[Music] welcome everyone to the Arkham sessions I'm Brian Ward I'm Dr Andrea letamendi Drea we're on episode 12 we are so far we've met manbat The Joker a few times Scarecrow Poison Ivy Twoface we've talked about everything from antisocial personality disorder and borderline disorder to disassociative Identity Disorder we've talked about memories and how reliable they are we've talked about what it means to lose those memories all together how do you feel so far do you do you feel like we've about covered it all well no I mean I I know that we've covered quite a bit in the last 11 episodes but we've only scratched the surface when it comes to psychology certainly there is um there's a lot more we can talk about in terms of psychological disorders psychological processes and certainly about the characters and stories of Batman the Animated Series yeah we've got a a lot to talk about I agree and this week while we're not focusing on some super villain we are focusing on trauma and uh what kinds of effects uh that trauma could have on different people um this episode is called it's never too late and it first aired on September 10th 1992 it was written by Garen wolf from a story by Tom Ruger and the episode was directed by Boyd Kirkland um we open on a couple of kids playing in the street and we see that uh they're willing to play outside the house uh they really are uneasy around the estate of mob boss Arnold stromwell he's the uh the Elder mob boss who's basically been running the Gotham underworld up to this point um but we hear on the news that a there's a gang war of Ruin between stromwell and um our old friend Rupert Thorne right rert Thorne is essentially the um the guy who's responsible for um Harvey Dance trans information into two face right Harvey no Harvey no Harvey no Harvey wherever you are I'm thinking about you he I think he says that he's in bed and that's what he says that was the best episode for Batman quotes are you dreaming tonight are they good dreams or are they bad dreams or both in a world no too soon oh it's too soon and B we hear that strw Well's son Joseph has been missing for a few days mhm this war has to stop I want a meeting with Thor and I want it tonight Thorn agrees so the two guys basically agree to meet up at a restaurant where Bruce Wayne disguised as a drunk hobo um has planted a listening device and um on his way over to the meeting with his rival we sort of get a little Peak inside STW Well's current state of mind right so on his way to meet rert he's in his vehicle um he approaches a railroad track and the railroad crossing signal as essentially goes off to to signal that a train's coming so when he sees the signal he kind of goes into this trance or he gets kind of goes into this kind of panic and um what we realize is that it's reminding him of something in his childhood and he experiences this flashback now in this flashback he and another young boy looks like maybe they're about nine or 10 years old are playing on the train tracks and a train comes um while he's still on the track tracks his friend manages to um you know to move away from the tracks but little Arie is is stuck on the track his foot is caught in between the tracks he's terrified because this train is approaching luckily he gets his foot out just in the nick of time the train you know goes by he's just in shock as he's uh as he turns around he another train approaches right and that's essentially the flashback that he has so is that realistic the the sitting at a train stop and seeing the signal and and immediately going into this panic attack mode well it's not unrealistic for a visual cue to trigger a memory especially a traumatic memory memories can be triggered by cues um that are perceived by any one of the five senses or a number of the different senses so for instance um something that you hear that reminds you of something traumatic um that would be auditory cue something that you smell or taste could be olfactory or gustatory um cues having to do with the memory um of a traumatic event for instance okay and interestingly the neural Pathways in your brain that are connecting those smells and tastes to those memories are incredibly strong so if you think about like what's something that you um might smell or taste or hear as an adult that reminds you of something very vividly in in childhood interesting uh I guess I guess anytime I smell uh smoke from firewood I think back to camping trips in the boy counts right and and they they usually are like Vivid memories of those experiences would you say that it really takes you back I I don't I don't really get Vivid memories of them but I I can feel like I I sort of feel the experience again like it I don't I remember the smell mhm and even though I've smelled firewood since then I don't think about it any other times that I've ever smelled firewood I just always think about you know campfire mhm yeah and if if those experiences were traumatic like let's say there was a traumatic experience for you it was the Boy Scouts well it could have been traumatic so not surprisingly when stromwell is um you know passing through town and either hears a train or sees the The Crossing signal or you know sees the lights going he's going to have flashbacks he's going to remember this traumatic event and I think for this episode this is really telling us that that traumatic event is important in some way you know it kind of starts out letting us know that he is he's Frozen in that moment he's really panicked and he's he's somehow drawing back to the memory of playing with this other child and nearly being killed by this train we also see that uh stromwell from the very beginning wasn't necessarily a good kid you got to swear you won't squeal on me Mike GE Arie you keep stealing junk you're going to get caught nah someday I'm going to own this town he ends up coming out of his memory um and going to this meeting with Thorne and at this meeting stromwell accuses Thorne of kidnapping his son you'd do anything to take over my city I didn't touch your kid I swear it Anie you know I don't mess with family uh and at the end of the meeting um Thorne basically