The Right Wing Batman: Lock-Up | Batman the Animated Series

What I find somewhat ironic about his character and what he symbolizes is WHO he punishes. Everyone at Arkham is mentally unstable and are criminals yes, but he selects those that he has physical power over. Harley Quinn, Scarecrow, the Ventriloquist/Scarface are all physically weaker than him and can’t fight back without some sort of weapon. He chooses to physically and mentally abuse them. None of his examples include the big names like Joker, Two-Face, or Killer Croc. It’s not about punishing criminals that deserve it, it’s about control and the superiority he has over them. If he practiced what he preached, his methods would apply to every single criminal in Arkham

I think Lockup’s costume is intentionally an extreme version of police swat armor in the show

Lockup ironically seems like the version of Batman that people claim Batman is

Batman doesn't kill because he's afraid of becoming the Joker, it's because he's afraid of becoming this kind of guy

I think Lockup's vs Batman's eyes might be a riff on "justice is blind."

A vigilante like Lockup or the Punisher popping up would be a natural reaction to the increasingly hellish criminal underworld. The difference is that Punisher wants to eliminate it while Lockup wants it to suffer.

While perhaps it's not intentional, Batman's costume showing his mouth (and also having prominent ears) reflects the idea that batman is a voice of the people, and listens to those who want to speak. See Baby Doll. Lock-Up, on the other hand, simply observes what he believes is good or bad and acts on it, often cruelly, without any idea of what is just or correct. Also police parallels but that's more of a Prometheus thing.

Lock-Up is basically what the people who criticize and don't know who Batman is think Batman is. One thing I loved about the animated series is how they don't use Arkham Asylum as just a stand in for a prison, it actually is a mental ward for sick patients (Killer Croc isn't even put in Arkham because he's found to be cognizant of his wrong doings) and so when there is someone who is terrorizing the patients that, realistically, is seen as an awful awful thing.

Personally I think Lock Up should have been the season finale rather than "Batgirl Returns" since it closes this sutle "character arc" of Batman in the season that I don't think many notice. Looking back at season 3, it that has many "villain reform" episodes like Second Chance (which focus on Two Face), Catwalk (focus on Catwoman), Harley's Holiday (focus on Harley) and House and Garden (focus on Poison Ivy), in which the villains try to reform only to go back to crime in the end . If the season ended with the Lock Up episode it would give more meaning for Lock Up arguments (the villains failures supporting Lock Up ideology), as well Batman's refusal to join him (showing how he still has compassion even after the villains failed and refuse to reform)

As with all good batman villains, lockup is holding a mirror up to an aspect of the bat and twisting it

What makes Lock-Up more shocking to me isn't so much any political affiliation but the GENERAL moral question he gives you; is it alright to torture criminals who are already punished? The lot of Arkham are not innocent angels in many cases though a lot are tragic in their origins. Regardless of that, how far is too far when it comes to dealing out 'justice' and how do we really decide how much one should get for their crimes. What makes Lock-Up so incredibly dangerous is how he PLANS and dishes out his 'justice', by putting the criminal in a compromising situation where they are unable to defend themselves in a cruel twist of irony as many of their own victims. The problem is Lock-Up isn't in it for the victims. This isn't retaliation or even justification. He sees and views anyone who did something wrong in his eyes as fitting to his abuse and pain, no matter how petty their crimes are. Batman stomps all levels of criminals but when he's done, HE'S DONE. Lock-Up is someone who wouldn't stop until his victim is dead which he would then blame on them not being able to take it. And to drive home how creepy he came off to me, consider how abusive Joker is to Harley. From the way things sounded, Lock-Up came off as stepping over the line in a way that I won't mention here that a lot of media never even implied that Joker did to Harley, at least the stuff aimed at kids. And if it wasn't any more of a fist to the face that Lock-Up is a contrast of Batman, THE DUDE IS NEARLY IDENTICAL TO BRUCE. Bruce is looking at himself not so much if he became a super villain but had he let his hatred of vengeance take over him in a NORMAL job to the point he becomes abusive to everyone because "someone has to take the hits to learn." Ironically I'm on a project writing a villain like this but it disturbs me that people like this exist and not just in law enforcement. People like this exist in all professions, with the belief that their protection is needed and I've learned through experience this attitude has no alignment political. Anyone who becomes obsessed with power and control can turn into this and it's AWFUL. Edit; about his mouth. What's up with that? You'd think they'd just allow for basic movements of the lower cowl which is often down for characters in costumes like that but....the went so detailed in his cowl you see his TONGUE through it and it makes you realize why they don't usually animate the mouth under full masks like that (cough spiderman cough). That may have been an error.

