Fresh Question #5: Bruce's End, Terry's Beginning

[Nightwing]

Hey fellow fans. Boy do I have a deep, Batman Beyond, Fresh Question for you, so strap on your lobster bibs and dig in, because we'll get right to it:

After what we've been given from our BB universe, could there have been any other factors beside's "the gun" which forced Bruce to stop being Batman?

[Trent Lane]

Ooooooo, A good one! That's a tough question, though. I think a few things weighed in on his hanging up of the cowl, but picking up the gun was what capped it all off. Tim's near death, years of fighting insane criminals, the fact that he was still probably trying to make his parents proud, and the somewhat of a fall-out between he and Barbara, and most likely Dick as well, all of that could've been the cause for the end of THE Batman and the beginning of a new one...

[Naraht]

I'd like to think so...
My theory is Dick assumed the mantle..but Bruce kept tabs on him, causing Dick to quit...That was when Bruce got the high tech suit...till the night w/the gun...

[DR. BELCH]

--besides the moral quandry of the gun, health problems were an issue. Note he takes heart pills...and I'd bet if he were X-rayed his skeleton would show years of stress fractures. Bone spurs in his neck, wrenched knees/elbows, damaged ribs, cracked collarbone, a fractured lower legbone (cf. "Robin's Reckoning")...you name it, the man must have it.

[Barb Gordon]

I think almost eveyone agrees that the final straw was the gun, I do. But mostly I'd say it was his health, combined with him realy getting on in years and everyone was gone. No more Robin, no more Batgirl, no more Nightwing. Not even most of the old villains.

Barb^-^

[Maxie Zeus]

I don't think it was just the gun, or just the health, or just one piled on top of the other. I think it was the interplay of them.

Bruce is having a coronary attack of some kind at the moment he picks up the gun. He's probably known for some time that his health is bad, and is a sufficient reason for him to retire the cowl. But of course he's never let himself.

At the moment he picks up the gun he realizes that his health has not just undermined his physical ability to fight, but his moral ability as well. Simply put, he can only continue to fight as Batman if he consciously decides to use weapons and tactics he had previously forsworn. It is not just the horror of finding himself with a gun, but of knowing that he has driven himself to the point where he *had* to pick one up.

Until that point he wouldn't let himself quit; afterward, he knew he had to.

[James]

I'd imagine Bruce's health had been plaguing him for some time - hence the suit.

Justification that he can do the job without help and decline in health. The heart problem probably just slammed the lid on that self denial and he realised he was becoming a libility and potentially as dangerous as those he protects against.

I don't think Dick would have taken the mantle. I'd imagine he'd offered but Bruce refused. That's like Bruce. He would defy all opinion and continue being the Batman despite protest. I wonder if Alfred was still about to protest also.

Problem is, the Bat is all Bruce knows how to do. Yes, he is a business man, but that is a facade - not something he enjoys. When he realises he can't be Batman no longer all he has left is reclusion.

I think Terry would never have been offered the role if Bruce didn't feel there was no alternative and that in some small way it was helping him continue as Batman... through someone elses body...

[Karkull]

Definately the gun. He could easily overlook his physical decline...until he needed to rely on a gun to save himself.

[superfreak]

The gun is the last straw for Bruce. After years of pushing his body beyond what is considered normal for a human, Burce was forced to rely on a gun to survive. This event must have forced him to realize that even with the batsuit he has reached a point where his own body can not take the punishment anymore. After this unfortunate event, Bruce hanged up the cowl and decleared that he won't be Batman ever again.

[James]

Surely then it was his health, not the gun which caused him to hang up the cloak?

It's not that he discovered his philosophy was waivering and had began to use more violent means in his crusade - nor that his mental state was becoming unbalanced.

Simply, the gun was a means to protect himself when his body had failed him. Clearly his poor physical heath had resorted him to take such action. I'd say his health had been an issue he'd ignored up until he'd picked up the gun (even to the extent of building a Batsuit that would help amplify his strength).

So holding the gun was what brought it all to light - that he could no longer stay a level above the criminal - but surely the need for the gun came from the constant denial that he was no longer fit enough - even when backed up by the new suit - to fight off crime.

Heath made him to resort to the gun and the knowledge that his heath was so poor that to carry would require Bruce to rejustify his approach to crimefighting (ie; he may need to resort to conventional weapons if he was to continue) - a step he was not willing to take...

[Kal-el]

Well said SJJ. I might add to that the fact that with his declining health, and the grabbing of the gun, his entire mission...his personal declaration...had come full circle. Resorting to the weapon that started his quest may have shook his foundations to the point of no return. He may have become aware that his health had led him to take measures that he would not, and vowed not to, take against criminals. Almost as if he was starting to become what he most despised, and the weapon that he resorted to exemplified what he had fought against for so many years.
With the appearance of Terry years later, his spirit and fight were renewed...possibly feeling that there was still hope for what he believed in so strongly.

[JL Man]

Forgive me, but what episode did it talk about the gun?

[TheScarecrow]

It showed the whole thing in the beginning of the first BB episode entitled Rebirth: Part 1.

[Monkicon]

The heart problem was a big part I think. Batman always has been a loner so without Robin or Batgirl he would have still functioned. Having to resort to using a gun because of his health really brought it into focus that Bruce was just too old to fight the good fight as Batman anymore.

[BeastBoyWonder]

Ever since his parents' death, he's had this obsession with stopping crime using his crimefighting methodology. Batman was always a VERY stressful job, but the light-heartedness of Tim Drake, Dick Grayson, Barbara Gordon, and Alfred Pennyworth relieved that to some extent. With them gone, the stress got 'im. We see that after Batman retired, the personality charactaristics of Batman started seeping into Bruce Wayne. So batman never really died; after batman retired Bruce Wayne kind of took up the character of Batman.

[Blade1225]

some times its almost funny, i mean the guy uses razor sharp boomerangs, has wrist-rocket missles, nerve gas bombs, electric fist thingys, has missles on his jet and sub but! he dosen't use guns....lol!!!