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DC Next presents:

GOTHAM KNIGHTS

In The Best Medicine
Issue Nineteen: Tragedy Plus Time
Story by AdamantAce
Written by AdamantAce & PatrollinTheMojavet
Edited by Dwright5252 & JPM11S
 
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Content Warning: Attempted Suicide
 
 
My name is Lonnie Machin. I am writing this of my own free will without coercion and all of this is the truth to the best of my memory.
I was born in Gotham December 1, 1992, in the East End to Melinda Machin. My dad wasn’t really in the picture. My mother worked at Ace Chemicals to provide for us, send me to school, put clothes on my back. We lived in a run-down apartment not far from there. The landlord wasn’t a good man. I was young, so I don’t remember a lot about him, but he was angry whenever he visited. Plus looking back, I’m not sure where our utility payments were going. Visit the East End today and you’ll see the place hasn’t changed. There’s actually more scumbag landlords extorting dirt-poor residents than there was before.
Sorry, I’m getting off topic. Like I was saying, the building wasn’t maintained. Garbage piled up by the emergency exit, the water was a muddy brown color. You get the idea. We stayed because the alternative was living on the street.
I remember I was in school, first grade, it was a Tuesday when we found out. If anyone here remembers the East End Fire back in ‘03 - it burned down two blocks, mainly residential. It started in my building. The electrical short-circuited in the walls. It started a fire. Mom would’ve just been coming home from a night shift at the plant, so she was probably asleep at the time.
An investigation found that the building hadn’t been inspected in over a decade and a court ruled the owners guilty of criminal negligence. I was placed into the care of a distant uncle who happened to live in the city and his wife; Michael and Roxanne Machin. The settlement contained an amount I cannot disclose, but no amount would have been enough to make up for the death of my mother, nor the tremendous loss of life which the East End is yet to recover from. Still, it was just enough to pull me out of the local public school and enroll me in Gotham Academy.
I remembered feeling dirty - using my mother’s blood money to go to school. I benefited from her death. I’ve been told to look at it like a gift from her, but it always felt more like a bribe to me.
Gotham Academy, from a physical, emotional, mental, and academic perspective, was hell. I would like to say I was at the top of my class, but truthfully, I was slightly below average and had to work my ass off to stay there. My time in public school left me lagging behind the other kids. Between that and my being poor, I was bullied basically my entire time there. It wasn’t anything physical, mostly. My classmates preferred exclusion and gossip to direct confrontation, maybe because of the stories they were fed about the feral kids at the public schools across the river.
I was sixteen when the bullying came to a head. A group of boys decided it would be funny to play a prank on me and hide pot - marijuana - in my locker at school, then report me for it. The police got involved. I was escorted out of my classroom by an armed officer of the law. I was instantly suspended and spent an unforgettable night in juvie. I was charged with possession of an illegal substance with intent to distribute, although received probation and community service before a judge.
Returning to school was the hard part. Word had gotten around campus and parents were concerned about their children mixing with, and I quote, my ‘kind’. I pleaded my case in front of the principal who was certain I was guilty. I feigned repentance, I promised to do anything to stay at the school. I knew that if I got kicked out, I’d be right back where I was and my mother’s death would’ve been for nothing at all. The principal let me stay, but I was walking a tightrope after that.
I tried to confront the kid that did it after school. That was the first time I was in anything resembling a fight. I stopped him after school to extract my pound of flesh, figuratively, of course. I was pissed. I knew most of the kids there were scared of me. So there I was, going on some long monologue in front of him, threatening him basically, when he punches me in the stomach. Before I could retaliate, he told me his dad was on the school board and with me on my final warning, he could get me expelled like-- And then he snapped his fingers.
So I swallowed my pain, bided my time, and eventually graduated from Gotham Academy. Go Knights.
 
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Slam!
The door crashed to the ground, knocked off its hinges, and the clowns surged in. Having joined the new Joker’s movement, a dozen protestors broke into the run-down apartment looking to find where the GCPD were hiding the dirty child abuser Sebastian Hady, city comptroller and surviving mayoral candidate. But, as the clown-masked insurgents swept through the safehouse, it became quickly clear that the police had been tipped off to their arrival with time to spare. The place was empty.
Dick Grayson raced along the streets of Gotham City, across the Finger River and through Somerset. He was one part of a convoy escorting Comptroller Hady to a second location after a tip that the first safehouse had been compromised. Ahead of him was the black, unmarked police truck driven by Detective Harper, with Hady and Bullock in the back. Though it wasn’t the truck ahead that had Dick’s attention. Instead, Dick’s attention was pulled to the streets. After Jim’s lockdown, few vehicles were on the roads, a rare sight for Gotham. But what did pack the streets were protestors.
Navigating Gotham’s twists and bends was difficult enough on a regular night, but now along every other road marched dozens upon dozens upon dozens of people, packed tightly together, blocking what little traffic there was as they waved placards and chanted.
“Fuck the Waynes!” “Feed the poor!” “Eat the rich!”
“We are not a joke! We are not a joke!”
To Dick, it was inspiring to see the people of Gotham rise up and peacefully demand that their rights be respected, that they get what they deserved. But it was also hard to forget that the ones they held most at fault was his own family. Not only that, as the convoy crept and circled along the blocked streets, it quickly became clear that not everyone was so peaceful. The new Joker’s words empowered the disenfranchised, poor, and otherwise vulnerable to rise up and demand respect, but his and Harley’s actions and iconography, along with their direct call to action had also sparked a flame that was sweeping through the city. Whether it was rioters going too far to send a message, or the many opportunists of Gotham crawling out of the woodwork to loot and destroy among the existing chaos, widespread crime had engulfed the city, drowning out the more silent majority of peaceful protestors. Not that it was overwhelmingly easy to tell the difference, as many from both camps hid behind clown masks or white face paint. As such, as Dick drove through the streets, he saw several police cars race by - sirens on - and armoured-up officers on foot clubbing clowns. But of which colour? A shiver went down Dick’s spine as he recalled a vision of another Gotham City - one that was darker, and ruled by tyrants hiding under the guise of the GCPD *. Was this how it began?
As the convoy took a turn down Palance Street, Dick’s phone rang over the car’s sound system. He punched the answer key on his dashboard and refastened his concealed earpiece. “Alfred?”
“Master Dick!” The gentlemanly Alfred Beagle called down the phone. It was already immediately clear he was in a panic. “You must get back to the manor at once! A mob of men and women in clown masks have broken in and are searching room-to-room!”
Dick’s eyes shot open. “Is Stephanie safe? Where are you?”
“She is with me,” Alfred explained. “I’ve barricaded us in Miss Kyle’s old room. It hasn’t seen use for many years, but it’s deep enough into the East Wing that it should take those clowns a good while to find us. But you must hurry!”
“I’m on my way, Alfred.”
Dick pumped his breaks and took a harsh U-turn, barrelling up Lester Street to cut as fast as he could back to the outskirts of Gotham, racing to Wayne Manor and abandoning the police convoy.
 
