Who's Afraid of The Dark Knight?

I'm sure there has already been loads written about TDK, seeing as it is smashing box-office records and all. I've read a fair amount of TDK reviews (and, of course, seen the movie several times) and there's one criticism that has been made of the movie that I find, well, curious (to be charitable).

And that criticism seems to boil down to: The Dark Knight isn't Hamlet.

Surprisingly enough, I've actually seen this criticism in several reviews, but it was particularly glaring in a piece written for the Daily Mail by Chris Tookey (review can be found here). Now, I'm not here to debate the merits of whether Batman in general, or more specifically TDK, has the depth of Hamlet, or even whether TDK deserves to be taken seriously as a work of art (I think it does, but that is a debate for a different time). What I am here to do is criticize this particular argument, as I think it misses the mark.
In criticizing TDK for its lack of real depth, Tookey writes:

"Nolan and his co-writer brother Jonathan evidently think Batman is a figure whose tragic qualities have Shakespearean depth.
But he isn't - mainly because his problems aren't universal enough.
How many of us face the problem of having a split personality, or unlimited wealth, or the responsibility of being solely able to fight the worst kinds of crime?
You can take a character out of a comic-strip, but you can't take the comic-strip out of the character.
Batman is not a tragic hero at all, but an adolescent action-figure with the kind of problems most of us can only dream of having."

Given that the main point of his argument is that "Batman isn't Hamlet," I find this argument rather odd. After all, few of us will ever be in the position Hamlet finds himself in--none of us will ever be a Prince of Denmark, and few amongst us will have our fathers killed by conniving and ambitious uncles. Of course, as most people realize, we don't need to experience the exact same situations as fictional characters in order to find something similar there, to find something that relates to us in a deep way. Much in Batman (and, indeed, in all of superhero lore) touches on issues associated with leading secret lives, alter-egos, and so forth. Even if this isn't "universally relevant" (and I am sure many do find the idea of leading a secret life relevent to their own lives), there is much in TDK that seems certainly universal.
So while none of us may have the wealth that Bruce Wayne has, or the mastery of martial arts, and so forth, it just seems false to say the moral issues dealt with in the film (being a real hero vs. being a perceived hero, what means are appropriate in fighting imjustice and terrorism, being an outcast for doing what is right, to name a few) aren't universal merely because the particular hero Batman isn't universal.

I am also unclear as to what point exactly is being made when we learn that Batman doesn't have the depth of Hamlet. Let's say we grant this, for the sake of argument... so what? Is a novel or play not good, or not art, just because it isn't as good or artistic as Hamlet? There are many works of art that have value--and many deep and interesting protagonists--that don't have the depth of Hamlet.

So is TDK a deep and meaningful work? Maybe, maybe not. But if we're going to even have such a debate, the actual movie and its themes deserve serious scrutiny, rather than the careless dismissal that Tookey gives TDK because it is about a superhero.

Good to Be Bad

IGN posted a list of their "Top 15 Star Wars Villains" (part 1, part 2, part 3).

In this spirit, I thought I would post my list:

15. Nom Anor
14. Jabba the Hutt
13. Exar Kun
12. HK-47
11. General Grievous
10. Darth Caedus
9. Count Dooku
8. Darth Maul
7. Darth Malak
6. Darth Bane
5. Boba Fett
4. Darth Revan
3. Grand Admiral Thrawn
2. Emperor Palpatine
1. Darth Vader


Honorable Mentions go to Darth Nihilus (wish he would have been more developed!), Darth Krayt (kept off the list mostly because I haven't read enough of the Legacy series), and Grand Moff Tarkin (probably should be on this list somewhere).

NBA Playoff Predictions

Meant to post this earlier, but better late than never. Here are my NBA Round 1 predictions:

EAST: Boston over Atlanta in 4, Cleveland over Washington in 7, Orlando over Toronto in 5, Detroit over Philadelphia in 5.

WEST: Los Angeles over Denver in 5, Utah over Houston in 6, Phoenix over San Antonio in 6, Dallas over New Orleans in 6.

My Finals prediction is: Los Angeles over Boston in 6.

Also, go Cavs!

"Only Now, at the End, Do You Understand"

So, I was watching Return of the Jedi earlier tonight on Spike TV, mostly waiting for the best part (entire scene with Luke, Vader, and the Emperor). There are lots of great lines in those scenes, but one of my favorites is the line quoted in the title of the post (said by the Emperor to Luke, while using force lightning on him). For whatever reason, that line always reminds me of the part in 1984 where O'Brien is torturing Winston, and he is telling Winston that the Party desires power only for power's sake, and that he can make Winston believe that 2+2=4. Both scenes are a) creepy, and b) more importantly, they both have heroes who are finally realizing the brutal and evil nature of their enemies (as in, they are just realizing the true nature and depth of the evil).
Anyways, I'm not sure I have much more to add on this topic, just food for thought.

"Wars Not Make One Great" (But They Also Don't Make the Jedi Slavedrivers)

In my last I mentioned that I had some problems with the way Karen Traviss, in her new novel Revelation, characterized the Jedi and their history. The last 40+ pages or so of the book include conversations amongst her Mandolorian characters (including Fett) and Jaina--and, honestly, there is a lot of interesting stuff here worthy of discussion. However, I will limit my comments to two major claims that Traviss seems to make (note: obviously it isn't Traviss herself but her characters that make these claims--that said, similar views are recurrent throughout her books and she seems to in general sympathize with the Mandolorian viewpoint).

