let the egg hunt begin yes let's begin indeed hey everyone my name is brian ward and with me as always is my fantastic co-host dr. andrea let'em ND drea how are you this week I'm doing well how are you good excellent once again you've had your self a productive week of podcasts besides this one where else can you be heard this is true I am on a podcast called vodka o'clock this week you can find the podcast episode at amber unmask com amber is the host of the podcast vodka clock and she asked me a number of interesting questions about multiple identities psychology of fictional comic characters female characters and comic books and of course my favorite topic the bat universe excellent you can also find Amber's podcast on itunes if you search vodka o'clock and as the name implies actually her podcasts are listed as explicit and are probably recommended only for 18 and older listeners just a BTW there good good disclaimer no you know what that means time for a little nerd rage oh no what happened wait that signals nerd rage it does now that's our new signal for actually anything really ah okay rage disappointment good know-it-all applies yeah that sounds bad yeah so we got an email this week overall it was a very positive email in town so I'm not going to name its sender because it's clear they're nice folk but their email reads I have just begun to listen to the Arkham sessions and I love it thank you yeah it is part I like wait how can this go wrong this actually sounds good as a major bat fan I would like to offer a couple of possibly helpful things first in your fourth episode you and your co-host seem to make the common error of confusing to Joker weapons laughing gas and Joker venom both are gaseous and cause uncontrolled laughing the Lavin gas is not traditional nitrous oxide but it is used as a means of mass incapacitation death may or may not occur Joker venom is a binary compound as you will see in later episodes it is far more targeted and is intentionally lethal one fan theory is that the Joker is the only character who realizes that he is fictional he has often mentioned non Kent non-canonical events canonical non-canonical events that other characters cannot remember I look forward to your work on Harley Quinn interesting yeah so but before we we delve into the non-canonical perspective of the Joker what's up with the venom and the poison yeah yeah ok so yeah for starters well I would like to say that I too am anxiously awaiting our work with Harley Quinn needs you I think those conversations will be very entertaining um the remainder of his email look I don't mind being wrong and I don't mind being corrected in fact I welcome it if I'm wrong the problem is this this person has made the common error of mistakingly thinking Joker venom and laughing gas are two separate things while it's true that the Joker has used both aerosol and liquid weapons and some of them are fatal while others simply throw the victim into insanity my understanding of these weapons over the years of reading comics and watching these animated series and movies is that they were simply different names for the exact same thing different delivery methods yes yeah different potency yes but the Joker venom is the exact same thing chemically as laughing gas and by the way let me make clear that I'm not talking about nitrous oxide right um the but that it's called something different usually based on the writer of whatever whatever comic whatever whatever medium this email actually got me to thinking though that maybe my understanding of this weapon was wrong maybe they were two different maybe they were two different things well let me read from the Batman wiki on Joker venom it says in quotes Joker venom has had a variety of names depending on the writer they include smilax with an eye smile X with a why laughing gas Joker gas happy gasp giggle gasp Joker juice laughing toxin lappa loads produce Joker juice I don't think anyone should ever say Joker juice I don't know that's true i'm looking forward to airing that down the road uh laughing toxin lappa loads perma smile smiley gasps and Joker toxin by the way this was also confirmed at the DC wiki and in either place do they talk about the two toxins being different chemically so I'm going to go with that and if it changes sometime in the future episodes that's fine if Batman tells us this isn't just laughing gas this is Joker venom I might be willing to change my mind no I mean I you have a great point i would actually my position on this is i don't know that it matters so much if you know whether we understand the minor discrepancies in something like this kind of weapon i think it's important as we talk about some of the motivations and and of course some of the violence and criminality of these villains it's important to know like was this intended to kill people was it intended to make them lose consciousness what are the permanent you know kind of repercussions of those kinds of things so i actually think the email how to a point in needing to kind of needing for us to clarify what we're talking about yes when we're referring to something like Joker venom well but the problem is there are different there are different versions of it right you you can use it as a gas you can use it as a liquid sometimes it's going to be injected we'll get into that and a couple of you know a few weeks but um that does happen sometimes it's meant to drive people insane sometimes it's actually meant to kill people but what it all comes down to is it's all still Joker venom it's all still Joker use perma smile smile right at the end of the day it's some version of that it's some yet it is some breakdown of that compact you know but I don't want to deter people like if you have questions or you want to correct us go for it yeah that's an email absolutely send us an email you can find us at Arkham sessions at gmail.com or you can send us an email through your website under the mask online com look I don't claim to know everything about comic books I don't claim to know everything about Batman and I certainly don't claim to know everything about psychology so if folks want clarification or have questions or even have a correction you know I I welcome that kind of feedback and I really hope that listener continues to listen to our episodes because you know it