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By the time I graduated, I’d caught up with my peers enough to get a spot at Gotham University. My “Rising from Adversity” essay caught the eye of the Head of Admissions and I was guaranteed a full scholarship studying Social Work with a minor in Sociology.
As a freshman, I managed to land a spot in a research study with then-Professor Sam Young. We connected immediately. I found out that he’d grown up just two blocks from my old apartment in the East End and worked his way to his position from poverty. Even after the study ended, we would spend hours sitting in the campus coffee shop, talking about politics. We talked about history, about policies, candidates. We had a conversation about the corruption in Santa Prisca’s fascist regime, mass poverty, and incarceration rate which ultimately became the basis for my thesis.
I collected data, conducted peer-reviewed research, and wrote pages upon pages of a plan meant to improve the living conditions of the poorest and most vulnerable of Gotham City. I don’t remember exactly, but there were no fewer than thirty pages of charts detailing where I’d get the funds from. Little discretionary funds I’d found inspecting City Hall’s budget that wouldn’t be missed put to use elsewhere. I wanted to set up offices in poor neighborhoods that would teach people in poverty valuable skills, then put them to work in office jobs. Funds were set aside for a safety net just in case someone started backsliding into their old habit or if disaster struck, as it often did for Gotham’s vulnerable.
I showed it to Professor Young and he was blown away. He promised to get me in touch with the right people and my heart soared. That’s why I was so worried when a few days later he stopped replying to my emails. I went to his house, but found out he moved. I thought maybe someone had him disappeared. Either City Hall or one of the big CEOs who benefited from maintaining the status quo. I didn’t show my research to anyone else after that - I was worried I might be next.
Turns out I was wrong. Sam Young appeared on television a week or so later as the nationwide director of the Wayne Foundation. I saw Bruce Wayne on television commend him for his brilliant insight into poverty. Young had stolen my ideas, my thesis and was being bankrolled by Wayne Enterprises to introduce them nationwide.
I decided to confront him - and if you’re sensing a pattern here, good for you. I showed up at the Wayne Foundation Gala, crashed it technically, and called him out on it. I told him that my ideas were meant for the government, not to be co-opted by Bruce Wayne. You know what he told me? He said, “There’s a lot of money in charity.”
I think I remember the headline that night being ‘Professor Young attacked by deranged former student at Charity Gala.’
 
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In the haunted husk of Ma Gunn’s School for Boys, Jason Todd paced back and forth, having retreated here following Harley Quinn’s escape. It had been only a day since his whole life had been turned upside down, since some of his earliest trauma had been drudged up and entirely redefined. Sat on a pile of debris opposite him was Alice, his older sister. She had been dead for nine long years, along with their mother and father, claimed by the fire. Except she hadn’t. Having reappeared out of the blue, she had told him she was plucked from the fire by the Black Glove, the devil-worshipping cult their parents belonged to, and who had lit that very same fire to engineer an orphan to be adopted by Batman, but that Bruce had saved the wrong kid from the fire. So, because Bruce found Jason first, Alice was reclaimed by the cult and forced to be their assassin, wielding magical guns that killed anyone that deserved it.
It was all, frankly, ridiculous, but Alice was there right in front of Jason. And, even if she had avoided him all these years, and even if she was being pursued by powerful dark actors, Jason was overjoyed to have her sister back. But that didn’t mean the rest of his problems had vanished overnight.
“I don’t get it,” he huffed. “People are coming out in droves to support this fake Joker. As if their memories are that short!”
“He’s saying what they want to hear,” Alice replied plainly. She had been listening to him go for quite some time after he had rushed to get back to her following his failed mission. “People are fickle. And if they’re desperate enough, they’ll follow anyone promising change.”
“He’s calling himself the Joker! Wearing his colours, with Harley Quinn on his arm!” Jason exclaimed. “The things the Joker’s done… the people he’s hurt, or killed, or…” The second Robin recalled back to some years ago, in Bosnia, where he narrowly avoided a gruesome, sticky end at the hands of the Joker, the real one. That night, Jason had seen the Jester of Genocide as he truly was, beneath the glamour and the verbosity. A satanic figure, barely human. “No-one calling himself that name could possibly be out to help anyone, including himself.”
Alice shook her head. She had been outside of the Gotham sphere for long enough to see the Joker as most of the world did, from a distance. She hadn’t witnessed his atrocities first hand, nor had she seen the destruction he had wrought, but even thinking about him made her guns yearn for his life. Still, it was clear her brother was too far in his own head. “Look,” she stood and walked towards him. “As far as what they’re all feeling, Batman abandoned Gotham. The Waynes retreated to hide, lie, and tend to their own interests, and in doing so let a city dependent on industry that they managed to fall to fear. The elite that they depend on keep making selfish decisions without regard for their welfare. The Joker is an icon of chaos, of anti-authoritarianism. Nobody knows what he stood for, but everything he did spat in the face of the status quo that is oppressing these people. And, right now, the public would sooner follow a new Joker’s promises than be stuck under the elite’s thumb.”
“We weren’t looking after our own interests!” Jason scoffed. “If we lost the company, we wouldn’t be able to afford the gear we use to protect the city!” He leaned against the decrepit wall. “And Joker isn’t a hero. The old one or the fake. They can flock to him all they like, but he’s only going to destroy this city. Rule of law exists for a reason.”
“Is that why a vigilante had to swoop in to save Gotham from the mob all those years ago, outside of the law?” Alice challenged him, despite knowing she would get nowhere.
“Batman worked with the police as soon as they got on side!” Jason exclaimed.
“Well the rule of law is hurting people, Jason,” Alice persisted. “And you all lurk in the shadows, protecting industrialists, stopping desperate robbers, and locking sick people away. You rule with fear, and people don’t like being scared.”
“Gotham doesn’t know what it needs,” Jason shook his head, clearly not listening.
Alice sighed. She had hoped she could still convince him to leave this godforsaken city with her, but now she knew that wouldn’t be the case. Sadly, she replied, “So what does it need?
 
