Because most people tend to have this belief that children are special and killing them is worse than killing adults? Because he wanted to run away and he just didn't notice the kid? Because he was already looking at two charges of murder if he got caught and he didn't want to add a third (of a child no less) to the list? Plenty of reasons for him to not shoot Bruce.
Because he wanted their money but was guilty about it and only fired because they resisted/on accident? He never meant to shoot anybody, he just wanted to buy a drink/pay the rent? He only meant to hit one of them and but was to incompetent to hit one target and avoid being seen?
Modified Ura-nage, Torture RackBelieve it or not, I heard that in the very first version of the story, the mugger only shot Thomas Wayne. Martha Wayne was so distressed at the sight of her husband being shot dead that her heart gave out and she died! Clearly, that ended up getting changed to the mugger shooting both parents, and that has managed to stay consistent, which is interesting, considering that many things in Comic Books are practically made to be inconsistent.
Oh, yeah, there was that one Batman film where the mugger is revealed to be The Joker! That might seem out of the blue, but I think it does make sense in some ways. Let's see: the mugger is usually named Joe Chill, and doesn't Joker have at least one alias beginning with the letter "J"? Also, it adds a certain degree of It's Personal to the hostility between Batman and Joker.
Oh, Equestria, we stand on guard for thee!I read Batman #4. So far Snyder's style in writing Batman is to take overlooked aspects of lore and put them front and center. On his Detective Comics run, he put James Gordon, Jim's son, front and center as the main antagonist. Given that Owlman is an on-again-off-again character in the DCU, it's only befitting given Snyder's track record.
If anything, he's reexamining the murder of Gotham's First Family. I, for one, welcome this reinvention. Batman's origin has been told and re-told to death, and we have to take into consideration the reason why he survived. I think it's something beyond killing a child is a one way ticket to eternal damnation.
Perhaps the Court of Owls was aggressively trying to recruit the Waynes as financial backers. Alan Wayne most likely refused and the court took care of them. Tomas refused as well so the court hired Joe Chill to off them. Then they'd terrorize Bruce by trapping him in a crawl space for about a week so that he knows his place.
Now they want to recruit him and they're doing it thru aggressive means. The Court knows Bruce Wayne is Batman, and they want Batman.
Between you and me, "Owlman" isn't as intimidating, though
edited 22nd Dec '11 1:05:07 PM by EnglishMajor
With blood and rage of crimson red ripped from a corpse so freshly dead together with our hellish hate we'll burn you all that is your fateI don't really like the idea of there being a big conspiracy to kill Bruce's parents - in theory, anyways. It just feels like one more thing to make Bruce uber-special, and he doesn't need that.
...That being said, obviously you'd need to be a Nite Owl to strike fear in the hearts of the masses.
edited 22nd Dec '11 2:26:28 PM by Maridee
ophelia, you're breaking my heart
But we're talking about Bruce Wayne, sole survivor of the Wayne fortune. If I were the leader of a shadowy cabal, I'd want to aggressively recruit the richest family around. It's a misnomer saying that trying to make Bruce Wayne more special would be a bad thing: he's special enough as is.
Then there was that Flashpoint storyline that did a different take on the Batman origin story. In that one, Bruce Wayne and Martha Wayne get shot by the mugger, leaving Thomas Wayne alive! This results in Thomas becoming a Darker and Edgier Batman. Oh, and The Joker turns out to be Martha Wayne, who actually survived the shooting! Holy plot twist, Batman!
The writers ought to make a version of the story where Martha Wayne becomes Batwoman and The Joker is either Thomas Wayne or Bruce Wayne! What do you think, guys? Does that sound like a good idea?
Oh, Equestria, we stand on guard for thee!I wouldn't want to recruit them if they'd be very opposed to my Evil Plans, however rich they might be...pretty sure that one's on the Evil Overlord list somewhere.
..Also, trying to make someone more special is a bad thing when they're already special enough? Say what?
And I like that idea. Martha Wayne never gets any development.
ophelia, you're breaking my heart
What I'm trying to say is this:
Bruce Wayne is an exceptional person. Extraordinarily exceptional: the 1% humanity has to offer. To say that having a shadowy cabal actively targeting him makes him more exceptional and would be a detriment is like saying he goes from the 1% to the .9%: it's nitpicking.
And hell; there had to be something else behind the murder of Tomas and Martha Wayne. Something more "special" if you will about him and his circumstance.
And hey: what kind of antagonistic force wouldn't want to recruit The Dark Knight? The maze he's dropped in might be to break him psychologically.
With blood and rage of crimson red ripped from a corpse so freshly dead together with our hellish hate we'll burn you all that is your fateMeh. I'm just sick of everything revolving around Bruce Wayne. And the other half of my argument was that he doesn't need that extra special thing. So suppose this cabal really is responsible for the death of his parents. At the end of the comic, he punches them in the face with justice. What does it change?
Maybe he gets some resolution over his parents' death; maybe he becomes even more eaten by guilt and vengeance and the night; maybe he gets to the roots of one of the problems plaguing Gotham City. But it's not going to really change him.
