 It’s too bad that they don’t do company crossovers anymore, because this one would be pretty much amazing. You can compare heroes from Marvel and DC all you want. Superman to Sentry, Winter Soldier to Red Hood, the list goes on. But here is one you may not think about immediately – Batman and Iron Man. How alike are they?
Let’s look at some similarities.
Both Bruce Wayne and Tony Stark were children of priveledge. Definitely not men of the people, they grew up as brats, filthy rich brats. As they grew into men their pockets grew as well. Wayne Tech and Stark Industries are giants in their respective universes. Developing weapons and chemicals but also giving hefty charity donations, they both have money to burn.
Both these guys are also members in the No Powers Club. Unless you call being super rich a power. Anyway, under the armor and cowl they are just everyday normal dudes. Sure, they are highly trained, wealthy, super intelligent, motivated dudes, but just dudes none the less. They never let it stop them, though. In fact, they can whoop most powered folks without breaking a sweat.
Then theres the whole orphan thing. They both lost their parents at a young age. Tony lost his in a less gruesome way in the form of a car crash, but it still sucked for them both equally. This led them to be self reliant and most of all motivated. Despite being pampered, these guys had to grow up and be their own men at a very young here.
To me, this is where relatively the same personality splits in two.
Tony is ever the optimist. It takes a lot to spoil his good time. He knows that there will always be a way to buy or punch his way out of anything, so he doesn’t sweat it. He generally keeps the same happy outlook on things when the going gets tough (this includes his boozed out days). He sees everything as a friendly challenge and greets it with a smile.
Meanwhile, Bruce is physically unable to look on the bright side of anything. Ever. His paranoia leads him to prepare for the worst in every situation, and keeps his heart more than chilled to not impair his judgement. His inner pain causes him close himself off, and never even considers the happiness of Bruce Wayne, thinking the success of Batman vastly more important.
What it comes down to is Tony took his parents’ death better than Bruce. Tony took it as a chance to make something of himself and honor their memory. Bruce dedicated his life to harboring his pain and letting it turn to anger to motivate his ends.
In the end, they could be the same person. But Tony got over it, Bruce never did. Both are just boys with their toys, but one is easy while to other is grumpy. But what if the roles were reversed. Could Tony Stark have been the calculating paranoid freak of Marvel while Bruce Wayne strapped on an armor suit and cut through Gotham’s darkness with a hope shaped blade? If this was still the early 90s, a crossover book would have answered all these questions. In the meantime we’ll just have dream of villain blasted, supermodel glazed Batman/Iron Man book.
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