Wrong Villains For Heroes

With the Mandarin its the whole mysticism thing when most of Iron Man's villains are technology based. But like said it works as an opposite to Tony's views on technology and futurism compared to the mandarins rings and traditionalism.

The Mandarin dates from when Tony was basically a symbol of American industry, technology and military domination; an Eastern mishmash figure of superstition, deception, and underhandedness as opposed to good old American brutality while wearing a mask.

Obviously since it's no longer as trendy to be quite as hilariously racist the Mandarin has had to be retooled almost beyond recognition. Which is kinda why the movies flat out turned him into a propaganda figure, which is one of the only contexts in which he makes sense. (that wouldn't piss the hell out of the Chinese government anyway)

Ra's makes sense when played as both part of Batman's globetrotting origins and his ninja training (Begins did this well) and as an uncomfortable extreme of his own philosophy; Batman's willing to go outside the law and the framework of society to do what he believes will make the world a better place; Ra's Al Ghul also does to the point of genocide; that it's easier to build a better world when you start over from one small enough for you to completely control.

And the fun, disturbing part is that Ra's actually LIKES Batman, and wants him as his heir, believing they're birds of a feather and Bruce can be convinced over to his side. (Talia helps with that)

Also, an excuse for Batman to fight ninjas.

I think it more had to do with their buddies, the Chinese government, than anything else

But the Mandarin doesn't represent the Chinese government. In the comics the Chinese government hates him.

PRC aren't known for common sense. Most likely they'd take exception to any negative depiction of the Chinese, whether they're meant to represent the government or not

That's not really globe-trotting per se, though, that was more Batman traveling to another country to rescue a loved one (Julie Madison) tied to Gotham, as opposed to Ra's, where Batman is constantly being drawn out to stop Ra's plans to destroy the world some gazillion miles away from Gotham, without any intrinsic ties to Gotham in the first place.

(I also don't remember Monk being revealed as Count Dracula.)

Funny thing is, when Ra's first appeared, he had nothing to do with ninjas, he was just an immortal terrorist. The ninja stuff came after the Hand was created by Frank Miller in the Daredevil comics.

The Chinese government are basically big whiny babies, yes. They lose their shit with pretty much any negative implication about China. (though you can blow it up all you want, so long as China isn't at fault)

I'm not surprised. And also not necessarily off the mark.

I thought the ninjas were a movie thing, and Ra's uses Assassins in the comics, like when he shows up in Arrow.

In fact, Mandarin kicked the Chinese army's ass when they first tried to screw with him… which is ALSO insulting to China, I'm sure. It sucks, but his connection to China at all would never fly in a movie. But he works a lot better for a series anyway.

Is Iron Man armoured adventures good despite Tony being a kid in it?

would KGBeast not work as a Batman villain since he's international while Batman operates in Gotham?

Surprisingly, yes. I honestly didn't pay attention to it at all at first because "TONY WITHOUT A MUSTACHE, FUCK OFF!" but I eventually gave it a try.

Tony's fun, Rhodey is fun, Pepper is fun, the Mandarin is probably the best he's ever been (though a very changed character since he's Tony's age), and they do much better work with old Iron Man villains than the movies ever did. Guys like Living Laser, Blizzard and Crimson Dynamo get some pretty good use. Ghost is in it and he's a FUCKING BADASS.

They even get around to some good guest characters, like Hawkeye and Black Widow. I'd say the hardest part is getting through the first 2-3 episodes of set up, but once you're in it's engaging throughout.

Ra's always had a League of Assassins, pre-dating the Hand

KGBeast came to Gotham, though, and tried to kill people there, thus threatening Batman's turf. He's not really international like Ra's, who frequently devises plans of global destruction that seem fitting for a world-traveling terrorist fighter, not a vigilante who operates mostly in one city, and fights criminals that threaten it or people in it specifically.

Yeah, keyword: ASSASSINS. They weren't really some shadowy ninja guys like they are depicted nowadays.

Fair enough, I just thought he worked for the Soviets so I can see your point.

Batman gets pulled into a lot of his Ra's al Ghul stories against his will. Either Ra's or Talia will persuade/kidnap/blackmail him out of Gotham. He never leaves if he isn't forced.

Also, I think the perspective on their relationship is wrong. Ra's al Ghul isn't so much a Batman antagonist, it's more that Batman is a Ra's al Ghul antagonist. Ra's is obsessed with him, seeing Batman as both the only threat to his plans as well as the only hope for continuing his work, so Ra's is obsessed with Batman just as Batman is obsessed with the Joker/Riddler/Two-Face etc.

It's a role reversal of Batman's traditional hero-villain relationship, which is why he doesn't really fit in Batman's rogue's gallery. Instead, it would probably be more accurate to say Batman is in Ra's al Ghul's rogue's gallery.

