“22 year old puts on bat costume to punch criminals, has no powers” is hard enough to wrap your head around but throw in “24 year old adopts 12 year old who also punches criminals, has no powers” and that is not something that would ever occur to anyone
like OBVIOUSLY batman must be an older man who knows what he’s doing, and not just some traumatized 20-something accidentally collecting traumatized children
haha wow referring to bruce wayne as a 20-something really puts things in perspective. batman: probably actually younger than joey from friends.
i am enjoying how completely horrified everyone is by this thought
to elaborate on my preferred timeline it goes:
orphaned at 12 (consistent with how his ptsd manifests)
tested out of high school and accepted into yale at 16 (because he is an overachieving type a motherfucker who channels his survivor’s guilt into being The Best)
spends six years at yale getting a jd/mba and using all his free time to travel the world and learn punches
ready to take over the family biz at 22
“hello alfred i am back from yale here are all of my fancy degrees ps i’m going to dress like a bat now good luck talking me out of it i’m technically a lawyer now lol”
TWENTY-TWO YEAR OLD BATMAN. TWENTY-THREE YEAR OLD BATMAN. GOING IT ALONE. IT’S JUST HIM.
this is probably when he is most nolan-esque because have you ever met a man in his early twenties who thinks it’s his job to save the world
they’re the fucking worst
TWENTY-FOUR YEAR OLD BATMAN MEETS A TWELVE YEAR OLD WHO JUST WATCHED HIS PARENTS DIE
twelve year old mistakenly assumes someone who is 24 is a grownup, no one corrects him
the fact that either of them survive is a miracle even before you take the night job into account, thank god for alfred or they would probably get scurvy
i told you that just so you would understand how i have justified it when i tell you that this makes Batman during his first year with Robin younger than:
Joey in season one of Friends
Everyone in season one of Friends
Jake Peralta in Brooklyn 99
Uncle Jesse from Full House
This guy:
Everything makes sense now.
I always knew Bruce was in his mid 20′s when he took in Dick, but it only now occurred to me while reading this just what that would mean.
AU where the Justice League forms like usual, except Batman
maintained his “totally a myth” status and has in fact been active for years before the JL forms. He’s very
cautious about trusting them, but still joins, and the others sort of accepts
that as long as they trust that Batman has a really hard time with trust, it will
all work out in its own weird way
Then, one day, in the middle of a JL mission, the League gets
in a tight spot. Out of nowhere, this blue and black blur swoops in and saves everyone’s
ass. Maybe breaking some shackles that were proving very difficult, maybe disarm
a bomb that the League was just a hair’s breadth too slow to reach without
help, but whatever happens, the shadowy figure pauses just long enough to say, “Hey,
Batman, you know you there are these things called cellphones now and you can just call sometimes, it doesn’t have to be this dramatic?” and bounds away after
shouting ‘let’s do brunch! Bring your new friends!’
Batman is mortified.
No one lets it go.
The entire rest of the mission, the whole League is asking so
many questions. Who was that? Do you know him? How do you know him? What’s going on? I didn’t know there was a
vigilante in this area?? They don’t let up until he talks.
“That was Nightwing.” Batman is mumbling. The JL forces him
to bring them to the Brunch. Brunch happens to be in a run-down apartment on
the edge of a bad neighborhood, at five in the morning, in costume. Nightwing
introduces himself as Batman’s lovechild with justice.
“I did not realize Batman had a child,” Martian Manhunter
says, calmly enough that no one’s sure if he’s accidentally plucking a really
loud thought out of the air or if he’s trying to make a joke.
Nightwing stares for a moment falling over laughing. He doesn’t
get up. Batman starts trying to apply anti-Joker venom but Nightwing just kicks
him and laughs until he cries. He keeps trying to wipe his eyes and his mask
keeps getting in the way, so he asks everyone to leave so he can please get
a hold of himself
He is still laughing when they leave. Everyone is confused.
Batman is furious. Nightwing manages to
breathe long enough to say, “We’re just so glad
you’re socializing now, Batman.”
Superman turns to look at Batman very slowly. “…’we’?”
bruce wayne maintains a presence on all conspiracy theory boards with the screen name BruceWayneIsTheBatman and all his posts have titles like “BRUCE WAINE IS BAT-MAN INDISPUTABLE PROOF” and it’s just a picture of Bruce Wayne from the back next to a picture of Batman from behind and they both have the contours of their butt drawn on in a shitty MSPaint red line (note: Bruce is in a suit and Batman has a cape, neither of their butts are clearly discernible) and the quote “THE BUTTS MATCH!!! THE FACTS DON’T LIE!!!!!” and he makes at least three of these posts a day, and “Bruce Wayne is the Batman” becomes a meme a la “Ted Cruz is the Zodiac Killer” and he gets asked about it on a talk show and he laughs uproariously at the idea and Stephen Colbert just HAPPENS to have a batman mask under the desk and they do a bit together where Bruce Wayne puts on the mask and walks around saying things like “excuse me, bank robbers, can I perhaps offer you some money to stop you robbing this bank?” and “I say, cease and desist your criminal behavior or I’ll have my butler ask you to leave” and the audience is LOSING THEIR MINDS laughing at the idea of this pampered rich guy taking on the Joker on a bi-weekly basis and then anyone who suggests “Bruce Wayne is Batman” in earnest gets met with mocking “oh man do the butts match” comments
Okay but imagine Bruce actually getting exposed as Batman and like his only response to all of the commotion about is
“The butts did match. There was no lie.”
and just everyone is flabbergasted because this fucking douchebag has been advertising his alter ego with the most ridiculous of observations and it was TRUE
Plot twist – Selina was the one who started the butts-match meme, Bruce just ran with it.
wupacing 