I’ve written about Superman’s decline in popularity and I’ve written about Batman’s rise in popularity. But I never really discussed why that happened, other than the rise of a new cynical wave of comics. However “Cynical Comics” are a symptom not the disease, Batman’s greatest power is money both in reality and the comics and that is also Superman’s greatest weakness (not that Superman has trouble acquiring money, he crushes coal and makes it diamonds, no one can do that will ever need to file for bankruptcy). Batman is very exploitable for cash, think about it from the stance of a kid playing dress up in their back garden, to be Superman all they need is a piece of red cloth, to be Batman they need, a cape (properly cut to look like Batwings), a mask, a utility belt full of assortment of gadgets and a toy car. Because Superman has Superpowers that can’t be replicated in the real world, all of what makes Superman special exists in the child’s mind, Warner Bros can’t get a toy manufacturer to make real X-ray glasses or a Superman branded flight suit but they can make ride on pedal cars that look like the Batmobile or plastic Batarangs. Superman’s powers even get in the way of toy manufacture, how does a Superman toy fly? a kid runs around the living run holding it over their head yelling swoosh. a radio controlled one is expensive, but also by Superman never requiring new gadgets unlike Batman, less variants can be made to seem authentic, although DC have tried in various ways to create more variants like how Superman the Animated series took away his ability to survive in outer space so they could make a rocket ship and space suit variant toy or the abysmal non sensical Red vs Blue from the comics which literally doubled the amount of action figure variants they could make. Simply Batman is very Toyetic, Superman is not, and when you’re owned by a company that cancelled production on a popular TV show (Young Justice) because “it didn’t sell enough toys” guess whose the golden boy (and getting ANOTHER cartoon series).
But it’s more than Superman’s lack of a Malibu beach houses that have hindered him, Superman has often been used to explore anti-consumerism ideas. The Monicker the Man of Steel actually stems from John Henry, a proletariat hero who smashed a machine because it stole livelihood from workers and died destroying it. Superman as the Man of Steel can do that and survive as he’s made from the same material as the oppressor, he can smash through and save the people. Superman’s archenemy Lex Luthor is even a selfish capitalist (based on Donald Trump in John Byrne’s Man of Steel mini-series). Lex seeks power for power’s sake and doesn’t care about anybody else, and the only one who can stop him is Superman. Of course Marxist ideology was downplayed in Superman comics in the 1950’s after Siegel and Shuster where accused of being Communists. This lead to the new version of Superman, The Man of Tomorrow. The new spiritual Superman, a smarter, kinder man with more power than anyone else, in touch with his higher self. A more ascended being who thought more about others than himself, the Super in his name does not refer to his immense Superpowers but to him being a manifestation of the Super-Ego (from the Freudian trio). As the Super-Ego man, he feels the weight of the world on his shoulders and must try to figure out whether to help or not as sometimes short term help is long term hurt. This version of Superman is still used by Grant Morrison and the ideas where first explained to me by a Buddhist Guru. But what do Buddhist and Marxist ideologies have in common? well they both believe the acquisition of material objects is bad for you, leading Superman to being an anti-capitalist hero.
Of course the corporate overlords of Warner Bros can’t have a flagship hero who says “don’t spend all your money”, especially as they’ve survived on a Whales not Fish. This probably needs explaining “Whales and Fish” comes from freemium online games, a Whale is a player who will drop lots of money on the game and help sustain the games longevity for longer, (like how a Whale will feed a village for months) whilst a fish will only give them a little bit of money if they ever payout. DC has been using this kind of economics for years, in fact Wonder Woman has always had fairly bad sales in the comics but been a very popular license for clothing and other more expensive items. To make up for being in 3rd place in comic sales (first being Marvel and second being Image), DC sell a lot of Toys and massively expensive variant covers.
Batman is a much easier sell to a creepy Billionaire filling his penthouse with Toys, that doesn’t mean DC have never tried selling Superman to these people, but the results have been divisive at best. Look at Zack Snyder’s vision for the character; a first movie where he only cares about the hot redhead, then a movie where he fights Batman and then a 3rd unmade movie where he becomes an evil overlord.
Modern Batman seems modelled on James Bond, film’s most profitable misogamist. The preferred idea of Batman is an angry loner with a Harem of action figure ready ladies who he attracts by being emotionally distant and abandoning at the drop of a hat. Some are allies other are enemies but one things constant an underlying sexual tension even when it’s creepy or doesn’t make any sense. Poison Ivy is portrayed as lesbian except when she’s around Batman then she wants to find out whats under his utility belt, Harley Quinn has the mind of a child but DC Comics will have her posing suggestively licking a baseball bat as a phallus, Bat-Girl his best friends girlfriend he has no qualms about banging. Meanwhile Superman has had the same love interest in Lois Lane, a progressive hardworking girl trying to make it in a man’s world that Superman treats as an equal and stays with even if she has some negative personality traits. Well Batman and Superman do share a love interest, Wonder Woman, often the one woman in the Justice League reduced to the middle of a love triangle, DC made it officially canon a Superman and Wonder Woman after years of shipping between the two (see Dark Knight Strikes Again or Red Son both storylines that reduce her to nothing more than that), but it made some sense. Wonder Woman and Batman only makes sense in Bruce Timm’s mind as many version of the two have Wonder Woman hating Batman, Wonder Woman respects truth, honesty and vulnerability three things Batman can never be or he’d lose his bravado. But who cares about character consistency when you can have some creepy Batman fan buy his girlfriend Wonder Woman themed lingerie for Christmas that year and claim “She’s like totally empowered” as he ties her up remember that’s the characters only weakness.
Batman pays the bills, Batman is aspirational to creepy dudes, caring for others doing the right thing, they’re not profitable. That’s the truth, but superheroes where meant to teach little kids to be a good person and do the right thing. Chasing after money is what DC do, with bespoke services like a Brazilian hotel that lets you pretend to be Batman for the night. But those who can afford that, often didn’t get that way by being good people, more Billionaires are like Lex Luthor rather than Bruce Wayne. In the real world parodying comic, Lex became president and we have his inspiration as the real world president. The only real difference is Trump has molested more women than Lex and doesn’t have Superman to stop him. But DC doesn’t want to lose their gravy train by making people question this status quo. Both characters are completely successful at what they’re creators wanted, Siegel and Shuster wanted to create a new American folk lore hero for the Sci-fi-Atomic age and that’s what Superman is, he even in the real world fought the Ku Klux Klan and poses with eagles. Bob Kane he just wanted to make money, he even stole from anywhere he could, Batman comics even stole antagonists from Superman. Seriously a fair amount of Batman villains are clones of the Prankster and even more on the nose is Riddler and the Puzzler (the Puzzler debuting a year earlier in the comics), The Planteer and Maxie Zeus are almost indistinguishable, is it any wonder that Superman the Animated Series feels like sloppy seconds. But at least Superman gets the seconds while Batman cartoons steal his stories, there has never been a Flash or Wonder Woman animated series, I would even say the Flash is tailor made for a cartoon show, the characters known for witty comebacks, using science (sometimes highly suspect science) to defeat his enemies and has a main power with a long history in cartoons (Super speed being shared with Speedy Gonzales and Road Runner). Green Lantern was given a brief a chance to shine, but it was hardly given a chance his movie was originally meant as a slapstick comedy and his cartoon was cancelled in mid-production. Meanwhile Batman is on what his 12th cartoon series now? If anything DC needs to stop having one flag bearing hero and let all of it’s heroes shine, especially as more and more derision is being laid at Batman, except by his fanboys of course.