sounds like they they liked what they were listening to and just want to wanted to contribute something absolutely okay so let's get into the episode I've got Batman in my basement good to know but could we get on to the episode right wait we're talking about this episode right right this episode as Draya mentioned is called I've got Batman in my basement it was written by Sam Graham and Chris Hubble and it was directed by frank power it was first aired on sep tember 30th 1992 we open up in Gotham City it's nighttime shocker and to not so bright thieves J and Raven one of which appears at times to be ginger shocker are stealing the van Alistair Faberge egg at least they think they are because Batman shows up to stop them only before he can he's attacked by a gigantic vulture and the two thieves escape with the egg we move on to Sherman and Roberta two kids hanging out on Sherman stoop opening up his brand new junior detectives kit it's got a walkie talkie wristband a penlight binoculars even his cool badge and Sherman's a ginger this is true the directors of batman the animated series may have read even themselves with this one sherman is a ginger albeit an extremely nerdy one so we're still not past the point that a ginger could be anything other than a weakling but you know baby steps yeah I mean he is essentially the lead in this particular episode that's true when Sherman is on the stoop with Roberta he is instantly picked on by two teen bullies and you kind of get the sense that this is a pretty common occurrence for him yeah he doesn't seem to phase that they're calling him names calling him you know Sherwood Sherlock and and picking on him for what appears to be his his nerdy interests in detective work for the record I wouldn't mind being called Sherlock I think it's a compliment now yeah you know when you're uh what would you say he's probably 11 or 12 and getting picked on and you know getting pushed around and being called Sherwood and Sherlock probably not the best right yeah Roberta on the other hand is uh no she seems a little on face she's a bit of a tomboy she hangs with Sherman she likes to help him solve cases Allah encyclopedia brown she wears a ball cap yeah they seem like a couple of they seem like very smart kids hanging out together we do get the sense that they are I don't want to call them outcasts but we do get the sense that they have very kind of they have this geeky interest yes in detective stuff and he gets this kit and he's like super geeking out over it because it's you know it comes with all these great gadgets and and different activities and he's he's uh he looks like hes getting picked on essentially because he is a nerd right and while the foursome are sitting there on the stoop and the two teens are bullying for lack of a better word no I would say that is accurate yeah they're bullying Sherman and Roberta they end up seeing the same vulture that we saw Batman fighting with the night before a gigantic vulture in Gotham City is a bit mysterious so it prompts Sherman and Roberta to do a little investigating which leads them to uh I don't know it looks like an abandoned warehouse filled with bags of birdseed you know the typical warehouse thing right it's certainly it's definitely got signs it's condemned building no one's supposed to be in there but we find the two thieves from the night before and the penguin ah he does kind of make that weird he calls out to his vulture pet yeah it's a it's not a sound I expected coming out of the penguin but it's his way of communicating with his his little pet that's true it's our introduction to the penguin okay by the way is voiced by Paul Williams Paul is an interesting choice because if you guys don't know he's been an actor before absolutely but he's primarily known as as a songwriter from the 70s mostly I mean this guy's famous for writing songs for himself he's written songs for other groups he wrote songs for the carpenter as he wrote we've only just begun oh um any wrote and sang just an old-fashioned love song and he wrote this is my favorite Rainbow Connection from The Muppet movie as sung by kermit the frog nice uh just a little bit of cool trivia no maybe goes justing of course we can't play any of that music because of copyright yeah stuff like that you know don't sing any of it I won't yeah but people know I mean you say the Rainbow Connection people know what people know the Rainbow Connection I thought that was a cool bit of trivia I don't know maybe you guys don't think so I I do um Sherman Roberta catch a glimpse of the Faberge egg from the night before and Sherman instantly recognizes it Roberta does not don't you read the papers did a comics count wow she's kind of a she's got a comics nerd isn't she geek girl yeah um Batman comes in dumps birdseed on the penguin and his men gets the kids out of harm's way and then gets knocked out by a gas pellet from the Penguins umbrella um trai Batman is getting worse and worse about letting stuff like this happen what do you mean we're in episode 13 mm-hm and so far we've seen him given a healthy dose of Scarecrow's fear toxin we've seen him captured by a giant Venus flytrap and briefly succumbs to poison ivy's poison we've seen him captured by gangsters after a burning building collapsed on top of him let's see we've seen him hit upside the back of the head giving him amnesia he's been knocked out by the Joker's exploding gasps playing card he's been taken down and knocked unconscious by a kick from to phase and which by the way that was probably especially embarrassing because he was woken up by a janitor I would say at this point no one makes a better case for Robin than Batman himself well that's not fair um you know I think we do have to see the hero fall once in a while why do we fall to get back exactly I think the point though is he gets back up right right he doesn't let these are minor setbacks and speed bumps the man the mystery the mystery is baby I think that's the point though I mean many people believe Batman because he's fallible and because he's susceptible and vulnerable sometimes that he's he's more relatable as a superhero and and then were far more impressed with him when he's able to really defeat the villain and and get the bad guy and and do what he does best when he's you know on two feet so I like that about him i