Interesting take.
It's worth noting that batman usually does not care about Ra's schemes, as long as they happen outside of his city.

Also, Ra's Al Ghul kinda strikes me as a displaced Bond villain, whom Batman is the most interesting option to oppose, being damn near an American vigilante version of Bond.

I think the idea is if you're going to have an ancient order of secretive assassins with mild supernatural flavouring, why NOT have them be ninjas? (Well, there's Assassins Creed, but that flew up its own ass long ago)

Most of the times Batman has fought Ra's, Ra's has done either one or the other

He was intended as a take on a Bond villain

Huh, that makes sense. Hey, if it works. (Funny that Bond has become Batman in turn)

Bond's been Batman since Goldfinger

>Batman isn't a globe-trotting vigilante who fights international terrorists.
Why else would you give him a billionaire secret identity that makes him the closest thing to James Bond before Bond was even a thing. (The Shadow).

Seriously though, restricting Batman stories to Gotham is little more than a editorial deceit that actually complicates his modern involvement with superhuman affairs in general (the dreaded "Why doesn't the JL help out in Gotham" question comes up way too often now).

Likes and respects. It's the reason why he addresses him as "Detective" and always speaks so cordially to him. Bats thinks he's utterly mad. Ra's simply sees their conflict as an ideological impasse, no hard feelings at all.

Hell, their unique state of affairs is why Under the Red Hood happens at all. Resurrecting Jason was meant to be an apology for accidentally aggrieving Bruce.

To put another nail in OP's argument, Gotham is a major city on the American East Coast. It figures that international criminals would be interested in it. By that logic, Batman must occasionally deal with these outsiders. If he can stop their schemes on a local level, that's great, but if Bats wants to stop them from happening again (or at least for a longer term), he'll go to the source of the trouble. Thus, travel.

Don't forget Livewire. STAS notwithstanding, she should never be even remotely a threat to any member of the Super-family. Unless they are nerfed as hell, electricity should do jack-shit to them.

She could be a high-level Batman foe, or a low- to mid-level Aquaman foe, but not a Superman foe.

They realized Superman's rogues gallery lacked credible threats but their OCs aren't exactly a huge improvement

Superman is so overpowered and boring, surely getting the shit kicked out of him by Spider-man tier villains will make him more appealing.

There's all kinds of odd overtones to that. Like Ra's is trying to be Bruce's substitute dad.

they kind of did that with Batman Begins.

Was having more amusing mental images of Ra's trying to get Batman to play catch and buying him a motorcycle.

I like the idea of heroes who take on specific threats.
My ideal Batman is 3 separate characters or one that evolves over time that are/is based on the level of conflicts they stop.

The first is a man who mostly beats up thugs.
Any powerful entity he fights can at most slowly lift up a car and toss it.
He has to figure out ways to make up for his lack of enhanced abilities.
The stakes are a criminal getting away.

The 2nd version is one that is a detective.
He solves mysteries in his city and his struggle isn't physically beating the bad guy but tracking them down/proving guilt and or innocence.
The stakes are at most a threat to the city.

The 3rd is an international spy who is basically just James Bond.
He foils national and global threats.

She's more tactically problematic than a threat to Superman or Supergirl per se, she's always trying to kill everybody else, and then zips away through the power lines to do it all over again.
It forces the Kryptonian heroes to do something clever with water or power cables or something instead of just punching things or throwing things into space.

I think the Batman that can do all 3 is too close to an actual superhuman. Peak physical condition. Master of countless martial arts. Genius intellect, masterful strategic thinking, and investigative insight. Nearly unmatched computer, mechanical, engineering talents. The list goes on.

Even in the realm of comics, I can't understand how one man could master all of these abilities. So either he's a metahuman masquerading as a street-level hero, or he's a street-level hero who has bullshit plot armor that lets him fight alongside superhumans.

Luminus was pretty dangerous once he figured out the higher end use of his gear.

I think he has bullshit armor.

A shame that Luminus was fucking boring.

Besides, Superman was mor of a scapegoat for other characters in his series. Because of him, the DCU started to include more heroes and villains from the Dc universe.

Despite that, you would think Bruce Timm would fuck up by doing that? Not really, most of Justice League conflict is Superman vs Darkseid, with Hawkgirl and her whole deal too. Even the Cadmus plot is mostly "Superman goes rogue = KILL HIM with Doomsday or Annoy him with Luthor! And then Brainiac"

Superman and Hawkgirl = the protagonists of Justice League.

They could've at least given him a Galactus or an Ego, The Living Planet knock-off to fight instead. Then the show might've actually been interesting.

The Tyrant Sun is Superman's counterpart there, iirc.