The bat cave--all it's cracked up to be?

As everyone knows, Batman, otherwise known as the Caped Crusader, has his very own cave, the Bat Cave, which is located beneath the stately Wayne Manor, home of his playboy alter ego Bruce Wayne, just outside of the perpetually troubled Gotham City. In the classic--or at least the "cool"--film Batman Begins, we learn that as a boy Bruce Wayne was traumatized by bats and used his superhero persona as a way of overcoming that and the even greater childhood tragedy of losing both his parents to violent crime.

(Below, Bruce Wayne and sidekick. NB: They are definitely not gay and there is nothing even remotely weird about them sleeping in the same bed. Or their clashing pajamas.)

The Bat Cave is full of technological gizmos and gadgets that range from the sublimely ridiculous “Bat Shark Repellant” that Robin whipped off his utility belt during an undersea adventure when “Superfriend” Aquaman was not available to use his sonar powers, to the rather nifty full-body armour that the Dark Knight sports during his myriad feats of derring-do and whatnot. There are many large computers and other items with blinking lights and bat costumes, and probably even a few actual bats. Or would be if Batman wasn't scared of them.

The Bat Cave also has cars—the Batmobile, of course, but all of the many iterations of it, some fancy sports cars that Bruce Wayne is tired of, and things like little Bat Tanks that need someplace to be while they’re not outside vanquishing foes or zooming up to Batman in his hour of need like a cross between Trigger, the faithful mount of Roy Rogers, and Kit, the self-aware car of Knight Rider. Plus any planes and gliders that Batman and Robin are using or working on also have a place in the BatCave. It is worthy of note here that Batman is cooler than David Hasselhoff and also that the Batmobiles are cooler than Kit.

Of course, the Bat Cave is a made up story and no one really believes it exists.

Except MightyIsis… and then, only a little.

Sometimes.

After a few beers, mostly.

And while watching the Superfriends,

or any Batman movies,

or reading about Batman…

or Spiderman, actually,

or any other character popular at the Comic Book Store,

and well…

Ok, MightyIsis is a bit silly about Batman.

Luckily, Batman is not the topic of today’s blog or things would begin to get a bit soppy at just about this point.

This past weekend, MightyIsis visited an actual “Bat Cave” at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM). It was a bit of a disappointment. The museum itself was marvelous, but the bat cave was not as good relative to its billing as the rest of the exhibits.

Of course, an obsession—well, let’s say a healthy interest—in Batman does not lend itself to realistic expectations of other Bat Caves. It rather places them at a disadvantage. But the bat cave literature—not to mention the helpful signs—indicated that this “new” bat cave was “bigger, better, and scarier than ever !” With bats…and animatronics.

So, as a lover both of bats and of animatronics, MightyIsis made haste away from a truly gorgeous exhibition of twentieth century African art to the bat cave, eagerly tamping down all thoughts of Batman Begins or “It’s a Small World” as she went. After all, why set up the ROM bat cave for failure? That would be unfair.

The bat cave had a lot of plastic bats on what appeared to be elastic strings…and some other more detailed plastic bats, and a lot of red lights. The cave walls were nice, and the bat cave sounds were realistic-sounding for a person who had never actually been in a bat cave.

But it was less good, certainly than the “Masters of the Night” exhibit that showed tons of real, live, actual bats and flying foxes. Which are pretty big. Or the World of Darkness at the Wildlife conservation society, or even the bat that got stuck in the hallway at MightyIsis’ last job.

Surely this is not the fault of anyone at the ROM. The children right in front of MightyIsis seemed to enjoy the bat cave very much, actually. Until they reached the end and wanted to know where the real bats were. Below: a bat--not the type at the ROM.

MightyIsis just went and looked at the totem poles. Admittedly, there are tons of bigger, nicer ones in the Field Museum in Chicago (they are left over from the World's Fair), but the ROM had some simply delightful classical music.

Images: Batman and Robin: This low-quality image which represents a single panel from a larger comic book work and is for illustrative purposes is in no way an infringement of the copyright holders' rights to the property, nor does it limit the copyright holders' ability to sell reprints of the entire work. All DC Comics characters and the distinctive likeness(es) thereof are Trademarks & Copyright © 1954 DC Comics, Inc. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Batcave: limited use of this copyrighted image in as an illustration directly pertaining to it is a fair use. It depicts a fictional subject (such as a character) that is copyrighted. It would be impossible to create a replacement image which would not be subject to the original author's copyright. The image is only used to illustrate the fictional subject. The purposes are not for profit and in no way reduce the value of the original or limit its use. characters and the distinctive likeness(es) thereof are Trademarks & Copyright © 2006 DC Comics, Inc. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.