tries to kill strongwell by blowing the restaurant up it's a very god father like moment except to the extreme he's not just riddling the place with bullets he he's willing to blow up the restaurant M uh Batman of course steps in and uh and rescues strongwell just in time um and he makes it clear to strongwell that that he wants information on the two gangs right um Strong's a bit reluctant so Batman takes him on a little Tour all A Christmas Carol M um where Batman basically plays the role of of Ghost of of strw Well's past and present um he he takes him to the place where STW well first started his career pushing drugs prove it and now you manufacture them prove that too and then he takes him to the rehab facility nearby where um his own son is lying there in bed with withdrawals from strum Well's own drugs Joey well right we get the sense that instead of being kidnapped or abducted his son actually went into rehab for treatment of of drug abuse right I mean it's kind of a heavy thing he Batman takes him into the room and uh I guess it's his uh Little Joey's well Joseph is probably like a teenager or young adult right yeah some yeah they call him Joey so Joey's in the bed and his his mother is there and she said that she had just found out that he had been essentially um hospitalized uh here or admitted to the um drug rehab center and she informed stromwell that the the doctors are saying you know to let him rest he needs to get through this and um and stromwell is is pretty taken aback and surprise look at the effects of your drug ring and your organization it's hitting home it's impacting your son it's potentially could be killing your son it has to stop strongwell it has to stop and rather than rather than understand that stromwell um essentially says we're going to take this kid out of the rehab center where he's going to get well on his own and pretty much is in denial about um the fact that he really is responsible for his son being there Batman then attempts to convince strongwell to give him the information he needs and strongwell actually sort of makes him think he will he he takes him to a uh to an office and he gives Batman a fake file uh of course Thor thinks it's all legit so he unleashes his men and the rest of the episode basically plays out with strongwell trying to escape Batman taking out each of Thorn's men one by one and then strongwell being confronted by his brother uh who is a priest now we learned that the other child in the me is STW Well's brother mhm uh and he has since grown up from this incident and has gone in the opposite extreme uh as his brother he is now a priest right and he shows up and basically uh also tries to confront his brother I came to help you Arie I don't need your help is that a fact at the end of the episode stromwell ends up turning himself over to Commissioner Gordon but only after we see the full extent of the memory mhm it's interesting because at the end of the episode we see as you said we see the entire event the entire traumatic event that Stell and his brother experienced together and um and it's really interesting we see that uh stromwell when he escapes the first train ends up on the second set of tracks his brother Michael uh pushes him off of those tracks and ends up getting hit by the train right uh the result is he loses a leg right however he's still the the the half that ends up going down the better route later in life one can say that just looking at that information about this event that the traumatic experience could potentially have been if I might say more traumatic for Father Michael because he actually lost a leg so let me just first Define what a trauma is because I think a lot of times um we use that word right like we'll say oh being on the 405 was really traumatic or you know I saw a really terrible movie that was so traumatic for me and we're all kind of um we're using the word on a day-to-day basis but really what a a traumatic event is when defined by psychologists and psychiatrists is actually something very specific and it's defined in the DSM our Diagnostic and statistical Manual of mental disorders a trauma is defined as exposure to actual or threatened death Serious injury or sexual violence um that trauma can actually be experienced by a person firsthand or um one could be a witness and see it secondhand and it still could be considered a trauma so that's really how we Define uh traumatic events so then let's talk a little bit about the differences in the paths down which these two guys go Michael who loses his leg in the incident becomes a priest AR who is already a bit of a bad egg eventually becomes Gotham's Premier mob boss and drug manufacturer uh but they both clearly have responses to this trauma on the train tracks just different responses right well you know one thing you want to think about in terms of um responses to traumas is that certainly the way that we are before a trauma can kind of influence or shape how we are after a trauma does that make sense so um stromwell already has these um these traits of being somewhat a young criminal he's stealing candy sure so he's sort of like the child's version of of a criminal he's stealing candy he seems to be on his path already to a lifestyle of crime one can say and Michael is on his lifestyle of or is on the path to being a priest yeah he's he's saying basically you know I want nothing do with that you stole that candy that's wrong and so we want to be mindful that even prior to um to the accident they have these certain traits and these certain values and lack of values one can say so after the accident it's interesting that it's almost like their World Views almost um intensify possibly right that strongwell ends up growing up to be a mom boss and as Batman is kind of taking him down you know memory lane and reintroducing ucing him to the places where he first you know enacted his crimes and started out dealing drugs and so forth that you can tell that he had he had been involved in this criminal lifestyle for his you know a long time so on the other hand his brother became a uh became a priest so it's possible that there's something about his experience