesively. So thank you, Mr. Nolan. I thoroughly enjoyed your work.

Climbing Arthur's Seat (Into the Tearing Wind)

A looming mound of sharp turf-covered stones rises,
sharp like the chill that races up my spine, sharp like the biting
breeze that cuts through my coat like a blade.
This mound is an island amidst Edinburgh’s crowded streets.
Here atop this mound, this island, the hands of time sit still.
Here soft comes the rain, and tearing comes the wind.

Fortress walls have crumbled. Kings have passed away.
The earth is old, but the air is young,
still young as it was the day the world was made.
That air, that fierce young wind tears the words from my mouth,
carries my voice over the evergreen grass of Caledonia, over the seat of kings
where soft comes the rain, and tearing comes the wind.

Mason’s stones lie scattered upon this aged mound,
towers toppled, walls crumbled, the fort destroyed beyond recognition.
Yet I cannot help but wonder what they once were,
what sort of men stood at arms atop them in the same soft rain,
and what sort of voices spoke, voices whose words were torn from their mouths,
like mine, bourn away and still carried by this same ever-young, tearing wind.

The highland gale cries, it screams long, loud, and clear,
a wind fresher, a wind greener than the grass that grows
upon this aged mound of rock and earth. Voices in the air whisper
below the gale’s keen, asking almost altogether unheard,
“Was this the throne where the Bear of Britain sat? Was this Pendragon’s roost?
Was this where warriors feasted? Peerless Cai, bold Bedwyr, and the rest?”

Soft comes the rain; tearing comes the wind.
I know my mind is filled with too much romance,
with men who likely never lived outside the songs the poets sing.
But those words, those songs, those voices still resound in me,
playing upon my heartstrings like Taliesin played upon his harp,
Like Merlin’s magic that seems to play upon my immortal soul.

Soft comes the rain; tearing comes the wind,
stirring some sleeping soldier in my soul that longs for battle, beasts, and blades,
that needs to feel the same rough, caressing wind that blew the banners of kings.
Like bottled thunder, my sharp, rolling laughter bursts out.
Blade-like and biting, it cuts through the squall’s scream,
and my labored climb turns to a run at breakneck speed.

Into the tearing wind I step, into the tearing wind,
trying to steal a kiss from a hurricane, to feel the embrace of the rain,
to find seat at top of the world, to hear the words on the wind.
This the eye. This is the sacred centre of the storm of this world’s realm.
This where the shackles of time fall, broken, to the ground.
This is where the stories end, where memory begins.

The Truth About Christianity

I want to start this off by saying that I am no expert on theology or Biblical literature or anything like that. I'm not a pastor, I'm not a theologian, and I have no formal training or schooling. But I've read the bible, and I've been learning and thinking about these things my whole life. Some I learned from my dad, who pastored at one point, some I've learned from reading, some I've learned from experience with God. That being said, here's my rant:

I have a lot of issues with how the Church in America looks. I don't mean churches, I mean the Church as a whole. One element of Christianity that everyone seems to dwell on is the idea of the afterlife. Not that there's anything wrong with believing in an afterlife. It's important, and one of the things that Jesus said he came to bring was "eternal life." But I think people are mistaken when they think that the whole point of being a christian is getting to go to heaven. It isn't about fire insurance. It isn't about being good and getting to play a harp and wear a robe when you die instead of going to hell.

This misconception comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of the fall and what it means. Yes, after the fall, the curse dictated than man has to die. Suffering and toil come into the world, blah blah blah. Everyone's heard that a million times. But that isn't the only part of it. Before man falls, he and God are humanity in perfect relationship. After the fall, that perfect relationship is broken. Sin has come between them. Paul has something to say about it in Romans 1:21, "For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles."

The ultimate problem isn't that man now has the knowledge of good and evil. The problem is that he let go of the knowledge of who God is. By disobeying him, he refused to acknowledge the creator's role as God. The serpent told Eve that after eating the fruit she would "become like God" (Gen. 3:4). By disobeying God's only command, Adam and Eve were essentially saying, "No, I will be my own God. I will follow my own commands." And since man refuses God's sovereignty, he forgoes God's protection, as the latter part of Paul's passage indicates:

"Furthermore, since they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, he gave them over to a depraved mind, to do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them." Sin and death are not punishments in as much as they are the logical consequence. After man rejects God's sovereignty, the protection that comes with it is also rejected, and God essentially has to watch as man destroys himself with his own rebellion.

Every man has eaten the fruit and rejected God's sovereignty and protection, save one. Christ was in perfect relationship with his Father. After his Baptism God says, "This is my son whom I love and with whom I am well pleased." He does nothing in his ministry without consulting and following the will of the Father, and he follow's God's plan even to his own death. The primary thing that he gave up wasn't his life, though. He took the full burden of the world's sin on his shoulders, and that burden separated him from God. He gave up the perfect relationship with the Father that he had. That's what he means when he says "my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" That is a sacrifice far more painful than anything that he endured in his tortures, brutal though they were. And because of his sacrifice, we now can have relationship with the creator.

That's why I get angry when people think that christianity is about being pure and good, or about going to heaven when you die. This isn't a self help class. This isn't fire insurance. Those are tertiary elements. Christianity is about having a relationship with the creator of the universe, even though you don't deserve it, but he was willing to give up everything to let you have it anyway. Behavior is a byproduct. Heaven is a bonus.