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Dick barrelled across the Trigate Bridge, away from the Burnley island and into the hills of Bristol Township, flashing his badge to pass through the quickly erected police checkpoint. His silver Porsche couldn’t move fast enough as he raced along the inner waterfront, climbing Dozier Hill and approaching the front of the manor. And as he did, Dick saw more and more people in clown masks marching up the hill towards Wayne Manor. As he approached the outer gate, he found the mansion surrounded by rioters spewing hatred and fire. The gate had been knocked clean open, and while many had pushed in, a large proportion opted to stay out front, preferring to be seen and heard than to cause needless destruction.
A minute before arrival, Dick’s phone blared.
“Grayson!?” spat the voice of Harvey Bullock. “Where the hell are you!?”
“Family emergency, Harvey!” Dick replied quickly, hanging up.
Instantly, he pressed his communicator and got in contact with the family on the secure line.
“Robin! Huntress! Regroup at the cave ASAP.”
Dick cut the line and brought the car to a screeching halt. He leapt out and sprinted towards the mansion, and while he was recognised instantly by the mob, he didn’t care. A dozen clowns leapt on his sports car, rallying against its doors and windows, destroying it. A similar number ran towards the detective, but he was faster and more agile than any of them, especially when he was determined. Then, as Dick burst through the front doors and into the foyer, he found absolute chaos.
The portraits were torn, busts smashed, the windows and glassware alike shattered across the floor. Piles of wooden doors, ripped canvases and torn curtains were strewn about the floor, set alight. Similar fires raged all about as far as Dick could see, with black smoke pouring through each doorway. The very air was red, polluted by the smoke and fire. The manor was like Dick had never seen it, a horror to behold. Two dozen men in clown masks and colourful face paint turned to face him. Some were still clutching placards, the most carried baseballs, tire irons and strips of metal. They all froze and then dispersed, allowing their leader to emerge from within their numbers.
Joker.
“Oh, look everyone!” The new Joker grinned and gestured towards Dick. In one hand he held a silver handgun, and in the other a jerry can of gasoline. “A cop!”
At the impostor’s ushering, the clowns dived toward Dick. First came close and Dick threw his torso back, ducking under the swipe of his baseball bat by a large margin. He then pivoted round, moving up and striking out at the next two in a fluid motion. An elbow to one’s throat, the back of a fist to the next’s nose. He heard a crunch and a twang as a tire iron came crashing down against his back, and - winded - Dick held his breath, pushing through. He dived forward, bouncing off of the ground into a front handspring, bounding over another attacked and driving his elbow into their back as he brought his front half over, landing. Sure, he was a cop, but he was also a master gymnast. And when it was 1 v 20, you needed to move quickly.
As two more rushed him, Dick employed some capoeira, taking a low stance and beating away a swing with a kick, diverting it to hit the clown’s friend and then switching balance to strike the clown in the side of the head with his other foot. Then, it was time for some Wushu, leaping up and striking the clown advancing from behind with a butterfly kick. A second’s breath later, Dick swept to the ground, plucking off of it the discarded baseball bat of a fallen clown. He gripped it tightly, pulled inwards and then flung his arm out, raking it across three more clowns. Another bat beat against his shoulder, so Dick moved his grip and drove the metal-plated knob at the base of the bat into the ribs of the cheeky assailant. But, in doing so, Dick left himself open. For as quick as he was, he was outnumbered and emotionally compromised. As the enemy behind him fell to the ground winded, four more clowns moved in. The first kicked him squarely in the gut. The next two grabbed him by the arms and pulled them back, attempting to restrain him. Dick tried to thrash, to overpower them, but the fourth swung back and struck him in the ribs with a swing. Dick’s body went limp, and he fell to the floor, only held up by the clowns taking him tightly by the arms. He had lost.
Dick struggled and strained in agonising pain, forcing himself to look up at what was happening. Before him stood Joker, who had forced his followers aside to get a closer look at the cop. It also meant Dick got a much better look at the clown. He was younger than Dick initially thought. The real Joker was ageless, with twisted, wrinkled skin, jaundiced eyes, and a long-stretching career of carnage, but the vigour and energy of a man in his prime. This Joker on the other hand was clearly not much older than Dick, a man who looked - beneath the haphazardly dyed hair and messy chalked face - like a normal man. Like any man off of the street in a halloween costume. That was the true terror. The Joker’s identity had always been an enigma, but it never mattered who he was. He was just the Joker. But this Joker? It mattered who he was, because he was everyone and anyone.
“I don’t get you, Dick Grayson,” the clown got up in Dick’s face, slapping his lips as he spoke. “Why do you do the things you do? It’s like… I’m missing one piece of the puzzle, the one piece that makes it all make sense.”
Dick spat, his brow furrowed. “The real Joker wouldn’t waste time trying to make sense of anything.”
Joker stood up from his squat and moved back. Dick tried to pull himself free but the clowns only tightened their grip. Their leader took a deep breath and then shrugged. “I suppose you’re right.” Rapidly, Joker turned and leveled his handgun, training it at the helpless detective. “Is this spontaneous enough for you?”
Beat.
“The GCPD has failed Gotham. You all truly don’t get it,” he shook his head. “The people finally rise up and refuse to be oppressed by the tyrannous elite, refuse to submit to the manufactured safety of the police and the Bats. And what do you do?” He took a step forward. “You double down. You come down on us like a ton of bricks, shove your boots back in our faces, and oppress us a bit harder for extra measure instead of actually listening. And then you wonder why we had to get violent!”
“I’m listening now,” Dick replied.
“No. No, you aren’t, Dick Grayson.” He took another step forward, his gun still raised. “You’re just biding your time so you can escape and go find the rest of your pig family before we do.”
Dick spat. “Then kill me,” he said. “You brought that gun. Use it.”
Joker broke out into a splutter, a hearty laugh to himself. “I’m not going to kill you!” he exclaimed. “I’m not letting you be a martyr. You need to live to tell the tale!”
Dick said nothing. He looked past the villain, seeing the flames rapidly beginning to grow out of control, enveloping the space around them.
“And you’re so perfect!” Joker clenched his off-hand into a fist. “Born in dire straits - to a Romani circus performer, no less - and adopted by the billionaire monarch of the city. A class traitor, a race traitor. Bourgeoisie, and now even a pig to boot. The perfect paragon of the true evils of Gotham all rolled into one: A privileged, wealthy American protecting the interests of other privileged, wealthy Americans. And now you’ll go down with the ship. People will see what happens to the wicked when they reap what they sew!”
Dick listened to his words, and as he watched the flames grow into an inferno, it became clear what he meant by ‘going down with the ship’. This man was no Joker at all, not an agent of thoughtless chaos. He was a laser-guided agent of social change, an anarchist obsessed with the bigger picture. And now the Waynes were set to lose everything.
“Harley’s already having your man Fox drain the Wayne bank accounts as we speak. Once she’s done, we’ll redistribute the wealth, and no-one in Gotham will go without again,” Joker grandstanded, the roaring of the flames having grown so loud that the clown had to shout to be heard. “You’ll be left with nothing. You can stop pretending to care about this city, and we can do some actual good for a change. Without your selfish motives.”
In that moment, Dick had an epiphany. He knew exactly who the clown before him was because he had encountered him before, years ago. But it didn’t matter, because a second later, the gas oven in the kitchen two rooms away went up, engulfing half of the foyer in a fireball.
 
