Batman/Gordon Plot Element Grab-Bag

[cimorene]

(I figured once I'd gone to the trouble to type this up, I should post it.) Almost any Batman/Gordon plot can by typified using the codes from this schema:

1. H/C from Batman to Jim:
1a. Batman rescues Jim daringly
1b. Batman takes Jim to the Batcave
1c. Batman bandages Jim's wounds

2. H/C from Jim to Batman:
2a. Jim rescues Batman daringly
2b. Jim takes Batman to his house
2c. Jim bandages Batman's wounds

3. Bruce Wayne and Jim
3a. Bruce Wayne flirts with Jim
3b. Bruce Wayne takes Jim out on a date
3c. Bruce Wayne invites Jim to a fundraiser/gala/party

4. Jim discovering Batman's identity
4a. Jim notices something familiar about either Bruce's or Batman's mouth
4b. Jim doesn't buy Bruce's playboy act
4c. Jim discovers Bruce/Batman's identity during sex

Comments

[undersea.livejournal.com]

I... Yeah, you've nailed it there. :)

[cimness.livejournal.com]

It really gets useful when you can't remember which story is which! You can make a little chart and be like, "Noelia's? Oh yeah, hers is a... let me see... 2a-2b-2c-3a-3b-4a-3b-4c!" (I'm working from memory, there, so I might have missed some elements.) "Whereas the other one was a 2a-3c-3a-4b..."

[undersea.livejournal.com]

Haha, there should be an epic challenge to use all in one fic.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

Oooooh. The prize goes to whoever does it believably in the fewest words! \o/

[cobweb-diamond.livejournal.com]

And yet we read them all anyway.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

It's not exactly a huge time investment. I'm more intrigued by the pattern than anything else. I haven't observed such a strong similarity throughout a fandom in quite a long time, if ever.

[cobweb-diamond.livejournal.com]

It's probably due to the limit of characters, plus the fact that AU just doesn't work. There are only so many ways you can get two characters to interact when one of them only gets about 10 minutes of screentime per movie. ;)

[cimness.livejournal.com]

It could be why, but it's not true that there are only so many ways to get them to interact. If you survey most fandoms of any variety - movie, television, science fiction or otherwise, rps, anime, comics - you find a pretty wide range of plot devices ranging from the clichéd to the completely wtf-inducing. Fandom doesn't lack for imagination, and a lack of canon precedent has never stopped it before.

[someblazingstar.livejournal.com]

On the plus side, though, while somewhat cliched, I've hardly read any truly bad Batman/Gordon, though it could certainly be that I'm not looking hard enough. A pairing like, say, Batman/Joker may have slightly more original plots (though not really; "the Joker kidnaps Batman" and "the Joker is injured and Batman nurses him back to health" are both ridiculously popular plot devices), but man, so much badfic. And I think if I read one more story where the Joker (or worse, the author) refers to Batman as "Batsy" I may scream.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

Hahhaha. Well, I wouldn't know, being a pairing-based reader, but I'm certainly not surprised to learn these things! I have read what I would call actually bad Batman/Gordon, although it hasn't reached the offensively, egregiously terrible stage... at least, not more than a couple of times.