Batman: TAS, episode #6: It's Never Too Late

This episode is a departure from what we've seen so far and is, consequently, an appropriate insertion. We go from the shapeshifting monstrosity that is Clayface to a relatively mundane story about a crime boss coming to grips with the legacy that he's leaving behind and the impact that his actions have had on the city around him and the family beside him. It's a way to portray The Batman as a member of that community, instead of just the stopgap measure against the super-powered threats. But it stays true to form in one respect: The Batman is something of a side character, as the story is really about Arnie Stromwell, crimelord of Gotham, as the camera almost never leaves him and all of the major events revolve around his life and perspectives. This is where the character of The Batman kind of assumes its "guardian angel" aspect, which works hand-in-glove with Bruce Wayne's determination to protect/revive/save the city, depending on where you come into the Batman mythos.

It's also our first meeting with Rupert Thorne. Thorne occupies an unusual place in Batman lore because he was one of the central figures in Steve Engelhart's run on Detective and Batman in the mid-70s, but had very few other appearances once Engelhart left the books. That run is often lauded as one of the defining arcs for the Darknight Detective. It provided the template for both Bruce Wayne and The Batman against mundane opposition (Thorne, a corrupt politician leveraging his way through city hall and the local crime scene) and the more fantastical (Dr. Phosphorus, a man with see-through skin who burned everything he touched); through obscure characters (Dr. Hugo Strange) and the most prominent (The Joker, as we'll see later in the series); the strictly superhero side of The Batman (encountering all the usual suspects, like The Riddler) and the human side (the emotional weight of losing girlfriend, Silver St. Cloud.) It was so good and so highly regarded that it was reprinted in the 90s as Shadow of the Bat. As much as I enjoy other renditions of the character, that will always be the defining version of him for me. So, I wasn't really surprised when the main "crime boss" character selected for BTAS was Rupert Thorne, despite how obscure he might have been to others more familiar with characters like Carmine Falcone, who appears so frequently in the comics that he was tapped for Christopher Nolan's Batman Begins, for example. The fact that Thorne fits the role of "standard White guy" without a lot of the cultural stereotypes attached to characters like Falcone might have helped that decision, too.

As much as this story is a "come to Jesus" moment (almost literally, given the involvement of his brother, Michael, a priest) for Stromwell, I wonder if a slight change of atmosphere might have made it work better. From the very outset, we know that Stromwell is a figure of pity. He's already under pressure from Thorne and he's already distraught about his missing son. We're already set up to feel for him as a human, rather than perceive him as a figure of menace (crimelord, guys with guns, etc.) We don't get the opportunity to see a real shift in his behavior, since he's already kind of sad sack from the opening moments. I think that may have been an attempt to make him, the callous crimelord ("I sell candy!"), into a sympathetic character, but given that we're already sympathizing with a guy who dresses up as a bat and beats people up, I think the audience is already primed to accept people "in the life", as it were, and don't really need the encouragement to look favorably upon them if they decide to drop out of it. After all, that's basically The Batman's driving mission through the whole story: he's trying to encourage Stromwell to a state of contrition, and not just throw him in jail again. The flashbacks to the moment with the trains as a psychic scar and how we're shown that increasingly powerful impact (possibly losing a friend, possibly losing a brother, brother losing a leg) was sufficient for us to generate some degree of sympathy for him.

Along the way, we also intersect with a prominent social issue then and now: The War on Drugs. Given that this was produced in the early 90s, with it still in full swing and ardently supported by politicians across the spectrum, I think it's a credit to writers Tom Ruegger and Garin Wolf that they couched it fully in the theme of the episode. It isn't Batman beating Stromwell to a pulp to get the scourge of drugs off our streets. It's just a demonstration of what often happens to regular users; the ignored consequences of Stromwell's attitude that "No one's forced to take'em!" Of course, the wider scope on this is that legalization would force a lot of guys like Stromwell and Thorne out of business and the millions poured into enforcement and prisons could instead be poured into treatment and social services. But that's understandably not a conversation that either writers or producers were interested in having in this little morality play.

There are a lot of little technical points to be made in what is, first and foremost, a decent episode of the series. First off, it's odd that in their possible eagerness to distance themselves from constantly portraying Italians as crime bosses and crooks, in general (as with using Thorne and another "typical White guy" Stromwell), they end up in a restaurant, neutrally named "Pete's", whereupon Thorne asks him to bring out "an antipasto that will knock our socks off!" For the record, a place named "Pete's" is not the first choice I'd make for a dish like that. Also, why does everyone in this bar/restaurant, from the in-disguise Batman to Thorne and all his thugs, seem to be drinking Tang? Was there no more neutral color available in the palette that could still be interpreted as alcohol? And speaking of our disguised hero, this is exactly what I was complaining about in Feat, part 2. Instead of a Batman in full costume who throws a maintenance worker's cap on so that people somehow won't know it's him, we have Bruce Wayne in full disguise, convincing people that he's a passed-out patron of the bar. An actual master of disguise, yo. Also, I think it really helps Thorne become memorable in the audience's mind by being voiced in the stentorian tones of John Vernon, whom most know as Dean Wormer or the mayor from Dirty Harry. Vernon's voice could easily go from bark to mutter and still carry an enormous amount of weight. On the other side of the coin, it was kind of hilarious to see Commissioner Gordon speculating on an active event/investigation (a mob war) to a reporter on camera, as it that wouldn't inflame and/or hinder things. Yes, I know it's a way of avoiding straight exposition, but still. Plus, this episode was a much more bumbling Harvey Bullock, concerned only with the commissioner's hair, than the one we see in On Leather Wings.

Overall, despite the symbolism being a bit heavy-handed, I think It's Never Too Late did its job of showing the "regular" side of The Batman's adventures. Next time, we ramp back up with the most notorious opponent of all...