that lends to more compassion or lends to more hopefulness he actually survived this now remember his leg was was destroyed from this train so was there something about that accident that made him feel like he survived for a reason maybe he felt that he was left alive for a purpose maybe he turned to God in religion maybe he felt that he could save other people you know that's kind of what I mean by someone's worldview changing because of a traumatic event and you've dealt with amputees in your line of work uh have have you seen this wide range of patients some who handle it much better and some who don't I do you know absolutely a lot of times um somebody can lose a limb or um be in an accident and and have to have a limb amputated and um and the responses vary some people recover quite quickly both emotionally and physically and we would consider that a normal recovery and that they they begin to to live a life of acceptance and one that they can you know one that's adaptive with their their new body so to speak um others unfortunately have a more difficult time transitioning and adapting to to their injury or their loss of Limb and can uh present with a lot of guilt depression anxiety maybe PTSD and a lot of times it has to do with what caused the injury so if it was like an accident being in a vehicle uh car crash um something that was just you know a natural disaster something that was outside of our control people who tend to have those accidents are more likely to recover in a healthy way however if someone's victimized if they're assaulted if they're you know in combat and they have these types of injuries they may be more likely to um to deal with some of those emotional responses that are quite challenging like depression PTSD anxiety substance abuse and so forth where does guilt play into all of this because as we can see Father Michael has basically let go of the of any sort of negative residual effects of having lost his leg but stromwell is paralyzed in fear uh when he comes up to the train tracks so clearly he's got this guilt playing into it I think you know what you're getting at out with guilt is actually something that's been studied more recently when it comes to post-traumatic stress responses so for anyone wondering whether stromwell has post-traumatic stress disorder let me quickly go over that criteria because I actually think that he doesn't um PTSD or postraumatic stress disorder is characterized by four different um symptoms or clusters of symptoms and this is actually a newer recognized version of pt SD uh I'm referring to the dsm5 so psychology nerds who are listening right now are realizing this is the newer version of the diagnostic manual basically and in this version we have four symptoms or four clusters versus the three we had before so very quickly the um the symptoms or the symptom clusters for PTSD include reexperiencing the event so having spontaneous memories of the traumatic event like recurrent dreams Flash facts um that's essentially what we're seeing with strongwell right so keep that in mind the other three major symptom clusters include heightened arousal like um aggression Reckless Behavior um sleep disturbances just kind of being on guard constantly avoidance this would be um trying to avoid the distressing memories the thoughts the feelings the reminders the event and finally negative thoughts um negative thoughts and mood or feelings um um these may be feelings like blaming others estrangement from other people um a markedly diminished interest in activities things like that we've seen this guy have the flashbacks MH we haven't necessarily seen him uh avoid trains you know but we have seen him he has clearly become estranged from his brother he he avoids his brother he that relationship has sort of gone downhill mhm um at one point when Batman is recruiting Father Michael Michael even says that's one soul I wish I could give up on so he certainly seems to fit a couple of these a couple yes and he's he's also gone down the path of of becoming a criminal now no one could say necessarily that he wasn't already going down that path but could that this event have sort of sent him down that way it it probably it probably sent him down that way more in intensely and and more quickly if one can say we don't know what would have happened to him without this tramatic event maybe he would have just engaged in you know kind of petty crimes or or maybe he would have just um with the help of his brother done something a little bit more pro-social but um you know one can probably because he's having these flashbacks in adulthood one can probably surmise that that event was was pretty crucial to you know kind of shaping the person he is today and I don't know that we have enough information to say for sure he has post-traumatic stress disorder but what we can see is that yes he has these flashbacks and his brother who experienced the same traumatic event more or less doesn't seem to have the same psychological um he doesn't it didn't have the same impact on him he doesn't seem to have those negative thoughts the flashbacks the avoidance um the hypervigilant or aggressive behavior he seems like a an a healthy guy he seems like he's adapted well Dre I feel like this episode has a lot to say about the power of family in that Batman actually shows strongwell the effects of the drugs he produces and yet nothing seems to persuade him until Father Michael steps in in your profession is there a value to family beyond anything else is blood really thicker than water it really depends but for the most part yes I would say when there's a crisis or um when there is a strong need for change in Behavior like getting off of drugs or engaging in safer behaviors we usually will try to um recruit family members or involve family members in that change process because those family members will be able to speak to um you know some some deeper level they'll be able to to connect and to find um hopefully to instill some hope in a way that maybe a mental health professional can't um you can certainly instill that kind of change in Hope without a family member but it can certainly