From my article in The Sunday Times today:
“The Batman is a symbol of hope for a cartoonist who has given up on the ability or willingness of ordinary forces of law to fight on the side of justice and lock up the supervillains that plague us. Of course, we can draw cartoons and read them. But there is no Batman. There isn’t even a Commissioner Gordon. All we have are the inept, scaredy cops and the corrupt, compromised political bosses. And we have the supervillains who mock us with their self-indulgent publicity, their pathetic back stories, their audacious protestations of innocence and the loyalties they command from holding a city in their thrall.”