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After I - a deranged man with a criminal record for drug abuse - viciously assaulted my former mentor in a public place, I was sentenced to six months in Blackgate Penitentiary. Six months. Six months in a hole for losing my temper against a man who would exploit the vulnerable for a profit. I spent those six months minding my own business, trying to stay alive in a prison populated by literal supervillains and their minions. But that wasn’t the worst part, for as awful as it was, it was over in six months.
When I was released, I was a changed man. Not because I was any different, but because, in my anger, I had seemingly confirmed every rumour passed around about me at school. I had proven them all right. I was a dirty criminal, not a scholar. After six months, I had my freedom, but my reputation was irreparably tarnished. No-one would hire me, despite my more than impressive qualifications. All my years of tireless study, all my research, my whole degree, it was worthless to them. The schooling that my mother’s blood money had afforded was for naught. She had truly died for nothing.
That kind of thinking was what brought me to the Trigate Bridge.
I’ll spare you more theatrics of my downward spiral, and the true depth of my self hatred. What matters is that I was there, ready to jump, with the traffic passing by giving not the slightest care. Nobody saw me until he did.
A gentle flutter. I turned from looking at the river below to look behind me. There was Robin - one of them at least - in his red tunic, his green tights and his yellow cape, looking ridiculous as ever, if not especially so having long since outgrown the look. He gave me the usual spiel: That I had so much to live for, that there was a better way. Nothing original. But one way or another, he got me talking. That’s one thing I remember often: Getting me to talk to him was effortless for him. So I told him everything, like I’m telling you, probably skipping a lot of important details. I told him how Professor Young stole my work and gave it to the fat cat playboy Bruce Wayne to make a profit nationwide. He sympathised, but he said something that truly infuriated me.
“Surely, helping the poor and the needy is a good thing, no matter his intentions?”
Intentions are everything, I assured him. What’s the point in a prosperous world if nobody is good? I don’t know why I expected him to understand. Batman and his Robins *protected the city - sure - but they didn’t make it any less terrible. They kept the criminals in their homes, scared, but they didn’t make them any less awful. Just like how men like Bruce Wayne kept the poor safe, and arguably well fed, but they never gave them the means to rise up and compete with them. Not if that risked them being toppled.*
Robin told me that everyone hides things, that we can’t always glean people’s exact intentions just on what we see. He said some people may seem awfully cruel, but are good on the inside. But, to that, I asked: What am I meant to think of someone other than what they choose to show me? I told him what I have always known to be true: Any small amount of real goodness out there is and always has been swiftly trampled on by everyone else. The universe isn’t fair and never will be.
God, I got so enraptured in the debate, I almost forgot I was here to kill myself. And the truth is - and I haven’t admitted this to anyone before - he convinced me. He had me so riled up that I didn’t want to do the world the favor of ridding them of me. The world had to suffer my stern words much as the former Boy Wonder. That was the plan until I lost my footing. It’s embarrassing. You make a plan to kill yourself, you stand on the edge for a good 15 minutes, and as soon as you decide to live, the wind knocks you over the edge. Seemed awfully par for the course.
So I fell. I plunged faster and faster towards the Gotham River, the shallow rocks welcoming me. For a moment, a wash of calm fell over me, until at the last minute I thought of everything I was yet to say. Every man and woman out there I had yet to give my piece to. At that moment, I had something to live for. Then I hit the water.
 
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When Dick came to, he found himself in the heart of a ferocious sea of flames. It was difficult to see through the smoke, and his every muscle still throbbed, but he had to keep moving. Lonnie Machin and his followers were gone, and now only the flames stood in his way. They had expected Dick to flee, to watch his adoptive father’s home come crumbling down from the outside and know the cost of his mistakes, but instead Dick delved deeper into the blaze, charging up the stairs, covering his sinuses with the inside of his jacket.
He fell down the East Wing, sprinting towards the room Alfred had referred to, the one that was once Selina’s, and as he moved Dick noticed something even more alarming. Even as he outran the flames, plastic explosives were littered along the halls, on walls and support beams. They didn’t just want to burn the manor down, they wanted to demolish it. Dick pushed further, his head beginning to spin from smoke inhalation, and before long he reached the final door of the East Wing. He pushed it open and fell in, the air pressure rapidly equilibrating from behind him to the room before him. There sat Stephanie Brown, scared witless, close to Alfred Beagle, who nearly fired a shotgun slug in Dick’s chest from the sudden start.
“We need to go!” Dick spluttered. His face was caked in soot and blood. Without thinking, Stephanie lunged forward and threw her arms around Dick, holding him tightly.
Alfred moved through the doorway and saw the explosives lining the hall and the flames in the far distance growing closer and closer. “By God, there’ll be nothing left!”
Dick grabbed Alfred by the arm as Steph moved away. “They’ve hit the manor at its key points. And no doubt the rioters are waiting outside. We need to bunker down.”
“You don’t mean…?” Alfred looked to Steph, who was none the wiser.
“It’s our only option,” Dick snatched a breath.
Alfred furrowed his brow, raised his shotgun and took the lead. Together, Alfred, Dick and Steph weaved down the servants’ staircase, taking the back way back around to the front of the house. And while Alfred nearly fainted at the sight of the foyer in ruins, he couldn’t stop.
They pushed into the lounge, which was - apart from the interior walls - mostly intact. Alfred moved over to the piano and laid his weapon across the top of the lid and held down as many keys as he could with his bony fingers. And though the piano made no sound - a piece of debris having taken it out of commission - the important mechanisms were still in place to prompt a section of the nearby bookshelves to recede and slide away, revealing the hidden staircase. Stephanie’s eyes went wide. Why hadn’t they gone to the panic room sooner? She had no idea what was in store for her.
Behind her, Dick ushered Steph along, with little time to spare, the flames hot on his back, and - with Alfred still at the head - the three disappearing down the stone steps, down to the Batcave below, the bookcase door sliding shut behind them with a resounding click.
 