be helpful okay so let's go to the questions uh on Twitter Bernardo Shay asks the episode seems inspired by It's a Wonderful Life and angels with dirty faces I certainly get those uh those references although I also see more of a Christmas carol for some reason um but uh although the theme remains relevant the character values seem lifted from the 1940s mhm uh Batman also seems more like a guardian angel than the dark knight uh Redemption is an eternal theme in fiction but how do you think a story like this should be received by a modern-day secular generation uh does the episode seem preachy to you uh should our heroes forgive drug dealers do the theme of forgiveness and Redemption contradict Batman's own values pertaining to Justice he's got some interesting thoughts you wow yeah it's interesting that this episode happened after the Harvey D to face Tarter because I felt like I felt like Bruce Wayne when we left that episode Bruce Wayne was essentially giving us this message or we were left with the message that um it isn't too late for Harvey Den either and that he was Bruce Wayne was still hoping that Harvey would turn his life around right and and you know become the person go back to the person that he used to be and it's interesting that this episode is called it's never too late and kind of has the same theme of redemption and of um Rec I want to say like I keep using the word recovery but I think that you know if we think about mental health that is that is really the theme that I'm seeing here recovery getting better um yes going through some hard times but being able to with the help of friends and with the help of family being able to get healthy again and get right back on the good track and I didn't for some reason I didn't see this episode as very religious and preachy I know I know the the episode ended with a scene I think of the church and church bells and um and you know that was a nice Capstone to the end of this episode because of you know of course Father Michael and and the story about the two brothers but I didn't see this as being um preachy yeah Kyle tonella over at Twitter also asks uh what are your thoughts on some of the religious aspects of this particular episode of Batman and I like you I don't know that it necessarily gets preachy I don't think I don't think they're focusing on religion so much as they're focusing on the black and the white they're focusing on the guy who went evil and the guy who went good and they're just focusing on two separate well and interestingly while it focuses on the good and the bad like the black and the white it still it still addresses the blurriness and the gray areas that someone who does go bad or someone who does engage in bad behavior can actually be a good person again and again with mental health we do look at you know quote unquote bad behaviors as being the behavior the person isn't bad it's the actions they're taking the behavior they're engaging in um you know the symptoms that they're suffering from those are what's negative but the person isn't negative the person isn't bad and I think that this episode is very consistent with that mental health philosophy and I like that you brought up the fact that this came right on the heels of the Two-Face two-parter right um both of which involved rert Thorne to a great degree and rert Thorne basically being responsible for Harvey blowing up and in this case legitimately planting a bomb and trying to blow up uh stromwell yeah um rert could have created another Toof faace yeah I I think it's I think it's interesting that you brought up the fact that Batman sees this as an opportunity to redeem himself in that in that way in that he he wasn't able to uh get to Harvey in time he was not able to help Harvey but he is able to help strongwell yeah um on one hand this could be Batman learning from mistakes or learning from experiences and and truly reaching out and helping or this could be Batman helping himself I mean it could be his own Redemption his own he wasn't going to feel better until he was able to save someone else and then he felt fulfilled like he felt like he was able to fulfill this role yeah true I mean I think there's some truth to that as well as always if you have questions for us about the episode or anything else for that matter you can find us on Twitter we are Arkham sessions there Drea what's your personal Twitter address you can reach me at Arkham Asylum doc that's Arkham Asylum do and I'm at b028 you should also be sure to like us on Facebook just look up the Arkham sessions there and you can ask questions leave comments and all that shazz D any any thoughts on uh any parting thoughts on this episode well you know there there was some discussion about um drug abuse and uh and Drug intervention or treatments and so I just wanted to say if anyone is interested in learning more about um Substance Abuse and Mental Health treatments for problems with drugs and alcohol there is a number they can call it's the number for samama samama is the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration the number is 1 1800 622 help that's 1800 622 4357 they also have a website ssa.gov that's samhsa.gov a lot of really important information there about drug and alcohol abuse Independence um there's also the National Institute on drug abuse that's www. n. nih.gov and for more things Batman I actually want to invite folks to um to visit just gen recipes.com there's actually a fantastic Batman recipe right now on how to make Batman cookies again it's justjen recipes.com j s Jenn recipes.com Jen is a good friend of mine and she was very kind to not only bake some fantastic and yummy Batman cookies but also to plug our podcast and talk a little bit about um what we're doing with the podcast so thanks Jen yeah thank you Jen and I want some cookies you shall have cookies excellent that wraps up this week tune in next week because I've got Batman in my basement you do that's actually the name of the episode oh and it introduces us to the penguin finally yes so come back next week for that till then I'm Brian Ward I'm Dr Andrea lendi and we are the Arkham sessions [Music] oh [Music]