1. The Jedi enslaved the Clone Troopers and exploited them during the Clone Wars.

2. All of the Jedi--most specifically Luke Skywalker--lack the moral courage to kill Darth Caedus.

Anyways, on to the first point. I can't seem to find the passage I'm looking for, but when discussing why he left the Jedi Order, Gotab basically says that he couldn't stay after the way the Jedi treated the clones (as exploited slaves) during the Clone Wars. He says that he became close friends, and cared deeply about, his troopers, and was disgusted by the way in which the troopers were treated.
Now, as an anarchist, I'm not sure how much we ought to defend the Jedi for fighting in the Clone Wars. In some respects the conflict seems analogous to the Civil War, and a better plan would have been allowing some substates to secede while using nongovernmental means to fight against the corruption and excesses of the Separatist movement. All of this just underlies a bigger problem with the Jedi Order--namely, that they spend too much time being diplomats for the Republic, enforcing their laws, and not enough time rectifying social evils (e.g., working to end slavery on the Outer Rim in The Phantom Menace).
But the claim that the Jedi were somehow "enslaving" the Clone Troopers--or were the ones somehow most responsible for their mistreatment--seems ridiculous. First of all, contrary to the suggestion that the Jedi and Sith are responsible for all wars, the Clone Wars was a war engineered by the Sith in which the Jedi just happened to fight (it is not as if, say, the jedi started a war in an attempt to exterminate the Sith, a la the Jedis' attempts to elimate the 'Brotherhood of Darkness'). And it is not as if it was the Jedi who were primarily responsible for having Clone Troopers under their command. While the Clone Army was created at the behest of Sifo-Dyas, it was a) without the knowledge or approval of the Jedi Council, and b) quickly integrated into the plans of Dooku and Sidious. It was the Sith who manipulated events such that the Republic would eventually use the Clone Army (note also that the Jedi didn't bring the clones to Geonosis until the Army had been "approved" by the Senate). In the end, it was not the Jedi who jumped to wage war against the Sith with a slave army--it is the Republic more generally who fought back against the Separatists, and the Jedi who--with much reservation--agreed with Palpatine's suggestion to serve as generals of an army that would have been used by the republic regardless of what stance the Jedi took on the war. And a cursory glance through the EU novels in the Clone Wars era suggests that Gotab isn't the only Jedi who befriended his or her clone troopers.


And what of the Jedi's "lack of moral courage"? I feel like there are two related questions here: first, would it be morally acceptable for the Jedi to kill Caedus? And second, are the Jedi morally obligated to kill Caedus? If we are to believe that, say, Luke lacks a certain moral courage, then we would almost certainly have to agree with the latter point--that since he has shown himself to be more powerful than Jacen, and since Jacen is so dangerous, that he is under moral obligation to kill him and end the threat. But this seems implausible to me. First off, if we know nothing else, we know that Caedus is reponsible for the death of the people he kills, not Luke. Just because Luke could have killed Caedus before (he had an easy chance in Inferno, and possinly one in Revelation), that doesn't make him responsible for any subsequent deaths that Jacen causes. Second, making it a moral obligation for someone with the means to kill Caedus, to do so, would require Caedus to assume a much exaggerated role in the galactic conflict. It is not as if, before Jacen turned dark, the galaxy was at peace, and his actions alone started a galactic war. He may be the most extreme and most evil proponent of the war, but it hardly seems to me obvious that assassinating Caedus would either end the war or completely end the suffering that has been wrought. It would, I think, end the war's greatest excesses and violations of conventional warfare and human decency. And, in case, Luke has his reasons for not killing Jacen himself, or allowing Ben to kill him, and his reasons for doing something should never begin nor end with galactic considerations since the heart of ethics is the question of how *I* (or, in Luke Skywalker's case, how *Luke*) should live my life. I think Gotab has the burden of proof in showing this supposed 'duty' to kill Jacen (rather than redeem him, neutralize him, etc. etc.) before he can claim that Luke Skywalker lacks "moral courage."

Thoughts on the latest SW novel

So, I just finished up the latest Star Wars EU novel--Karen Traviss' Revelation in the Legacy of the Force story arc--and I thought I would share my thoughts. Since my comments are filled with *SPOILERS*, I will post them in the comments section.

Star Wars: Episode 2.5?

Good news for the Star Wars fanatics amongs us! As I'm sure many of you already know, an animated Star Wars film is coming to theaters this summer, just before the animated series begins this fall. In general, I will read, watch, or play anything dealing with Star Wars, so this is big news indeed. But, I do have a few minor gripes, the first being that both the upcoming movie as well as the series will be set in the Clone Wars era. It's not that I dislike the Clone Wars era--it's just that this era seems sufficiently covered for my tastes (there is a Dark Horse comic book series,and a Del Rey book series, and of course the Cartoon Network animated series, not to mention the "spinoff" stuff like the Republic Comnnando series). I would vastly prefer something set set either in the KOTOR era, or the post-RotJ era (preferably something during the Thrawn trilogy, or during the NJO). My other little gripe is that the animation looks a little goofy--frankly, I would have preferred computer animation more realistic (more like Advent Children).
But--minor gripes aside--I must say that I am extremely excited.