What is Bane’s History?
I saw the new Batman movie and it did not go into Bane’s history. How did he get messed up and need to wear that mask? Did Batman do it to him like he did to the Joker? Is Batman making as many bad guys as he is stopping?
Randy s.
Hi Randy,
There are a number of discrepancies between the back story of Bane in the Batman movie The Dark Night Rises versus the earlier Batman comic book history. Both versions allude to Bane having broken out of an inhuman prison. The movie says the location of the prison was the middle east and that Bane had been there as an adult whereas the comics say the prison was on an island off South America where he was imprisoned as a child to serve the life sentence that was due Bane’s father. In both instances the imprisonment was both unjust and brutal.
The movie doesn’t explain Bane’s extraordinary abilities, but his history in the comic books indicate that he learned to become an aggressor as a child just to survive in the prison and that the warden of that prison used him as a human guinea pig to test a drug called Venom. Bane came close to death when given Venom but unlike the earlier human test subjects he survived and when he recovered he ended up with the powers he now possesses. His body remains racked with pain and he must have a dose of Venom every 12 hours to keep from being incapacitated. It seems in the movie he has handled this problem by wearing a mask that has him inhaling either Venom or some type of pain killer that makes it possible for him to carry on.
Bane is bitter and has no moral compass. He does have feelings and fears though he covers them pretty well. One fear that pursued Bane since childhood is of being relentlessly pursued by a demonic bat. He apparently has decided that bat is really Batman and that he must destroy Batman if he is to know any sort of peace. This, in addition to Batman standing for law and order is the cause of him seeking to destroy the Dark Knight. So the injury done to him by Batman is imaginary.
It’s In The Bag,
Sara Bellum, Editor-at-Large Buzzy Mag
