Bat and Cat

That’s the thing that bothers me probably more than anything: the emotional manipulation and what it’s taken from us. This moment was so big and so important to so many people, and many people (like myself) have waited for this for so long. This was going to be the culmination of my fandom career. Even if King has them married somewhere between now and the next two years (and I’m not holding my breath on that) it’s really just delivering what was promised in the first place. All the excitement that was built up is gone. The proposal, the dress, the whole thing with Superman; it’s all meaningless now. I’m really pissed that now we’ll never get a proper wedding album.

The thing that kills me is that none of this had to happen to achieve King’s goal. I can accept that breaking up is perhaps part of his larger plan but he took it too far. A wedding is just ceremonial; that was for the audience. That was to get people talking about the book. Obviously Batman and Catwoman getting married is a headline maker and got people who only read comics casually or even not at all interested in picking up the issue. 

King used the wedding to catfish the audience in what was really a set up for Bruce going on some bullshit journey of self discovery. If that was his end goal they didn’t need to almost get married to make that happen. They didn’t even need to get engaged. They could’ve just broken up and the effect would’ve been the same. So this moment, which has been building for nearly 80 years, has been ruined for us, and for what? What kind of selfish asshole. 

The next few months are going to be crucial. If not played right it’s going to look like King was just using Catwoman to segue into his real story about Batman and happiness and exploited batcat fans to the fullest degree along the way.