Warning: Spoilers for Batman Beyond: Neo-Gothic #5!
Terry McGinnis’ run as the Batman Beyond gets its own Karate Kid moment thanks to an overlooked training lesson from Bruce Wayne. Those familiar with the movie will remember that the protagonist is subjected to a “wax on, wax off” style of training. What Daniel mistook for basic chores turned out to be Mr. Miyagi’s means of teaching him how to concentrate during a fight — which proves useful for the student later on, just as Bruce’s strangest lessons prove useful to Terry.
Bruce goes through a similar training method with Terry that proves valuable in Batman Beyond: Neo-Gothic #5 by Collin Kelly, Jackson Lanzing, and Max Dunbar. Batman Beyond ends up reminiscing on what he thought was a useless botany lesson as he fights a mysterious enemy connected to the Green.
What he thought was useless at the time — a boring lesson that Terry “never thought would come in handy” — turns out to be incredibly useful as he takes on the Green, the metaphysical representation of plant life in the DC Universe.
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As they venture deeper into the layers beneath Old Gotham, Terry discovers that his companion Catboi has one tool Bruce Wayne never used…magic.
Batman Beyond Makes Use of an Old Botany Lesson from His Mentor
The series has seen Batman and his new sidekick — Kyle the Catboi, who is the former ward of John Constantine — go underground to search for missing children. In this issue, they finally make their way into a dark garden, the Green, where they are immediately plunged into a fight with Poison Ivy and Black Orchid. Using teamwork and Kyle’s magic skills, the two are able to successfully fend off the plant duo, but Batman and Kyle must still find the source of all this.
That is when Terry gets an idea. Suddenly, Bruce Wayne’s botany lessons come to his mind, something that he never thought would ever prove useful to him at any point in his superhero career. He remembers learning that, “every tree has a taproot, an absolute center.” He starts to attack the center of the tree when he’s confident that he has found the center. He hacks away at the tree until he finds the source of The Green: John Constantine in a new God-like form. Much like Mr. Miyagi from Karate Kid, all of Bruce Wayne’s lessons for Terry McGinnis mattered in some way — or would, at least eventually, prove to be useful.
Bruce Wayne’s Lessons Are All Important to Batman Beyond
It sounds like Bruce’s training was much like his meticulous levels of planning for missions: always be prepared for any and every obstacle. When he has villains like Poison Ivy in his rogues gallery, it makes perfect sense that he would want Terry to be prepared for anything plant-related. Now, those out-of-place botany lessons finally prove vital to Terry saving the day. Batman Beyond may not be as painstakingly overly prepared as his mentor once was, but the Miyagi-like training that Bruce put him through clearly prepared him well.
BATMAN BEYOND: NEO-GOTHIC #5 (2023) | |
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