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Believe it or not, I survived my nosedive off Trigate Bridge, the universe once again playing fast and loose with my trajectory. I landed in the hospital a broken man. My time in prison had driven away basically everyone I knew, but I got two visitors while I was in my full body cast and eating lunch through a straw.
The first was the wealthiest, gaudiest, most well-known playboy in the city. The late Bruce Wayne. He said a little birdie told him where Professor Young’s ideas were coming from. He said that Young was no longer attached to the Wayne Foundation and even offered me a spot on the team once I’d left the hospital.
What a moment that was. I had a few moments to think everything was right in the world. I’d just come off years - maybe a lifetime of bad luck. So to think it was starting to turn around, that perhaps karma was real, and the universe wasn’t just another oppressor - well it was great. Naturally, it only lasted a day or so.
My next guest, they said, was a psychologist. I figured she wanted to ask me important questions like ‘Why did you jump off that bridge?’. Imagine my surprise when Harley freaking Quinn visited me. Apparently she’d been watching me for a while at that point. That’s what she said anyway. I wasn’t in much of a position to force her out - and after she said she had information for me about my mom, I didn’t want to either.
She knew about the faulty wiring, but she showed me documentation of a building inspection. It pointed out everything that was wrong with the apartment and what would happen if it wasn’t fixed. I didn’t understand it at first. It would’ve been peanuts to get it fixed, not to mention that that document didn’t show up during the investigation. Harley said the fire was planned and pulled out more documents. It was an insurance claim they filed after the fire, worth a hundred times what was paid out in the settlement.
For a third time, I felt cheated. It was wrong. Worse than wrong it was repulsive, cruel, wicked, and unfair.
Harley looked at me and said it was a sick joke.
 
♦ ♦ 🦇 ♦ ♦
 
Stephanie Brown stood in the centre of the Batcave, dumbfounded. Everywhere she looked was a wonder, be it the array of Batmobiles, the towering penny, or the giant animatronic dinosaur. But no single sight rivalled the impact of the underlying truth. One - that Bruce Wayne was Batman, and her new adoptive family were his sidekicks, and - two - that she had been lied to.
And though she was angry, and though she had only narrowly escaped certain death either by burning alive or by killer clown, as Steph put the pieces together, everything suddenly made a lot more sense. That was why the family had defended Bruce Wayne so ardently. That was why they lied about his death. That was why it was so important to them to hoard Wayne’s assets: Batmobiles weren’t cheap. And finally, the most important thing clicked into place. She wasn’t adopted for good PR, nor was that the reason Wayne had taken in Dick Grayson and Jason Todd all those years ago. Grayson and his family weren’t looking for good press, they were protecting orphans like themselves, and… God.
Was she the new Robin!?
“Our sincerest apologies, Miss Stephanie,” Alfred hung his head in shame. “We wanted to give you a home, not… this.”
“So I’m not the new Robin!?” Steph exclaimed.
“What?” Dick looked to Alfred incredulously. “No, I--. I’m retired from leaping off buildings. I promised to help you as Dick Grayson, not as Robin… or anyone else.”
“So Bruce Wayne was Batman, and you’re Robin,” Steph relayed.
“I used to be.”
“Now you’re just a cop.”
Dick took a deep breath. He was used to this. “Cops can do a lot of good.”
“Cops are fighting a war on the streets,” Steph shook her head. “My streets. My dad died helping the cops. He needed more than ‘just a cop’.”
“I know,” Dick replied. “But I can’t be that.”
In the distance, the far off waterfall parted ways to open up the secret runway that trailed from the street to the cave. Along it raced a violet motorcycle that came to a prompt and screeching halt. Off of it dismounted the Huntress, in purple and black regalia. She turned to find the family, her face flush with worry having seen the manor up top, and then jumped again as she saw Steph.
Stephanie scoffed. “So I guess Jason’s Robin then,” she threw her hands up. “You all must have thought I was a real idiot, didn’t you?”
Alfred moved over to her after having discarded his torn and burnt tuxedo jacket and rolling up his ashen white sleeves. “Master Dick wanted to give you a safe home, Miss Stephanie. He didn’t want you wrapped up in this world.”
“Well,” Stephanie turned to Dick. “Great job. There’s only rioting clowns burning down my bedroom!”
Then, in came the Robin-Cycle. From it, Jason dismounted and tossed his helmet aside. His face was wrought with pain. But unlike Helena, he wasn’t worried. He was hurt.
“Great, we’re all here,” Dick began, raising his voice. “Things… are terrible. But I have a plan.”
Instantly, Jason cut him off. “I have my own plan.”
With haste, Jason reached over his shoulder and removed his torn canary yellow cape from around his neck, throwing it to the ground. He moved towards the armour situated beyond the Batcomputer and began replacing his gear, worn out from an especially harsh night.
“As far as Gotham cares, Batman abandoned them,” he began, echoing his recently-found sister’s words. He removed his red domino mask and placed it on a nearby table. “We ran away to look after ourselves and the company--” He unclipped his golden utility belt and hung it over a railing. “-- And the city that depended on us to keep them in check descended into chaos. There’s only one answer, and it’s obvious. It always has been.”
Stephanie looked to Dick, confused. “What’s he talking about?”
“The people of Gotham are a superstitious and cowardly lot. They’re dangerous because they’ve gotten too brave,” Jason resolved, looking to Dick with expectancy and finality. “And they need Batman to return.”
 
 
Next: Everything ends - Coming December 16th
 

Keep in mind that this is not some exhaustive, end-all be-all list of every reference. These are just the ones I, a random idiot, managed to spot.

• When selected, he turns around and pulls his cane out from the front of his pants, similarly to how he pulls out his really long pistol in Tim Burton's Batman movie.
  
• Forward 1 throws burning money, referencing him burning a huge pile of money in The Dark Knight (It's not about the money, it's about sending a message.)
  
• Batsy-Poo obviously pulls up a puppet of Batman, though this isn't the first video game where he uses a ventriloquist puppet: he also used The Ventriloquist's Scarface doll in Batman: Arkham Asylum.
  
• Birdboy Beatdown is a reference to his iconic murder of Jason Todd, the second Robin (Robin is often nick-named Birdboy). Joker beat him with a crowbar, then blew him up. This is why Joker uses a crowbar in every NRS appearance he's had.
  
• Dousing gasoline like in Getting Lit is just a thing he does, like the aforementioned money-burning, but also his victory animation in Injustice (also made by NRS).
  
