In Batman’s long and storied career as the protector of Gotham City, The Dark Knight has saved more citizens than he can count. Whether it’s thwarting the newest evil scheme put into play by any number of the villains in his ever-growing rogues gallery or simply putting a stop to a petty crime down the street, Batman is a force of good in a city that needs more of it.
But Batman can’t save everyone, and although he tries his hardest to save others from experiencing the tragedy that made him who he is, there are some souls that simply slip through the cracks. In the case of Batgirl’s brother, James Gordon Jr., Batman very well might have been the catalyst that drove him into becoming a remorseless serial killer that has since become a consistent thorn in the Bat-Family’s side.
The event in question takes place in the iconic graphic novel, Batman: Year One by Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli, where a young James Gordon and Bruce Wayne are just starting out in their similar – yet vastly different in practice – crime-fighting careers. Doing his best to not partake in and condone the rampant corruption running through the Gotham City Police Department, Gordon constantly finds his back up against the wall as crime boss Carmine Falcone, Commissioner Gillian Loeb and his own partner, Detective Flass, push his moral and ethical boundaries in more ways than he can manage.
Having just been blessed with his first child, James Gordon Jr., Gordon has a lot on the line, especially now that a new vigilante named The Batman has started to stalk the streets of Gotham and is causing a ruckus in a way that is angering Falcone, the corrupt GCPD Commissioner and other powerful figures throughout the city. Inadvertently painting a crosshair on Gordon’s back as he is eventually wrangled into trying to take the Bat down by Falcone – and by extension Gordon’s corrupt GCPD Commissioner – Gordon puts it all on the line by staying true to the honest cop he strives to be. And it’s here where the tragedy of James Gordon Jr. rears its unfortunate head.
After chasing down one of Falcone’s nephews who had kidnapped James Jr., Gordon gets into a scuffle with the man in the middle of a bridge as Batman rushes to help (sans costume due to the daylight creeping up on the horizon). As Batman arrives, the fight topples over the side of the bridge, Falcone’s nephew and Gordon’s newborn plummet to the ground below. With no other options, Batman dives over the edge and catches James Jr., saving his life in the nick of time. While this may sound like a happy ending, years down the line in James Jr.’s return to comics in the Scott Snyder penned Black Mirror story arc as well as subsequent appearances by the character, it is alluded that the fall, triggered by a domino effect stemming from Batman’s actions (or simply the way Batman caught the baby to begin with), led to James Jr. becoming a killer.
So while Batman might not have directly turned James Gordon Jr. into the remorseless, psychopathic murderer he eventually became, it can’t be denied that the chain of events Batman put into motion in regards to the Falcone crime family and the corrupt GCPD had something to do with it, leading to James’ fateful fall and eventual slip into darkness. Batman might be in the business of saving people, but it doesn’t always turn out the way he intends, a sad fact in his constant war against the criminals that mean to do others harm.