For me, yes. I don't know what others have been saying.
When you said "I don't buy it", I thought the "it" was an allusion to the then current debate
But they are more likely to understand your situation, which increases the probability of success. If we're to break it down to basics, the more similarities two people have with one another, the easier it is for them to bond. This is a universal truth to which all types of relations are founded upon, is it not?
Bonding does not necessarily lead to being of help to each other. Many can that bond on similarities only strengthen their current selves, reinforcing both their virtues and their flaws. And about understanding, like the great Morpheus said: "Comprehension is not a requisite for cooperation". While that may be an overstatement, it's actually very much in play here. You don't make an experience blind man lead a recently blinded when someone who has never lost its sight can be much better at it. You don't give a boy in poverty in adoption to another man in poverty. Only when the man has been able to build an stable enviroment for the kid to grow. Any adoption official (or any sensible person) could read Wayne's reckless behavious in the past as an evidence of not being able to build a stable enviroment, possibly from lingering trauma from his parents' death. Would you give a boy with issues to someone who apparently hasn't been able to work those same issues out? No way.
I'm not well versed in how adoption policies work, but I imagine this is a particular detail that even for Nolan would be long-winded. Not meaning to throw your concerns out the window here, but it can't possibly be much of an arduous process for a man of Bruce's status to secure Dick as his ward.
Adoption processes in America has been documented in pop culture many times. Especially in TV and Film. Just in TV, there's Friends, House, Dexter, Lost, you name it. Most people are aware of how high the requisites can be. It is an arduous process. Especially for a man of Bruce's status. I've not been the only one to bring that up.
That a (multiple) Robin reference?
No, I was making an allusion to CaptainClown's list of issues I hat quoted right before your post. The points in bold are the ones
not pertaining to adoption.
1. Why would Bruce want to endanger another person in his life after the tragedy of Harvey and Rachel?
2. How would he be able to obtain Dick as his ward?
3. Why would he see himself as a suitable father to raise this child as he sleeps all day typically and has to fuel his playboy persona?
4. How and why would Bruce want to hide his persona from Dick? If he is bringing him into his home then he is in closer then anyone else in his life. It seems backwards to want to adopt a child then hide this persona of Batman from him.
5. What elements can Dick bring to the greater whole of the story that other characters couldn't do in a simplier fashion?I feel that the humanizing aspect can be explored in greater detail with a natural flow using Selina Kyle, while at the same time, including her with ease to a plot around Gotham Post-Dent.
What pressure in particular does the film Bruce have over the comic Bruce in the same time frame? I'm not sure I can agree with that assertion at all. I'm not much of an avid comics reader, but I can recognize how much hell Bruce has been put through, ever since he donned the cape and cowl.
And even so, he has come to achieve certain stabilities. Mainly, he has a whole group of trained people to rely on, he doesn't have the full force of the police after his trail, he is more experienced and doesn't question his place in Gotham so much, and in the comics, been less verisimile than the Nolan films, he miraculously finds the time to lead both of his lives without any major problem. That's some pressure-reliever.
Based on...what? By all indications, Robin has been very widely accepted as an established character. And aren't Bruce's transgressions what makes him so interesting? Literary characters feed on flaws.
Transgressions of other people's rules, not his. He stands obtusely true to his own principles and almost never breaks a single one of them.
My assertion about audiences are most likely based on my own experience and can, ideed, be wrong.
The only way to know how would it be received would be to start a poll. Here, one has already been made. I'm sure all the people who voted are 'recurring audiences', since they all saw Begins and TDK. See the results.
But as a result of their differing training methods, it's been emphasized time and time again that Batman is the superior fighter. Even as Robin, he is still a student. No one's saying that it takes a few months/years for Dick to become Bruce's equal. With that said, it's a daunting comparison in the first place. In spite of their training gap, it's still possible for Dick to hold his own. Note that I am not in favor of a child Robin, I personally believe for him to work he should at least be 16-17 before he starts his crimefighting.
Then we have nothing to argue about here.
There's certainly no rule stating that. His future is unwritten, it could be whatever Nolan wants it to be.
And it has been argumented very thoroughly here that in Nolan doing so he would be taking the franchise in a quite different direction. I suggest you retrace El Payaso's and CaptainClown's comments a couple pages back if you can, and read it. It's not about what Nolan wants but what is consistent with the world he has presented us.
Parts of a whole. Sum of it's parts. (insert another appropriate figure of speech here).
Ideally Bruce sustains a neutral position during the course of his work. But we all know that's never the case. Things do get personal for him, and yes, at times that may get in the way of "the mission". Take your pick of the numerous characters in the comics. In Nolan's series, it's Rachel. The plan, and the execution of said plan, are two very different things. Bruce isn't perfect, but we don't want that either. I'm not in favor of a character whose motivations and behavior are incredibly predictable from the get-go.
They haven't been predictable so far. Quite the contrary, it has been very different. But these series may be telling a story that leads to that point of altruistic public persona I described; a more stable Bruce that's stronger than ever to face the endless mission he took as Batman.
The series are, so far, about the initial formation of Batman. It's easy to predict it's going to end there. Is it bad it is that predictable? No at all. That would like saying no stories should end with the bad guys being defeated because that's what's expected. As long as the ride is bumpy and it seems the good guys may not win at all until the very end, it's okay. Like they say in The Prestige, we look at the trick and do not see it because we want to be deceived. That's our pact with the storyteller.
That's missing the point of what I was addressing in his comments.
I was focusing on public image, reputation, and personality. How it is possible to turn that around towards the other direction.
Bruce's life style is being brought here as something on which his ability to adopt is completely dependant. You tried to refute that by pointing at an example of a celebrity with also a wild, unstable reputation, who could adopt several times with no inconveniences.
Then I pointed out how that cases is completely irrelevant for two reasons: 1. Because in the case of Jolie's children, the system in their countries works differently and they lived in conditions of extreme poverty, without many people competing over who would get to adopt them, as opposed to America. And 2. because Jolie's reputation was already in a drastic turnaround since at least two years prior to the first adoption, cementing the "Ambassador Jolie" image that would completely substitue her previous one.
I didn't deviate from the topic. I was bringing it back.
Why? We are consistently thrust into unsuspecting circumstances and many times we are not prepared for it. Life doesn't hold our hands or gives us warnings. You deal with it as it comes.
Taking away the difficulties Bruce has to face with Dick is driving straight into a creative blockade. It's boring. I like when the characters I watch get into jams, or have to fend for themselves.
With the big issues, like the lives and livelihoods of orphans, with judges and officials calling the shots instead of oneself, it is more than reasonable. Like you said before, being on the right path already, for a time: "increases the probabilty of success". In the case of adoption...
legal adoption, Bruce would need the trust of the authorities. Trust is earned with evidence. A drug-addict who says he's clean the next day he stopped using can't possibly expect other people to believe. People only trusts the one who has been clean for a long period of time.
Now, unless the sequel takes place some years after TDK and the public Bruce Wayne has already took that turnaround, he wouldn't have the time to prove it without seriously damaging the flow and screentime. And if that were the case anyway, well, not showing such a big event for Bruce... that would be cheap storytelling.