will give you that sherman and roberta drive batman away in the Batmobile what yeah this is this is where the writers really redeem themselves in my book because the ginger gets to steer the Batmobile Roberta gets to punch the gas pedal but you know he's he's a kid and he's too short to reach the pedals course but he does get to steer the Batmobile and the next thing you know Sherman's got Batman hidden away in his basement or as he likes to call it his crime lab that's what I called my basement oh no and there's a it did you notice right there's a big poster of the Joker on the wall and everything like this kids he has set up his crime lab yeah he's kind of come emulating Batman yeah it's not like a it's not like a wanted poster though like it's like a it's like a commercial you know the Joker's boy when we had posters of uh Tiffany yeah on our wall who's we well you I didn't well I yeah there was the one poster of Tiffany I had him I knew last week I know but in this crime lab Batman still under he's not coming to but the teens from earlier have discovered the Batmobile outside and Sherman has to go defend it sort of you guys better leave that alone Oh golly we sure are scared aren't we Nicholas oh yes Francis we certainly are step aside surely while out there scrap the vulture finds them and lures the penguin to Sherman's house where now Sherman the teens Roberta and Batman are all down in the basement everybody but Batman is planning operation foul play which is essentially home alone but using Batman's utility belt yeah the kid pulls the utility belt off of Batman's body and essentially takes all the different gadgets and uses them to to fight the penguin and the Penguins two thugs right and most of the stuff works I mean they actually are able to take down the penguin with a couple of bolos very briefly until penguin cuts through it with his umbrella knife and right before the penguin can kill Batman Batman wakes up because he's been given antitoxin and defeats the bad guys and saves the Faberge egg penguin goes to jail vulture goes to the Gotham Zoo and Sherman now leads his team of K solvers which includes Roberta and the two former bully teens interesting yeah it's one of those TV tropes interesting and unlikely is what I say but we certainly hope yeah we hope it's possible well it's a good ending yeah it's a good ending so let's talk a little bit about Sherman and that bullying that we see it bullying especially recently has become kind of a big deal especially through social media and the Internet has really exposed this this bullying for what it is let's talk a little bit about that impact on children and sort of how we can get beyond it yeah well I mean I think I totally agree with you that bullying and cyber bullying has become a really contentious issue in an important issue in the last couple of years I don't know if you remember when you were a kid but in you know I would say 20 years ago the bullying campaigns were very similar to kind of like the anti-drug ones like well you know obviously we're all against it just don't do it yes stay away from it kind of thing and there's a lot of psychological and social psychological research now that shows that you can't just ignore it you really do have to address it whether you're a parent a teacher or that that target that victim being bullied and so luckily nowadays there's a lot of research literature and resources for families and for kids to kind of help them you know identify real bullying and then try to intervene or try to problem-solve around it and it's also important to talk a little bit about the impact of bullying as I said now there's a lot of research and literature especially lately on the neuroscience of bullying so we now know that bully victims experience anxiety depression post-traumatic stress headaches stomachaches difficulty concentrating and other psychological physical and attentional problems as a result of repeated bullying so you just said that bullying victims can actually suffer from PTSD that's absolutely not something that people generally think of when they think I mean so bullying can actually lead a kid into the same sort of dysfunctional mindset that a soldier could get going to war well yes in what we would consider the children's version of PTSD which you know is similar in terms of the presentation mixed set for you know the types of memories they would the types of nightmares the triggers and so forth so instead of having flashbacks about combat they would have intrusive worries thoughts and flashbacks about the verbal physical and emotional you know assaults that they're experiencing so of course it depends on how severe the taunting and the you know the physical assaults are on them because let's face it a lot of times bullying involves physical and sometimes sexual assault right so yes depending on the type of bullying that's experienced one of the many responses could be post-traumatic stress symptoms wow it's it's important to note that you know kids can be going through the same thing that adults could be going through who are going through so much more than most of us so yeah and you know further there's actually evidence that being bullied leads to physical changes in the brain so for instance we know from brain scans studies that children who are repeatedly victimized by peers actually show differences in their brain structure and functioning so what we see in those are those brain scans are differences in in the actual structure of the brain as well as the narrow chemistry of the brain and what that results in are some psycho social consequences like the increase of sensitivity to future attacks and the likelihood like an increased likelihood to perceive ambiguous situations as threatening so let's say for instance a child has been has experienced verbal bullying and has been taunted about some aspect of themselves let's say you know the since we're talking about Sherman who's quite nerdy let's say that a youth has been bullied and pushed around because he he likes comic books or something right um you know if he has experienced enough repeated bullying around that he may perceive ambiguous situations with peers as threatening to him that could be something like hearing his peers laugh even if they're not laughing at him he may interpret that as them laughing at