• Hostage Hop has a dual reference to The Dark Knight: the hostages themselves are wearing paper bags with Joker's face on them, similarly to how he had hostages with clown masks to trick the police into thinking they were his own henchmen. The second is that he fiddles with the detonator like how he does when he blows up the hospital.
  
• I've seen some suggest that his Gun Down victory is a reference to his Fatality in Mortal Kombat vs DC Universe, but the BANG-flag gun has been a staple of his for a while. LEGO Batman the Video Game even has him pretend to commit suicide with one.
  

A whole bunch of references in the names of his attacks.

• Vaudeville Hook is a curved wooden pole used to pull performers offstage, commonly used in cartoons.
  
• Chuck Chapp Lyn might be a combined reference to Chuck Dixon (Batman writer) and Charlie Chaplin (who you should know who is).
  
• Fritz Trip/Slam is probably a reference to some other dancer, performer, etc. since Joker has several references to those already, and there's not really any major Fritzes in Batman that I could find.
  
• Astaire Step references famous dancer Fred Astaire.
  
• Jester of Genocide, Clown Prince (of Crime) and Harlequin of Hate are all common titles used for Joker (like how Batman is also The Dark Knight).
  
• One Bad Day is from a speech in THE defining Joker story: The Killing Joke. It's become a staple of his philosophy, that one bad day can turn an ordinary person into a raving lunatic.
  
• Super-Sanity is a term I believe Grant Morrison coined for the Joker to describe him as something beyond ordinary madmen.
  
• The Man Who Laughs is a 1928 silent movie about a man with a face disfigured into a permanent insane grin, and served as one of the inspirations for the Joker.
  
• Pale Moonlight is from a quote from the 1989 Batman movie: "Have you ever danced with the devil in the pale moonlight?"
  

I love The Road Warrior, it is without a doubt one of my favorite movies. Its seemingly simplistic action narrative (which actually VERY closely resembles the Hero’s Quest that Joseph Campbell used to talk about) drives a very engaging story about people struggling in the post-apocalypse.
I love the film’s primary antagonist, Lord Humongous. I love his design, I love his voice, and I like his incredibly-quotable dialogue.
But that got me thinking: The Road Warrior is seemingly straight-forward, there doesn’t seem to be too much ambiguity in the film. But if you do think about it, based on everything Lord Humongous says, there is reason enough to believe he isn’t evil, at least in the way that his men are evil. Is he simply the bad guy because he is the leader of men who are seemingly worse?
So this gets into my main question: Is Lord Humongous REALLY the bad guy of The Road Warrior?
First of all, be clear, his henchmen (or “dogs of war”) do horrible, terrible, evil things, which include but are not limited to: rape, murder, torture, killing dogs, etc.
But, in contrast, we never see Lord Humongous do anything particularly evil. He chases Max at the end of the movie and fires a gun at Max, both when he brings the oil tanker and during the climatic chase at the end, but that’s about it.
But take a look at his rhetoric in particular. It isn’t accusatory against the system, like Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, or promoting chaos, like the Joker does in The Dark Knight, or blaming a group for all of his people’s ills, like real-life dictators like Hitler or Stalin did.
Read these quotes from his famous monologue:

• “I’m gravely disappointed.”
  
• “Why? Because you’re selfish.”
  
• “You will not listen to reason.”
  
• “No more games! We are here for a purpose!”
  

That sounds more like a scolding parent than what we expect to be coming out of the mouth of an intimidating post-apocalyptic warlord. When he refers to their plan as “puny,” he sounds more like a middle-school bully than an adult.
After his mohawked “dog of war” goes berserk after the feral boy kills his partner with a boomerang, Humongous puts his “dog of war” in a chokehold, while whispering:

“Be still, my dog of war. I understand your pain. We all lost someone we loved.”

Other villains might have just shot and killed their underlings for being insubordinate, or overly emotional. (Just imagine Darth Vader Force-choking various admirals and Imperial officials in the Star Wars films, among other examples.) In many genre films, henchmen are disposable so long as the ultimate goal is complete, but not to Lord Humongous. Rather, Humongous’ response sounds downright comforting, paternal even, hinting that his relationship with his men is based at least somewhat on genuine affection.
And then he says:

“Fear is our ally. The gasoline shall be ours, then you shall your revenge.”

That sounds downright Machiavellian- “it is better to be feared than loved.” It is very easy to see that someone like Humongous could stay in power through his own manipulation, and for reasons I’ll lay out later, chooses to stay in power rather than have other, more chaotic forces take over.
Another point- how many times have you heard the villain in a big genre movie say something like this (and they’re being completely sincere?):

“We come with an offer!”

He begins his speech by saying this:

“There has been too much violence, too much pain.”

This sounds like a man, a warrior who is tired of having to fight, and would prefer the alternative option of diplomacy, or at the very least, the closest thing to diplomacy a post-apocalyptic world is likely to get.
He continues:

“None here are without sin.”

That might be my favorite line that Humongous says in the movie. It has resonance because not only is he probably talking about his men, but also the compound people. You could imagine that anyone, everyone who survived the collapse of civilization probably had to do some pretty reprehensible things in order to insure their own personal survival. When he says “none here are without sin,” it invokes Jesus Christ’s quote from the Bible of “Let he who is without sin throw the first stone,” and the idea that all everyone has, in some form, trespassed against someone else, and that thought probably has extra resonance after an apocalyptic event like the one depicted in the film.

“But I have an honorable compromise. Just walk away. Give me your pump, the oil, the gasoline, and the whole compound, and I’ll spare your lives… I will give you safe passage in the wasteland. Just walk away, and there will be an end to the horror.”

