I saw a thread on Twitter and Reddit asking whether characters like Batman, Iron Man, and Iron Fist actually need to be wealthy for their stories to work. Some people were saying that, in the DCU, Batman doesn’t have to be rich—he could just be middle class and the story would still work. Similarly, if the MCU gets rebooted, Tony Stark wouldn’t necessarily need to be wealthy and could be working class instead.
A lot of people argued that this would make these characters more relatable and easier to root for. Personally, I’d say no. Elseworlds stories are fine, but if you’re adapting these characters into movies or TV shows, you should stay at least somewhat comic-accurate. Their wealth is a key part of who they are.
Stark Industries, Wayne Enterprises, and Rand Industries are characters in the story too, and they play important roles in shaping these heroes and their worlds.
It’s similar to how Clark Kent being a reporter or Peter Parker struggling financially are essential to their characters. Those traits help define their stories.
What do you think?
For Tony Stark, being poor makes him more of a Peter Parker equivalent. Also, having a suit of high tech armor likely means he’s sourcing his components from some very wealthy companies anyway. I feel like owning the companies feels a lot more moral than stealing from them.
For Bruce Wayne, being poor makes him more equivalent to the Punisher. By himself, Batman has to be at odds in hiding his secret identity and, to some extent, getting lost in his alter ego. In the Justice League, Batman ends up being de facto leader a lot of times because that is because he is funding the organization and his leadership skills in Wayne Enterprises and up matching well for the Justice League.
That’s the fantasy of superheroes: that people with power can be guided by morality.
Depends on how much the story is built on them being rich. If Tony Stark weren’t rich, maybe the story would still work but it would be very different
Unless they are metahuman - probably, yes.
There are exceptions, like The Punisher, but he’s not really a “super” hero (at least, not in any of the media I’ve consumed, which is admittedly not very much). Heroes like this are great at saving the day, but its just not believable that they can save the world or the galaxy or the universe.
Iron Man without money is some dude in a garage who spends his lifetime building the arc reactor and the Mark I. By the time he’s gathered enough resources to build a Mark II, he’s already 60.
One of DCs currently running batman series called Absolute Batman is quite literally this. Bruce Wayne is born to a school teacher Thomas and a social worker Martha Wayne who are on their best day maybe middle class. His only advantages in this run are that he is still extremely intelligent and he is a 6 foot 8 behemoth. There are other differences that make this run of batman compelling but I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who may want to read it. The first issue covers most of the differences between this batmans universe and others. I’m quite enjoying it personally.
Apparently a bunch of y’all have never heard of Absolute Batman.
Batman has to be free from the need for a real job, plus be able to run the Batcave research infrastructure that developed the Batmobile, the Batplane, and all that. Plus keep Alfred on staff and in on the secret, plus stay with his backstory of Thomas and Martha Wayne being murdered. Wayne Enterprises came much later. Bruce Wayne’s original guise was being an idle playboy in Wayne Manor.
Spider-man isn’t rich. If you want a non-rich superhero, you might check him him out.
Or heck, I’m old enough to remember Reid Fleming, the World’s Toughest Milkman.
Depends on how accurately you want to stick to Batman. If all the gadgets and batcave are necessary then yes, he need to be rich. If it’s just the physical and mental capabilities then he doesn’t need to be rich because he’ll just be Rorschach.
I thought part of the legend was that his parents were killed but they had arranged for him to be cared for and educated, probably at a level that the average orphan can’t get anywhere near. Plus there’s all that physical training that he has to do all the time. Like in this story he (at one point) beats the crap out of Harry Potter even though Potter is an Auror with tons of magical combat tricks. I’m unfamiliar with Rorschach so can’t compare.
You should definitely read Watchmen, it’s fantastic
Stark and Wayne need to have the financial means to do their thing at that scale because they’re not magic. A mid level manager of a domino’s would be far less convincing in those roles. If you add magic to the mix, income becomes less relevant. The royal nepo god baby Thor could be dead poor as long as he had the hammer.
I’m not sure if the Equalizer franchise is based on a comic. That would be an argument for a more relatable living situation for a former super soldier who isn’t magic. He just enjoys working at a Lowe’s.
Batman: I could see a street level Batman without as many gadgets in a more rudimentary batcave still be Batman. I think this is because if you take away all of the wealth Batman is still Batman, an excellent detective with extensive martial arts training who enjoys terrorizing criminals.
Iron Fist: that’s a title, like Ghost Rider or Spawn there are other Iron Fists that are not rich. So while not exactly the same there are some Iron Fists that are not rich.
