shaxper
CCF Site Custodian
Posts: 22,424
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Post by shaxper on Apr 27, 2016 2:10:03 GMT -5
I was rewatching Batman Begins last night, a version of Batman that depends heavily on Bruce having a corporation left to him that provides him with the necessary resources to be Batman. It makes total sense of course, except for the fact that Thomas Wayne was a doctor. I assume that later writers have gone on to explain how Wayne could be a doctor and create a multi-national corporation at the same time, but I'm curious as to when the idea of a Wayne Enterprises first entered the Batman mythos. I know the 1960s television series referred to a Wayne Foundation, which was pretty much just a charitable organization, and by the time of Batman #217, the Wayne Foundation appears to be the multi-national corporation we know today, but am I missing any earlier steps in that evolution? Also, interestingly enough, Wikipedia believes Wayne Enterprises was first introduced in Batman #307. Maybe that's when the new name was coined, but the earlier Frank Robbins/Denny O'Neil Batman run seemed to depict the Wayne Foundation as performing essentially the same role. Or am I mistaken? |
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Post by foxley on Apr 27, 2016 2:49:25 GMT -5
The Wayne Foundation is a different entity and has an longer history in comics. When Alfred was killed off in Detective Comics #328 (June 1964), Bruce Wayne establishes a philanthropic foundation called The Alfred Foundation to honour him. When Alfred is returned to life in Detective Comics #356 - having been transformed into the villainous Outsider - Bruce renames The Alfred Foundation to The Wayne Foundation in honour his parents. However, the focus of the Foundation was always phianthropic works.
As far as I can tell, Wayne Enterprises was created to explain the source of Bruce Wayne's wealth. However, this was just a consolidation of earlier stories that established Bruce as being an owner/director/chief shareholder in quite a number of different companies (Wayne Motors is one that I can recall). Wayne Enterprises became the umbrella corporation that controlled all of these smaller companies.
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Post by tolworthy on Apr 27, 2016 5:48:38 GMT -5
I was rewatching Batman Begins last night, a version of Batman that depends heavily on Bruce having a corporation left to him that provides him with the necessary resources to be Batman. It makes total sense of course, except for the fact that Thomas Wayne was a doctor. That explains everything. Thomas Wayne could have grown insanely rich by creating America's dysfunctional opaque medical system. Vast sums of money could easily be siphoned off. That explains why somebody would hire a petty hood to kill the Waynes. It also explains why Bruce would think of a bat - symbol of sucking life blood from people. And why medical insanity and byzantine secrecy plays such a large part in his life. When Alfred was killed off in Detective Comics #328 (June 1964), Bruce Wayne establishes a philanthropic foundation called The Alfred Foundation to honour him. When Alfred is returned to life in Detective Comics #356 - having been transformed into the villainous Outsider - Bruce renames The Alfred Foundation to The Wayne Foundation in honour his parents. Classic money laundering. Place your vast wealth in the name of somebody who is above suspicion, then quietly take control of it again some years later. Just speculating of course. I've just been reading about how Britain's NHS is being dismantled. So I am not feeling very charitable toward extremely wealthy doctors with links to the underworld. |
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Post by Randle-El on Apr 27, 2016 13:21:23 GMT -5
As far as Thomas Wayne being a doctor -- I had always assumed that in the films, Wayne Enterprises wasn't necessarily founded by him, and thus didn't need to reflect his medical expertise. It might have been Bruce's grandfather or some other relative, and that Thomas Wayne was simply the latest Wayne that retained controlling interest in the company. That's why in the movie he says that he still works as a doctor and leaves the day-to-day running of the company to others.
The other way to explain it might be that Thomas Wayne founded a biomedical technology company that later diversified into other technology areas that later enabled Lucius Fox to do R&D on the stuff that Batman later used. It would also explain why Fox happened to have enough biological/pharmaceutical knowledge to analyze and develop an antidote to the Scarecrow toxin.
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Post by Red Oak Kid on Apr 27, 2016 13:46:35 GMT -5
I don't know how far back we are going, but in the very very early Batman stories, Bruce Wayne was a playboy. I don't think I ever spent much time wondering where he got the money to be a playboy. And I had just assumed Bruce had inherited Wayne Manor from his parents. But a late 50s Batman story I read recently shows Bruce buying the mansion when he was an adult. At the time he did not know about the Batcave beneath it. He was going to use an old barn on the property to house the Batmobile.
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Post by thwhtguardian on Apr 27, 2016 15:19:02 GMT -5
I don't think we're necessarily meant to think Wayne Enterprises was meant to have been started by Thomas Wayne, I mean back in the 40's that probably would have to have been the understanding as that was the era when the mega-corporations were born but now a days there is room for several generations of Waynes who could have built Wayne Enterprises.
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