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Leslie Thompkins: only shows up to point your failures out

So, a lot of people don't know, or don't remember, but Bruce wasn't left in Alfred's custody. It may have changed with the newest timelines, but it wasn't the case before. No, after his parents' death, Bruce was put in the custody of his father's colleague and best friend, Leslie Thompkins. "But, Artie, Bruce lived with Alfred" you are right. Leslie had custody of Bruce, but she did not have him live with her, she left him at the manor with Alfred, and she did not live with him. And when did she, the one the state gave Bruce to, came to visit him?

Well, Leslie is shown to come to see Bruce for three reasons: when he is too sick for Alfred to deal with it himself, when he is sick but making it difficult for Alfred to deal with him, and when he is in trouble at school and they call his guardian. Can you see the pattern? That's right, she shows up when Bruce acts up. It's a bit much to say that the comics writers implied this, I don't believe they did, but we know now children acts up when they are trying to get attention. Without realizing it, the writers gave us Bruce acting up to have his surrogate mother's attention. Because Bruce does see Leslie as his surrogate mother, even as an adult he still tells people he sees her as a mother.

By the way, this was shown to us through multiple flashbacks through Batman's publishing history. And when these flashbacks happen, Leslie often makes a comment that Bruce was a difficult child to raise. Like, girl, shut the fuck up, you barely were there to raise him. And you are putting the blame on him for trying to get attention when you were neglecting him?

But, now, let's talk about the other issue with this and Leslie. Leslie interacted with Bruce during his upbringing principally when he was acting up, so she principally showed up only to reprimand him. This must have left some scars on Bruce's psyche. Like, his guardian only shows up to reprimand him, he must have felt unlovable. What? We are telling me in my earpiece that Bruce still believe as an adult he is unlovable.

Actually, I'm going to be very critical of Leslie, because she is VERY critical of Bruce, like he cannot do anything right. She is against Batman and thinks he is too violent, which she has the right to. But she will look out for more reasons to argue with him. Like in Knightfall where she is supposed to listen and help orphans that were victims of a kidnapping, but she is more focused on using their accounts to paint Batman in a bad light (Batman who is NOT BRUCE at this point, but she doesn't know that) Or during War Games where she put the blame of everything on Bruce, every crime and murder is his fault, and she is very vocal about it. Finally, she makes Stephanie fakes her death to teach a lesson to Bruce about letting children fight as his side (totally ignoring how he has been trying to make Steph stops and also tried to kill himself after bringing Steph to her, something that Barbara had to put a stop to herself because he was determined). And in No's Man Land, she even tells him she is afraid of becoming like him, making him to be the monster in her nightmare. She blames him for trying to make her "sink" to "his level", she is straight degrading him as inferior to her and corrupting her in a way. What a great mother.

And there's Bruce Wayne: Murderer? The title tells you what it is about. The batfam at large doesn't believe Bruce is guilty, but there are still some doubts, so they are working their ass off to find the truth. Well, Leslie, she immediately thinks Bruce did it, and when Alfred tells her that Bruce didn't, she tells him to stop excusing him, that they knew it would happen. She refuses to think, even for one second, that Bruce is innocent. And then, she goes to see him in jail to show him how disgusted in him she is, and that she told him she wouldn't be here for him anymore if he killed. I like to think this is the last straw for Bruce, because after that he goes full breakdown, where he escapes prison and thinks Bruce Wayne shouldn't exist anymore, only Batman. He is so mentally unwell in this, and everytime Leslie is there, I fell so bad for him.

I'm so mad at Leslie because nobody either call her out on how she treats Bruce. She is always painted as if she's right and "how hard it must have been for her to raise him, this mentally traumatized kid" (the same shit people tell me about my abusive mother raising me, like being a mentally ill kid means your parents get a free pass at treating you like shit because "it's hard", people care more about "how hard" it was for the guardians than for the kid) She thinks the worst of him, and she keeps telling him, her traumatized surrogate son that is suicidal and hates himself, that he was a burden to raise and he is to blame for anything bad happening to the people he loves... wait, no, to everyone around him. This qualifies as psychological abuse, btw.

Alfred Pennyworth: NOT a better father than Batman

Let's talk about the man y'all call a saint now. It's kind of incredible how Bruce will be criticized by the fandom for not adopting Dick earlier, when the context is pretty complicated (At first, it was literally not legal for an unmarried man to adopt a child. As the time changed, they changed the reasoning for Dick not wanting to be adopted. Bruce respecting that is him being a good guardian, but there's also how Bruce thinks Dick deserves a better father), but Alfred is called a saint, or a better father than Bruce, when he raised Bruce while keeping the butler/master distance between them. By doing this, he made it clear to Bruce, while raising him, that he wasn't family. Of course, Bruce still saw him as such, but he got the message that it was something he should keep to himself.

And when you add to this butler/master how Alfred brought up how he was doing this to honor Bruce's parents, how Bruce needed to make his parents' proud, how he needed to honor the Wayne's name and legacy when Bruce did not give a shit about it, it really increases the distance. Growing up, Bruce must have felt like he was just a job at time for Alfred. With Dick, he only develops a fear that Bruce and him doesn't have a relationship anymore now that he is an adult AFTER he becomes Nightwing and has a fight with Bruce. There were no thoughts about Bruce and him failing out once he was an adult before he became Nightwing. But Bruce must have believed that once he was an adult, Alfred would leave if he didn't keep him as his employee. When Bruce ran away to train, he probably thought Alfred would be gone when he would be back.

Also, Alfred complaining about Bruce not going to therapy when he didn't take him WHEN HE WAS HIS GUARDIAN is so hypocritical. He criticizes when Bruce doesn’t open enough to his kids, but he raised Bruce with a master/servant dynamic and barely vocalizes he views him as his son. It has even been shown that Alfred's way to deal with being worried about Bruce's wellbeing is by building more distance between them, either by getting very formal and cold, full "I'm just an employee", or by physically leaving. He also often has threatened to quit working for Bruce, which send the message that Bruce is just an employer, not his son.

And I'm being nice here, because I'm not talking about all the time Alfred drugged Bruce without his consent, which is fucked up. Or the worst thing I know Alfred did in canon, which was to pay actors to play a mugging looking similar to his parent's death, so Batman would come to help, only to get beat up. Yep, Alfred has once pay people to beat up Bruce to teach him that Batman was a bad idea. Like I said, I'm being nice and throwing that piece of canon away.

A penny for my thoughts

The most heartbreaking about this is how much Bruce loves them. They are his parents, they are his mother and father. He thinks of them as such in the comics, and losing them is nightmarish for him. He will never stand up for himself in front of them or call out their behavior toward him, because he respects them to much for "putting up with him", something they put themselves in his head, even if they didn't mean it. Leslie is made the president of a lot of charities and organizations Bruce created. He is way too good for them sometimes, but he was taught BY THEM that he wasn't someone easy to love, so he takes what he can. He doesn't even believe he deserves them, but he certainly deserved better.

And maybe Bruce thought he didn't deserve to adopt Dick and be his father because of how he was raised, with people he saw as his parents holding him at arms length. With getting the message again and again from them that he wasn't family to them, but a burden or a job to do. That they wouldn't be there if it weren't for the respect they had for Thomas and Martha Wayne. In a twisted way, he thought he didn't deserve a family.