He is actually telling the compound people that he doesn’t want to kill them! He is offering them an alternative that, while being unfair to the compound people who probably worked hard to find and keep the oil, as well as subsequently refine it into gasoline fit for cars, prevents any sort of bloodshed.
While intimidating and while certainly THREATENING death and destruction, it is Lord Humongous, the LEADER, who seems to be most reluctant for a full battle with the people in the compound. Imagine this scenario, which I think does a lot to explain Humongous’ mindset and role in the grand scheme of things:
It’s easy to imagine that someone of the Humongous’ size and strength thrived when society collapsed. After a few successful fights and skirmishes, whether it be over food or water or oil, he might have had people who wanted to be with him, because he was a man who, just by brute force alone, could get the things necessary for survival. Soon, this group’s number became quite large, and Humongous grows fond of them. His disfigurement has probably alienated a lot of people, but his people make him feel powerful and respected, so he’s willing to turn a blind eye when they do something immoral, which is increasingly regularly. (Imagine a bunch of delinquent teenagers who didn’t have to answer to parents or school? Yeah, that’s what it’d be like.) But despite the gang’s size, Humongous is still at the center of this group, as shown onscreen in The Road Warrior. The gang is made up of a lot of really bad people, but maybe Humongous sees the possibility of positive change, the way a concerned parent might, if only they were forced to unite behind something or someone…
Every gang, particularly in a world where nation-states have collapsed, needs an identity and, perhaps more importantly, a purpose. What if Humongous realizes this, and he realizes that the closer they are to “civilization” or what civilization used to be, or the better he can provide for his people, the better lives they will all have. Remember, based on his rhetoric, this doesn’t sound like a man who loves the idea of violence. But he realizes that this gang of marauders, some of who can very easily be called psychopaths, murderers or rapists needs focus and a common goal everyone can work towards in order to save their lives and “cure” his henchmen. If Humongous chooses people and places to steal necessary goods from, there is the hope that eventually they can acquire enough of it to settle down, turn their backs on the violent life and actually evolve towards something resembling a thriving society. He could view himself as some sort of Robin Hood, taking from those who have and giving who those who don’t, in order to preserve his power and provide for this group he suddenly finds himself at the center of.
The ultimatum scene in The Road Warrior is him trying to be diplomatic. He puts on a good show to please his bloodthirsty men, which includes putting the captured scouts from the compound front and center, with his men torturing them and causing them to scream, and threatening the denizens of the compound, etc. But a guy that’s willing to LET EVERY ONE OF HIS “ENEMIES” LIVE isn’t a psychopath or genocidal madman. Rather, he wants them to survive because he, as the leader, knows what his underlings are capable of, and probably doesn’t want it to happen to the compound people. Imagine the compound people are one group of kids who have a toy, and the “dogs of war” are another group of kids. Imagine the “dogs of war” kids are getting mad at the kids who have the toy. Humongous more resembles the concerned adult who tells the kids who have the toy, “Look, I know what the other kids are capable of, maybe you should let them play with the toy for a while.”
He isn’t evil. He has attained a massive cult of personality (which may have partly been out of his control), but chose to stay in power through Machiavellian scare-tactics because it was better than having some clearly-psychopathic underling (like the Mohawked guy) take over. Even now, even though he wants what the compound has, he seemingly is against attacking the compound without provocation, preferring to do it only as a last measure to please his blood-thirsty henchman. He offers an alternative that, in his mind, is reasonable in that the compound’s denizens would not have to face the horrors he know the men under his command are capable of.
It’s showing rather than simply the Darwinian principles of the biggest and the strongest winning (which is what a simplistic reading of Humongous would focus on), in a world where civilization has been wiped clean, humanity still clings to its worst tendencies: following a cult of personality, trying to control the insane by commanding them towards a common goal, and turning a blind eye to immorality so long as it benefits in the long run. Remember, the country where this film was made, Australia, was a country originally founded as a penal colony, so the idea that people who have done wrong can still come together to form a viable society probably resonated with the film’s Australian screenwriters and director.
Lord Humongous is an intriguing villain not just because of his booming voice, or unusual accent, or metal mask or hulking figure, but at the lengths he is willing to go to prevent the bloodshed that seemingly would benefit his long term goals, his rhetoric, and his role as reluctant leader. Notice how he only acts when the entire gang seems threatened, like the final boss in a video game. This is a guy who, despite his strength, chooses not to be front and center in battle.
So, all of this leads me to conclude that Lord Humongous may not actually be the “bad guy” of The Road Warrior, but rather that he is the product of his own environment, ego, lust for power, and perhaps most likely of all, the post-apocalypse, fighting to survive and having more of a moral code than most, if not all, of his men.
TL;DR- Lord Humongous, by appearing diplomatic and at least somewhat caring about his men, bucks the image of the traditional villain in genre films. Because it is his men, not him directly, that are depicted as being immoral, he could be seen as the figure they are rallied around whether he wanted to be that role or not. He tries to unite these psychopathic post-apocalyptic marauders under a common cause in order to provide what they need (food, water, shelter, oil, etc.) as well as to rehabilitate them into something that can eventually become a fully thriving society.

Howdy! I posted this to /FanTheories, but I'm hoping to get some more film-analysis discussion by the good people here on /TrueFilm.
I love The Road Warrior, it is without a doubt one of my favorite movies. Its seemingly simplistic action narrative (which actually VERY closely resembles the Hero’s Quest that Joseph Campbell used to talk about) drives a very engaging story about people struggling in the post-apocalypse.
I love the film’s primary antagonist, Lord Humongous. I love his design, I love his voice, and I like his incredibly-quotable dialogue.
But that got me thinking: The Road Warrior is seemingly straight-forward, there doesn’t seem to be too much ambiguity in the film. But if you do think about it, based on everything Lord Humongous says, there is reason enough to believe he isn’t evil, at least in the way that his men are evil. His he simply the bad guy because he is the leader of men who are seemingly worse?
So this gets into my main question: Is Lord Humongous REALLY the bad guy of The Road Warrior?
First of all, be clear, his henchmen (or “dogs of war”) do horrible, terrible, evil things, which include but are not limited to: rape, murder, torture, killing dogs, etc.
But, in contrast, we never see Lord Humongous do anything particularly evil. He chases Max at the end of the movie and fires a gun at Max, both when he brings the oil tanker and during the climatic chase at the end, but that’s about it.
But take a look at his rhetoric in particular. It isn’t accusatory against the system, like Bane in The Dark Knight Rises, or promoting chaos, like the Joker does in The Dark Knight, or blaming a group for all of his people’s ills, like real-life dictators like Hitler or Stalin did.
Read these quotes from his famous monologue:

• “I’m gravely disappointed.”
  
• “Why? Because you’re selfish.”
  
• “You will not listen to reason.”
  
• “No more games! We are here for a purpose!”
  

That sounds more like a scolding parent than what we expect to be coming out of the mouth of an intimidating post-apocalyptic warlord. When he refers to their plan as “puny,” he sounds more like a middle-school bully than an adult.
After his mohawked “dog of war” goes berserk after the feral boy kills his partner with a boomerang, Humongous puts his “dog of war” in a chokehold, while whispering:

“Be still, my dog of war. I understand your pain. We all lost someone we loved.”

Other villains might have just shot and killed their underlings for being insubordinate, or overly emotional. (Just imagine Darth Vader Force-choking various admirals and Imperial officials in the Star Wars films, among other examples.) In many genre films, henchmen are disposable so long as the ultimate goal is complete, but not to Lord Humongous. Rather, Humongous’ response sounds downright comforting, paternal even, hinting that his relationship with his men is based at least somewhat on genuine affection.
And then he says:

“Fear is our ally. The gasoline shall be ours, then you shall your revenge.”