It just seems unnecessary. Why does there have to be something extra special about the Waynes' deaths?
ophelia, you're breaking my heartI have to agree that Martha Wayne has never gotten development. I mean, Thomas Wayne, we have a number of stories revealing that he was a surgeon and philanthropist. Bruce apparently had a distant relationship with the guy, but then, a lot of kids seem to be more attached to their mothers than to their fathers.
Martha Wayne...let's see. What little has been said about her indicates that she was a socialite, she was Thomas Wayne's wife, and the mugger apparently killed Bruce's parents for the pearl necklace she was wearing. One version of the story pretty much says that the mugger was actually a hitman who was supposed to just kill Thomas Wayne, but it got out of hand, resulting in her death as well. Really, she seems to be treated as though she is just peripheral to all this!
Wait, isn't there a series called Streets Of Gotham that focuses on Martha?
Oh, Equestria, we stand on guard for thee!Yeah, I think I saw a picture of that scene somewhere! They should do more scenes like that.
Then there is Frank Miller's take on the story in The Dark Knight Returns, which goes pretty much the same as before, except Bruce Wayne reveals in his thoughts that at the time he thought the mugger was a Complete Monster, but he wasn't. Why? Because Bruce can remember that the mugger, after killing the parents, was shaking, scared, and guilty. That doesn't sound like a Complete Monster.
Unfortunately, Miller's story All Star Batman And Robin then drops some implications that either one or both of the Waynes molested young Bruce. That would mean that his parents were Asshole Victims and that they totally deserved to get gunned down. It's a good thing that the official stories don't portray his parents like this!
Oh, Equestria, we stand on guard for thee!In the original version of Batman's origin, as told in Batman #1 way back in the 40's, Thomas and Martha Wayne were both killed by a random mugger. In "The Origin of Batman" from Batman # 47 in 1948, that killer was revealed to be named Joe Chill, still just a random mugger (this story was the one primarily used as source material in Paul Dini's episode of Batman: The Brave and the Bold, "The Chill of the Night"). In this version of the story, Thomas Wayne made an attempt to stop Chill, which resulted in his getting shot. The shock of the incident is too much for Martha Wayne, who suffers a heart attack and dies. Chill is disturbed by how young Bruce Wayne is looking at him ("Quit lookin' at me, kid!"), panics, and runs off. In "The First Batman" from Detective Comics #235 in 1956, it is revealed that Thomas and Martha Wayne has attended a costume party (with Thomas dressed as a stylized bat, the site of which the toddler Bruce filed away for further reference, apparently) to which a wounded Lew Moxon, a bank robber on the run, shows up. He and his men force Thomas to give Moxon medical care. Eventually, Thomas is able to subdue Moxon and his men, and the police apprehend them. Moxon swears revenge. Some years later (in an interesting note, this version has it that Thomas Wayne was not born wealthy, buy became so through wise investments by the time Moxon was released from jail, which the story has is ten years later) Moxon hires Joe Chill to kill Thomas Wayne, with specific instructions to leave Bruce alive, so that Bruce can testify that Moxon did not, in fact, kill Thomas and Martha himself. This version remained canon until Frank Miller's Batman:Year One, which again has the couple the victims of a nameless, random mugger. Whether that's appropriate or not is of course, a matter of opinion. Personally, I would rather that Batman's creation be the result of a random act of violence rather than a huge conspiracy, and that his parents' killer is never caught. It's more poetic, and more fitting that way, to my way of thinking. As I've gotten older, I've started to lose my taste for the "child picked out by destiny" stories. As to why a random mugger would leave Bruce alive, as others have said, perhaps the shooting was an accident. Perhaps the mugger, like a lot of muggers, was not a complete monster but just a panicky thug. Makes sense to me.
These are my personal opinions on what Batman's origin need to be:
- The Waynes need to be not only rich (so Bruce can inherit the means to fund his crime-fighting career) but also exemplary people, so Bruce will become a hero and not just an obsessed vigilante: he knows his parents would not have approved of it. (Alfred helps by being a living link to them.)
- Watching a movie about a costumed hero (usually Zorro) right before the murder isn't strictly necessary; the DC universe already had plenty of masked crimefighters before Batman showed up, so it's hardly an unusual option. (Still, I admit I love the Zorro/Batman connection, especially since Zorro DOES precede Batman.)
- The shooting HAS to be a random incident: the Waynes were the victims of Gotham City's high crime rate, and that's why Bruce swears to combat it, rather than just seeking revenge on Chill or any possible Conspiracy behind him. (Incidentally, Bruce fights this war mostly *with his money* eg. by helping Gotham become a better place to live via the Wayne Foundation; he's too smart to think kicking random criminals' asses would actually have long-term effects on the crime rate. "Batman" is just a way Bruce deals with individuals who escape from the law via corruption, and sometimes, because of their skills or powers (eg villains.) But they aren't his true targets.)
- Why Bruce was allowed to live is something that should be made clear, whatever the explanation, because it just seems odd that a mugger would leave a possible witness alive. But it could have been anything, even his simply being out of bullets.
edited 26th Dec '11 7:57:48 PM by Sijo
There was a great story from the early 80's, called "To Kill a Legend," in which the Phantom Stranger shows up to give Batman a chance to prevent the deaths of the Thomas and Martha Wayne of a parallel Earth (spoilers ahead!). The Stranger transports Batman and Robin there, and while preparing, the two discover that this parallel universe, while having plenty of war, crime, and corruption A. Has no Krypton (learned from star atlases, which show no sign of it's sun; not really proof of anything, as various versions of Superman's origin have Krypton blowing up centuries, if not millennia ago, and the vagaries of faster-than-light travel kept the infant Kal-El from aging until he came out of warp near Earth)) B. Has no record of masked heroes ever operating there, and C. Has no heroic literature or mythology to inspire heroes (sounds like a boring place). Bruce and Dick discuss the possibility that, without the murder as impetus, this world's Bruce Wayne (shown to be a spoiled brat) may never grow up to be the Batman it sorely needs. Batman, of course, doesn't care much and resolves to save the Waynes anyway, but Robin, looking like a scmuck here, harbors some doubts. Robin comes pretty close to letting them get shot, too, having arrived on the scene before Batman, but he ultimately decides that he can't let 'em die just before Batman swoops in to save the day. In the end, we are given to understand that this world's Bruce Wayne WILL grow up to be Batman, but a Batman inspired not by pain and tragedy, but by awe and gratitude. I always thought that was a neat slant on things.
I agree with Sijo's interpretation of things. If Batman's parents' deaths were the result of a conspiracy, he'd be more likely to target the conspiracy, rather than try to keep what happened to him from happening to anyone else. Anyone can be a victim of a mugging, but not anyone can be the target of a vast criminal conspiracy. Batman was never really, in my opinion, supposed to be about revenge, but about trying his best to keep others from his condition.
edited 24th Dec '11 11:50:16 PM by Gray64
Because of what it symbolizes for Gotham and the nature of Batman's mission, Joe Chill kind of has to be a random mugger, and it doesn't feel right to think of him as being part of this targeted conspiracy or personal emnity, because it turns the very foundation of Batman's origin from a tale of justice over crime to a very narrow tale of vendetta.
What's the difference between the Batman and the Huntress? What about their origins drove them differently - why did Helena need guidance from someone like Bruce before she did something she would regret?
Joe Chill, and the death of the Waynes, symbolizes the fall of "good" Gotham, the Gotham of Bruce's parents, to the Wretched Hive overrun with random crime and meaningless violence that Bruce tries so hard to right. It's kind of the point of his character - that's why he often isn't named in story at all, because he's just a nameless symptom of the world that created Batman. If he turns out to be an agent from some secret society it doesn't add anything to either his or Bruce's characters, rather it turns Bruce from a person driven by upholding a fallen ideal to a man who has been wronged and seeks specifically to right that one wrong - in short, an avenger rather than a guardian.
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Scott Snyder addressed the idea of a young Bruce Wayne actually investigated the conspiracy behind his parents' murder and failed. But this conspiracy is rearing is rearing its head again.
I'm adamant about the idea that the Wayne murders were part of a conspiracy because that's how evil the town of Gotham is. Snyder's run on Detective Comics was to make Gotham a character unto itself: a sort of malevolent force that permeates every aspect from the town: as if it were a Lovecraftian horror unto itself.
Now yes, random crime would be a symptom of the inherent evil within Gotham, but a more direct example would be if the town itself conspired to murder the Waynes thru a shadowy cabal of assassins, ergo the Court of Owls. Nature abhors a vacuum after all, and if the nature is evil, than what happens when an anomaly tries to inject some good within said nature?
edited 25th Dec '11 11:18:18 PM by EnglishMajor
With blood and rage of crimson red ripped from a corpse so freshly dead together with our hellish hate we'll burn you all that is your fateFrankly, though it would seem that DC often disagrees with me, I'd say the less we know about the character of Thomas and Martha Wayne, the better. Snippets here and there are ok, but I'd really rather not see stories built around what they were like. They were Bruce Wayne's parents, he (and Alfred) loved them, they loved him, and they were killed. That's all I really need or want to know about thm. It's the same, in my opinion, as Superman's Kryptonian parents, and Krypton in general; the less said about them, detail-wise, the better.

First, I'd like to start off with this link
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As any person who has a marginal interest in Comic Books can tell you, Bruce Wayne's parents are dead. How so? A mugger usually named Joe Chill shot down both parents in front of Bruce. Bruce was only a child when this happened, and he was left alive. The trauma of all this eventually caused him to become Batman.
I don't about the rest of you, but when I think about that story, well, the whole thing stinks from the start (i.e. doesn't make sense)! For starters, why would a mugger shoot two people and leave their child alive? Was it a mugging? Did Gotham City turn into the Crapsack World we all know and love/loathe as a result of their deaths, or had it always been that way?
One thing I am certain of is this: if I had a penny for every time this story got presented, changed, expanded on, and what have you, I would be a millionaire at the very least!
Oh, Equestria, we stand on guard for thee!