Iron Man: I don’t think Iron man without money would work. Either you would have to change a core detail of him or it wouldn’t make sense that he’s not rich. The main defining characteristic of Iron man is his suit, which requires an extraordinary power source. So either he doesn’t understand the power source (e.g. it’s an alien artifact) or you would have to explain why he doesn’t sell products with a similar power source and becomes rich.
The problem with Batman and him having extensive martial arts training is the fact that to have extensive martial arts training like that you have to be wealthy. To travel the world to do the sales to train and all the styles he did typically requires a certain level of comfort in order to afford the luxury of not only traveling but then spending enough time to master those things while at the same time feeding yourself and taking care of yourself. Not only that but the amount of gadgets he has is definitely high level. If he weren’t he’d be closer to like say Daredevil who lived a comfortable life but had nowhere near any money to do all the training he did. Daredevil fortunately has a superpower in his hearing and sense of sight through that. Iron fist was much the same way. Extensive martial arts training because he was rich enough to go get the extensive martial arts training. Ironman is definitely one that needs to have the money. I mean we have the example of iron heart who was not very rich had to rebuild everything and wall yes genius level had nowhere near the resources to build the many Mark versions of her suit and we can see how much struggle she’s had to even maintain the one she currently has. Which she did have to steal to be able to get in the first place.
If you made Bruce or Tony middle or lower-class people, you could still make an adventure out of that. It’s just that all of the heavy infrastructure would need to be completely rewritten. Skills and abilities would allow them to do amazing things, but they just wouldn’t have million-dollar tech at their disposal.
The character would be the same, but the story would have to take a very different path.
Would the characters be the same though? Isn’t Bruce Wayne being a billionaire playboy a big part of his personality?
Tony would be really cool. imagine if he had to rely on a community of people to built shitty-but-miraculously effective contraptions. And the focus would be on how he has to positively interact with people to allow him to be a guy who tinkers instead of getting a real job
Maybe Bruce too but his trauma is more of a barrier to social existence. It would take a way more creative writer to work out him working through his problems with anything other than money. Bet it would be cool though
Tony has amazing skills. He could make just about anything. I think there’s some story potential here.
Bruce would probably end up being a bum or a weirdo. If you like redemption arcs, the story of Bruce could be interesting.
Bruce Wayne broke just becomes Rorschach
Iron Man and Batman can only do what they do because they have the time and access to resources to do it. Guardian from Alpha Flight, for example would be something like “Working Class Ironman.” Common engineer who found out the mining suit he was building was going to be sold off to the military so he stole the prototype and became a superhero. He’s kind of an “Iron Man’s brain, Captain America’s heart” kind of character, so if you wanted the non-rich Iron Man, it exists, it’s just not Tony Stark. Tony needs to be rich or he’s not Tony Stark.
Same with Batman. The Shadow is a former soldier who uses stealth, martial arts and magic tricks to fight crime. But he’s not Bruce Wayne because being a billionaire playboy is what makes Batman possible.
Why recharacterize heroes with totally new backstories when the not-rich version is already a different superhero.
I say that for Batman and Tony Stark, their super power is their brain. They design these gadgets that turn their brain power into brawn power. It only makes sense that someone as smart and innovative as that could easily start up a successful tech company.
And I’m pretty sure the first iron Man suit was built without any access to money.
The first Ironman suit was built by taking components from (probably) multi-million dollar missiles, and many other comments provided by an overly rich asshole benefactor.
And that’s ignoring the ongoing costs of maintaining the suit, or R and D on new suits, nor the costs of liability and litigation when you fuck up and accidentally murder an innocent.
So no. It’s not even close to a possibility in any context where reality can’t just be dealt with through handwaivium.
Ironheart did it.
iron man , bruce wayne is your rich billionaire that is funding the other superheros.
gifted is somewhat reversed, the "rich person a mutant is funding a Mutant state for them to live in through the use of “terrorism”.
Batman rocking up on a black Toyota Camry… Gadgets in his belt bought on Amazon. No Alfred. No mansion. No true cave, but let’s say he calls his basement the bat cave. I mean regular people already call their basements “man-cave” so I guess this gets a pass. Oh he probably has a day job too. I don’t know. The plot could work, but it’d be very different.
Batman superpower is his resources. If he’s not rich, then how would you explain custom made rocket car in his cave garage?
lol imagine middle class Batman he has a… bat-lawnmower and a bat-dog? lol it could work I guess but he would be fundamentally different
Maybe he could have a bat?
Like… a bat-bat?