That sounds downright Machiavellian- “it is better to be feared than loved.” It is very easy to see that someone like Humongous could stay in power through his own manipulation, and for reasons I’ll lay out later, chooses to stay in power rather than have other, more chaotic forces take over.
Another point- how many times have you heard the villain in a big genre movie say something like this (and they’re being completely sincere?):

“We come with an offer!”

He begins his speech by saying this:

“There has been too much violence, too much pain.”

This sounds like a man, a warrior who is tired of having to fight, and would prefer the alternative option of diplomacy, or at the very least, the closest thing to diplomacy a post-apocalyptic world is likely to get.
He continues:

“None here are without sin.”

That might be my favorite line that Humongous says in the movie. It has resonance because not only is he probably talking about his men, but also the compound people. You could imagine that anyone, everyone who survived the collapse of civilization probably had to do some pretty reprehensible things in order to insure their own personal survival. When he says “none here are without sin,” it invokes Jesus Christ’s quote from the Bible of “Let he who is without sin throw the first stone,” and the idea that all everyone has, in some form, trespassed against someone else, and that thought probably has extra resonance after an apocalyptic event like the one depicted in the film.

“But I have an honorable compromise. Just walk away. Give me your pump, the oil, the gasoline, and the whole compound, and I’ll spare your lives… I will give you safe passage in the wasteland. Just walk away, and there will be an end to the horror.”

He is actually telling the compound people that he doesn’t want to kill them! He is offering them an alternative that, while being unfair to the compound people who probably worked hard to find and keep the oil, as well as subsequently refine it into gasoline fit for cars, prevents any sort of bloodshed.
While intimidating and while certainly THREATENING death and destruction, it is Lord Humongous, the LEADER, who seems to be most reluctant for a full battle with the people in the compound. Imagine this scenario, which I think does a lot to explain Humongous’ mindset and role in the grand scheme of things:
It’s easy to imagine that someone of the Humongous’ size and strength thrived when society collapsed. After a few successful fights and skirmishes, whether it be over food or water or oil, he might have had people who wanted to be with him, because he was a man who, just by brute force alone, could get the things necessary for survival. Soon, this group’s number became quite large, and Humongous grows fond of them. His disfigurement has probably alienated a lot of people, but his people make him feel powerful and respected, so he’s willing to turn a blind eye when they do something immoral, which is increasingly regularly. (Imagine a bunch of delinquent teenagers who didn’t have to answer to parents or school? Yeah, that’s what it’d be like.) But despite the gang’s size, Humongous is still at the center of this group, as shown onscreen in The Road Warrior. The gang is made up of a lot of really bad people, but maybe Humongous sees the possibility of positive change, the way a concerned parent might, if only they were forced to unite behind something or someone…
Every gang, particularly in a world where nation-states have collapsed, needs an identity and, perhaps more importantly, a purpose. What if Humongous realizes this, and he realizes that the closer they are to “civilization” or what civilization used to be, or the better he can provide for his people, the better lives they will all have. Remember, based on his rhetoric, this doesn’t sound like a man who loves the idea of violence. But he realizes that this gang of marauders, some of who can very easily be called psychopaths, murderers or rapists needs focus and a common goal everyone can work towards in order to save their lives and “cure” his henchmen. If Humongous chooses people and places to steal necessary goods from, there is the hope that eventually they can acquire enough of it to settle down, turn their backs on the violent life and actually evolve towards something resembling a thriving society. He could view himself as some sort of Robin Hood, taking from those who have and giving who those who don’t, in order to preserve his power and provide for this group he suddenly finds himself at the center of.
The ultimatum scene in The Road Warrior is him trying to be diplomatic. He puts on a good show to please his bloodthirsty men, which includes putting the captured scouts from the compound front and center, with his men torturing them and causing them to scream, and threatening the denizens of the compound, etc. But a guy that’s willing to LET EVERY ONE OF HIS “ENEMIES” LIVE isn’t a psychopath or genocidal madman. Rather, he wants them to survive because he, as the leader, knows what his underlings are capable of, and probably doesn’t want it to happen to the compound people. Imagine the compound people are one group of kids who have a toy, and the “dogs of war” are another group of kids. Imagine the “dogs of war” kids are getting mad at the kids who have the toy. Humongous more resembles the concerned adult who tells the kids who have the toy, “Look, I know what the other kids are capable of, maybe you should let them play with the toy for a while.”
He isn’t evil. He has attained a massive cult of personality (which may have partly been out of his control), but chose to stay in power through Machiavellian scare-tactics because it was better than having some clearly-psychopathic underling (like the Mohawked guy) take over. Even now, even though he wants what the compound has, he seemingly is against attacking the compound without provocation, preferring to do it only as a last measure to please his blood-thirsty henchman. He offers an alternative that, in his mind, is reasonable in that the compound’s denizens would not have to face the horrors he know the men under his command are capable of.
It’s showing rather than simply the Darwinian principles of the biggest and the strongest winning (which is what a simplistic reading of Humongous would focus on), in a world where civilization has been wiped clean, humanity still clings to its worst tendencies: following a cult of personality, trying to control the insane by commanding them towards a common goal, and turning a blind eye to immorality so long as it benefits in the long run. Remember, the country where this film was made, Australia, was a country originally founded as a penal colony, so the idea that people who have done wrong can still come together to form a viable society probably resonated with the film’s Australian screenwriters and director.
Lord Humongous is an intriguing villain not just because of his booming voice, or unusual accent, or metal mask or hulking figure, but at the lengths he is willing to go to prevent the bloodshed that seemingly would benefit his long term goals, his rhetoric, and his role as reluctant leader. Notice how he only acts when the entire gang seems threatened, like the final boss in a video game. This isn’t a guy who, despite his strength, chooses not to be front and center in battle.
So, all of this leads me to conclude that Lord Humongous may not actually be the “bad guy” of The Road Warrior, but rather that he is the product of his own environment, ego, lust for power, and perhaps most likely of all, the post-apocalypse, fighting to survive and having more of a moral code than most, if not all, of his men.
TL;DR- Lord Humongous, by appearing diplomatic and at least somewhat caring about his men, bucks the image of the tradition villain in genre films. Because it is his men, not him directly, that are depicted as being immoral, he could be seen as the figure they are rallied around whether he wanted to be that role or not. He tries to unite these psychopathic post-apocalyptic marauders under a common cause in order to provide what they need (food, water, shelter, oil, etc.) as well as to rehabilitate them into something that can eventually become a fully thriving society.