Symbol Watcher

“What is it about bats?” I wondered as I sat fixed on “The Dark Knight” last Saturday. Even though I know most bats are not the fang wielding blood suckers most of us have learned to fear from watching Dracula movies, they’re still creepy. There’s something prehistoric and other worldly about them. After all, they hang upside down and live in the darkest, dankest places.

There was “the Bat man” flying through the air and flashing across the screen to save innocent victims and slay psychopathic criminals with equal venom. Still, I kept thinking: Bats aren’t the kind of creatures that instill a feeling of safety and security, so why would someone who wants to help save the world choose a bat as his crime fighting persona?

As I started researching the characteristics and symbolism of bats, I realized that a bat is very appropriate for this character’s dual nature of misunderstood vigilante outcast and life-saving hero. For starters, bats have a unique dual nature simply by the fact that they are the only winged mammal capable of extended flight (unlike a flying squirrel for instance, which only glides for short distances).

While I was well acquainted with darker bat symbolism (Vampires morphing into bats
and the Devil as fallen angel with wings) I did not know that several myths and cultures revere bats.

In classic antiquity, bats symbolized vigilance and a bat’s eye was believed to offer protection from the darkness. Mayan culture worshipped a bat-like god, Z’otz. Ancient China thought of bats as carriers of good fortune and some parts of Africa consider bats to be very intelligent since, they believe, bats don’t collide with anything while in flight.

From what I’ve learned about the varied symbolism of bats — sources of sorrow or strength depending on our cultural and religious beliefs — it seems appropriate that the Dark Knight is a bat.

In the movie, I saw how Batman’s actions and circumstances made him loved by many but also feared and ostracised — not just by criminals, but by the public he was trying to protect. He takes the fall for another character’s murder spree to keep the character’s hero reputation in tact. The movie closes with Commissioner Gordon explaining why Batman is willing to carry the weight of being unjustly accused. ‘He’s not a hero, he’s a guardian. . . . We’ll chase him because we need to and he’ll let us because he can take it.’ (Please forgive the rough paraphrasing.)

So Batman gets a public opinion crucifixion for something he didn’t do, but he’s self-sacrificing enough to withstand the criticism because he knows maintaining the public’s fragile faith in good means they have to keep believing in their already-appointed hero. It’s no wonder that in classic antiquity people would nail bats to their doors to protect against night demons and black magic.

–Writeye

Posted on July 23rd, 2008 under Movies • Tags: bat symbolism, Batman, The Dark Knight movie. •  Print This Post •  Email This Post • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback