Picard is 007?

[Christopher]

And in his earliest appearances, Batman had no qualms about killing villains or letting villains die. He even carried a gun. After all, he was based on pulp antiheroes such as The Shadow and The Spider.

That's something that tends to be hugely overstated. For one thing, it was only true in the first few months of the character's existence; his strict no-killing policy was handed down by the editor before the character was even a year old. (Some people claim that the change didn't happen until the Comics Code Authority was established a decade and a half later, which is ridiculously wrong. Comics as early as 1940 were stating emphatically that the Batman never killed.) It's also untrue to say he had no qualms about it in those early issues. In the issue that led to the no-guns crackdown, Batman shot up a truck full of superstrong monsters (and at least one human driver) from the Batplane, but said, "Much as I hate to take human life, I'm afraid this time it's necessary!" And the only previous time he'd been shown shooting anyone was to kill vampires with silver bullets; otherwise, he'd just been shown firing at inanimate objects or brandishing guns in cover or splash-page art that wasn't part of an actual story. Although in his fourth issue, he did break the villain's neck with a kick.

As to the question of double standards about killing... Audiences assume that the villain is a bad person killing good people, and therefore it's an act of heroism and justice to end the villain's life.

And as I've said, I think that's a bizarre and self-contradictory notion. If the villains are bad because they kill, why is it good for heroes to kill? That just doesn't make sense. The idea that "If they do something bad to me, that makes it okay for me to do the same bad thing to them" is a childish excuse for bad behavior. Other people's misdeeds are not a license to sink to their level. On the contrary, they're a reminder of the importance of being better than that.

 

[USS Firefly]

I think that Dalton is the most underated.
And Superman did kill in Superman 2 when he killed Zod without remorse.

 

[Starborn Dragon]

^But I just don't see the point of responding to "This is the way things are and it deserves to be challenged" with a simple assertion that "This is the way things are." That's already been established up front, and it's the very thing being complained about. You're not telling me anything I don't already know. The fact that I know all this is exactly why I'm complaining.

It's always hard to change the status quo. That goes without saying. But that's all the more reason to try anyway.

That sounds like change for the sake of change only.

I am not against changes, but I prefer to have real and valid reasons to change.

But the thing about Hollywood is that it is a business, and business follows formula.

The big problem with formula though is that in the entertainment business, repetition burns people out in the long run.

 

[enterprisecvn65]

I think that Dalton is the most underated.
And Superman did kill in Superman 2 when he killed Zod without remorse.

Actually it was never intended for Zod, Ursa, and Non to be killed. Apparently the original ending had Superman fishing them out of the snowy trenches they fell into and then turning them over to the authorities, although I imagine Zod would have one hand amputated because Superman turned every bone into it into powder when he took it to swear his loyalty.

But, like many other things that came out weird and uneven because of the Donner/Lester switch. The part where they are shown alive didn't make it into the film. So in lack of that we're left to believe they died when they fell.

It was a really weak part of the film that it was never really told to the audience definitely whether they were dead or not.

 

[enterprisecvn65]

IMO, the Bond movie franchise went completely downhill after "From Russia With Love."

And in his earliest appearances, Batman had no qualms about killing villains or letting villains die. He even carried a gun. After all, he was based on pulp antiheroes such as The Shadow and The Spider.

As to the question of double standards about killing... Audiences assume that the villain is a bad person killing good people, and therefore it's an act of heroism and justice to end the villain's life.

Kor

So the Bond franchise peaked in it's second film and it's been all downhill from there, including Goldfinger?

I admit the series has had dramatic drops at times in quality, but man that's a pretty harsh standard

 

[Lance]

On the topic of the Batman examples up thread, I tend to handwave his early instalment weirdness as being because it came before he had the epiphany that killing others doesn't make him feel better, nor does it make him any better than the villains he fights. Brucie clearly had this moment where he looked himself in the mirror and he was all like, "Yeah, I'm a vigilante, but I'm not a criminal, I don't murderer people in some misguided search for vengeance". And that therein became his core principal.

We can apply many cosmic retcons to explain away some of Picard's... perhaps out-of-character moments in the TNG movies. But we must always bare in mind that the likes of 'Starship Mine' or even 'Captain's Holiday' already shown him as being very capable of doing the James Bond bit. Perhaps what we needed was more balance. Something like the original ending of 'Insurrection' would've balance out all the other times when he just "goes Rambo" on the enemy.

 

[Christopher]

On the topic of the Batman examples up thread, I tend to handwave his early instalment weirdness as being because it came before he had the epiphany that killing others doesn't make him feel better, nor does it make him any better than the villains he fights. Brucie clearly had this moment where he looked himself in the mirror and he was all like, "Yeah, I'm a vigilante, but I'm not a criminal, I don't murderer people in some misguided search for vengeance". And that therein became his core principal.

Except the comics themselves quickly retconned it to say that Batman had never used guns or taken lives, ever. Continuity was never a major consideration in early comics.