I've really gotten into the new series on Fox called Gotham. I hadn't even heard about it for the first few weeks that it aired. My life is such that if it isn't mentioned at church or by my kids then I don't hear about it for a long time. When I did hear of it, I was intrigued because Gotham is not actually about Batman but instead it is more about Jim Gordon (later Commissioner Gordon) and the simultaneous descent of Gotham City into complete corruption and disarray and ascent of many of the villains that will battle with Batman in Gotham City's future. The story line for the show takes place when Bruce Wayne (Batman) is about eleven or twelve years old, so we get to see the evolution of Batman as well. Take everything you know about Batman and Gotham City and rewind about fifteen years and that is what the show Gotham is about. It is brutally violent in parts (it is Gotham City after all), extremely dark (again, this is Gotham City we're talking about, not Candyland), and there are some sexual situations in it (although far less than what you'd see in Grey's Anatomy). This show is for adults, not for kids. In addition, Gotham is very much written, directed, and acted as if it is a live action comic book. The characters and their dialogue are a little over the top. That's on purpose. Not everyone will like this show, but I absolutely love it.
I have never been that big into comic books or into superheroes. When I was a kid I had some comic books, almost all of them Batman comics. I like the X-Men to a certain extent, but I've just never been able to identify with heroes that have superpowers. Superman and Spiderman have never interested me. I'm the one person in the world that didn't like the Ironman movies. The Incredible Hulk is hokey to me. But I've always liked Batman, not in the campy 60's show, but in his darker incarnations. The reason I like Batman is because he doesn't have any superpowers whatsoever. Everything he does is done through skill, technology, and plain old righteous anger. He didn't come from another planet. He wasn't injected with a mutating chemical. He's just a moody, determined, ultra-rich guy who is tired of his city being controlled by corrupt politicians and law enforcement, and the criminals they're supposed to be fighting. I can't relate to someone who can fly or someone who can pick up a car and throw it at a helicopter. But I can relate to someone who is angry at injustice and wants to do something about it. That's why I've always liked Batman. Plus, Batman is a really complex character. He makes me ask important questions, mainly, "Is Batman really any better than the villains he fights?"
Again, Gotham takes place fifteen years or so before Bruce Wayne creates the "symbol" of Batman and takes to the streets of Gotham City. The city is almost completely corrupt. The politicians and police cannot be trusted. Everything is tied up with organized crime. It is out of this environment that different people try to address the corruption in different ways. One vigilante after another rises up and the cops have to deal with it. The cops are constantly fighting the vigilantes but the corruption of the cops is, in fact, the reason for the existence of the vigilantes in the first place. It's a great case study for institutional/systematic sin. Also, so far in this first season we have been introduced to the Penguin at the beginning of his life of crime, Cat Woman as a thirteen-year-old girl, the Riddler as a forensics expert at the Gotham City Police Department, and Poison Ivy at the beginning of her seductive criminality. As you watch the show you say to yourself over and over again, "This city needs Batman!" but you know he's still more than a decade away.
I don't know if I'm learning any great spiritual lessons so far as a fan of Gotham, but I do think that my exclusive interest in Batman as a hero specifically because he is not a "super" hero with superpowers, sheds some light on the way I see life. Gotham, as a prequel to Batman, teaches the same lesson. There is "darkness" in all of us, darkness in the world, and none of us have superpowers with which to fight it.
I'm a big proponent of Jungian psychology and the concept of the "shadow self." Basically, the "shadow" is all those things about you that you keep hidden, that you deny, that you don't even know about--the greed, lust, hurt, want for revenge, and so on and so forth. We push that down so we can function in everyday life, but it keeps seeping out and sometimes exploding out of us, oftentimes when we react to something without taking the time to think about how we're supposed to react. Have you ever "gone off" on someone, saying things you "didn't mean," when in reality you did mean them but you didn't mean to say them? According to Jung, that's your shadow seeping out. Jungian psychotherapy says that we have to get in touch with our shadow, knowing what is in there so that we don't get blindsided and so we can actually transform it into energy for good, rather than festering bad. Father Richard Rohr (a Franciscan) says, "What you don't transform, you will transmit." In other words, if you don't deal with your shadow then you're going to constantly dump it on other people without even knowing it. This is true for Bruce Wayne/Batman, for Jim Gordon, for the Joker, for the Penguin, and for you and me. What is inside of us must be brought into the light.
A socio-cultural example of the shadow being pulled into the open is Halloween or what used to be called All Hallow's Eve, which has traditionally been a day when the shadow side of humanity--scary, spooky, even monstrous--has been allowed to come to the surface. Over the years and still with some conservative religious groups today there have been movements to suppress this. What they don't realize is that, whether the shadow is a person's or a society's, suppressing it doesn't make it go away; it just makes it pop out unexpectedly. This is the role that many feel that scary movies play in our societies. They let us view the shadow in a way that is safe and transformed into entertainment. Likewise, on Halloween, instead of allowing everyone to actually become scary, spooky, and monstrous on that day we pretend to be that way. We have even transformed it to the point where probably the majority of costumes aren't even scary anymore--my kids are dressing up as Minnie Mouse and a pilot from Star Wars. It is important for the dark to be pulled out into the light, not so it can be stuffed back into the darkness but so it can be transformed by the light.
The Gospel According to John uses light/dark imagery a great deal. Near the beginning of the gospel, we read
This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God (John 3:19-21).
For Christians, our shadow side (maybe that's what Paul calls our sinful nature) has to be pulled out of the darkness and into the light of Christ--conviction, repentance, forgiveness, and then walking in the way of Christ through the Holy Spirit. It is the light of Christ that can then transform it so that we do not "transmit" it into the world, usually into the lives of our friends and families.
All that being said, one of the reasons I enjoy Batman and the Batman prequel Gotham is that the darkness of Gotham City cannot be dealt with until it is brought into the light. In Gotham, Detective Jim Gordon is trying to do that. Later Bruce Wayne, as he gets older, cannot face the darkness of Gotham City until he faces his own darkness--his drive toward revenge over his parents' murder--and transforms it into something good. The interesting thing about the Batman narrative, however, is that we're never quite sure if his darkness--his shadow--has been truly transformed (he's always right at the edge of descending completely into darkness). Whatever Bruce Wayne's darkness has become within his role as Batman, I don't know that it can now be called light.
Wow, I just had a thought about the symbolism of the Bat signal light that is used by Commissioner Gordon to summon Batman, and how maybe his cooperation with the authorities (finally under legitimate leadership under Gordon) transforms his darkness into light. My mind is blown!
Superman is obviously good. Spiderman is obviously good. Wonder Woman is obviously good. With Batman it isn't so obvious, and it isn't always completely obvious with us either. That's why Batman is so interesting, and that's why the grace of God is so important.
Anyway, you now know my thoughts on Gotham, Batman, Jungian psychotherapy, and John 3, as if you ever wondered. Hopefully you got something out of that.
Happy Halloween, and have a great week!
Everett