Drowning is one of the worst ways to go. There's panic, the feeling of your lungs burning as you try to hold on for as long as possible, and then the realization that you're dead as you finally run out of air. There's also that, despite common myth, witches were more often drowned. There could be other reasons, but that's what I thought of.

Lock-Up was a good foil for Batman, and the ending was chilling. The vocal performance of Bruce Weitz, Lylye Bolton's actor, was great. He truly captured the raging insanity of Lock-up very well. I think he works better as a one-shot badguy than a recurring one. Speaking of which, have you thought about making a video about Baby Dahl?

“Another villain made possible by a grant from the Wayne Foundation.”

I never thought of him as political i just thought he was a control freak

I love your focus on Batman's compassion. I think that it's something that often gets missed in many fns interpretations of the character.

In regard to the eyes and mouth parallels of their costumes, idk I think that might be significant. Batman hiding his eyes could represent “Justice is blind,” so therefore when he speaks it carries more weight because it doesn’t matter how he feels. On the other hand, Lock-Up’s exposed eyes shows that how he feels about the situation is all he really cares about; for him it’s not really about Justice, but power. Or maybe I’m reading too much into it, idk

When I first saw this as a young teenager, I didn't see any political overtones - and yes, I had an awareness of politics at that age - because the story was just so absurd I had trouble relating it to anything in real life. In our world, people as psychopathic as the Scarecrow would be exiled, put in a maximum-security prison with no hope of parole, or executed as soon as possible. They wouldn't get to lounge around an insane asylum. Watching this again many years later, though, I'm definitely able to read the episode's themes with more insight. I like the image of Bolton's apartment being an empty chamber with very few creature comforts. Not only does it emphasize his contempt for "soft" bourgeois society, but it's actually a credit to him in that it reveals how much of a righteous and moral (to use those two terms loosely) character resides within his psychosis. He believes that life should be hard and that discipline should be imposed, and he applies these principles to himself. As much as we might detest the man, we can't call him a hypocrite. Also, many violent fanatics do believe they are morally superior and see themselves as redeemers of a corrupt world. It certainly says something that Lock-Up is too extreme even for Gotham City, which is usually portrayed as socially conservative almost to the point of authoritarianism. Even Harvey Bullock, who often has to restrain himself from physically attacking even the most minor of criminals, is practically a bleeding-heart compared to Bolton, since he exemplifies the moderate right-wing philosophy that the letter of the law should always be upheld and vigilantism should never be tolerated. I can't help wondering whether, if Gotham City were real, not only would its courts execute every single murderer who failed to show remorse, but the local government would have the executions televised in order to instill terror into potential lawbreakers.

Not sure if anyone else has already said this, but batman's eyes being covered is part of the costume's purpose: to invoke fear. (Remember in the original opening of the show, when batmans eyes show his distaste for the shadowy criminals who flinch away from him?) Yet Bruce's humanity, compassion, fear (especially during the first seasons of the original animation), and annoyance (especially in the New Adventures and everything Justice League related) still bleed through. Whereas Lockup has his eyes fully exposed, "eyes being the windows to the soul" (reminds me of the scary eyes Harvey Dent had when he lost control in his premiere episode), his own eyes show the rage within, inspire fear all their own. He can't hide the truth of what he feels, his eyes are scary even when he's still in his prison officer uniform and supposed to be a symbol of duty, peace, and order, yet his own interests bleed through. His overall costume and its obvious police colors, might also have been emblematic of the fact that too many officers go through a power trip when donning their uniforms and weapons, especially since they will especially target those with less "power" than them.

I think Prometheus fills Lock-Up's role more or less as a dark reflection of Batman just with a better toolkit. Lock-Up is thematically neat, just...boring.