him oh god then experience further emotional and psychological impact of an event that actually didn't really happen you know given that perhaps that laughing was due to something else so that's what i mean by like you know being in a what could be a an ambiguous situation and interpreting that as being threatening to them it's very possible to grow up and develop some of these social anxiety types of of symptoms and yeah i mean again depending on your experiences it can become a more serious problem so are some kids more likely than others to be bullied unfortunately yes Ginger's yeah actually um sometimes uh I mean this is this is actually something that's difficult to talk to kids about like there are easier victims of bullying and in in the in the field of research and in psychology we would call them provocative targets or provocative victims and usually these are kids whose social challenges make them an easy target for bullies and whose behavior sometimes makes it hard for adults to see that they're being victimized some examples are children with autism or Asperger's disorder so you know thinking about their inability to really catch social cues some of their some of their social skills deficits and and again the the lack of capacity to really understand how to how to socialize properly to avoid things like like bullying from peers right um other children who might be considered provocative targets are those with very limited or special interests like hobbies and we can think about Sherman he has this very kind of restricted interest in in this detective stuff or comic book fans or Harry Potter fans I mean a lot of the unfortunately a lot of the geek fandom stuff a lot of the nature and passion toward those things could be seen as very kind of limited special interests in something and if someone doesn't share that interest with you they may target you know you and and you may get teased about it as far as provocative targets sometimes the things that we're bullied for are outside of our control so these are things like you know thinking about kids who are extremely tall kids that hit puberty too late or too early being obese being an ethnic minority or being a redhead those are also social challenges because quite simply they make that child different and it's not something that the child can really change about themselves right you know that's who they are that's a characteristic that they have and so that's what we mean by you know some children are easily victimized or considered provocative targets so I find it interesting that in this episode it's brought up a couple of times that Sherman is from a single-parent household they makes a comment about you're safe here it's just mom and me and at the end of the episode Sherman tries to even hook Batman up with his mother say Batman you wouldn't be single would you so they make it a point that Sherman is from a single-parent family I find that interesting what are your thoughts I agree I think they really wanted us to know that that little bright imaginative Sherman is part of a family of two and he even says you know it's just me it's just me and my mom when when he takes BAM into his basement and I think you know I look at it like another strength of this episode that the writers are including diversity in the way that they're showing different families in the way that kids are being portrayed and you know maybe back in the early mid 90s there were children who were experiencing single-parent households and and saw that and could relate to it and felt included in some way because as you know we grew up during a time where a two-parent actually a male-female two-parent household was the norm and was constantly portrayed in the media so I I really nuclear family and I see this as as a strength I didn't see anything negative about it I thought that it was certainly something that that made the episode better so any other thoughts or uh or tidbits from this particular episode I actually think this episode stands out from others because now I don't know if you'll agree with me and you might laugh at this but my theory about this episode is that it's not real and what do you mean by not real I actually think that this episode is coming out of Sherman's imagination that the entirety of this episode is Sherman's fantasy about what might happen if he were to have some of his inner wishes fulfilled why but what about it this episode suggests that it that it didn't happen from beginning to end it looks to me like the success story of little Sherman Sherman is a Marty's do Sherman could be a Marty's do well thinking about like from the very beginning he's yes he's being bullied but then he um he's portrayed as being super smart he he can handle the bullying he sort of like leave me alone he drives the Batmobile and not only that but he he steers the battery he stares about mobile but all these things about the episode the ease in which he takes the penguin down in in his home the way Batman doesn't even wake up until the end of the episode at the very last minute the bullies aligning was Sherman toward the end and like joining his you know his team of detectives and then at the end Sherman trying to set Batman up with his mother so I see this as all of his psychological wishes and needs being fulfilled he's he has success with his peers he has friendships he has validation of his interest in detective work he has a father figure in his family which is Batman so I don't know it's just my theory that this is sherman story this is his fantasy and and there's nothing wrong with that I don't know no that there's any anything wrong with that idea you know that this this episode is is kind of like a dream so now I'm fascinated by the idea for starters this episode just got a lot deeper than we thought it was but secondly I'm fascinated by the idea of now looking at every episode from the perspective of who's fantasy is this then Natalie Batman doesn't exist in this world or at least is not as prominent as we think he is it's just every single sub character has some kind of fantasy about him and right yeah and really our ginger is really all that successful no no so in this world in the Gotham in in the animated series world this is a ginger being pro-social successful having a strong peer relationships but still having self-hatred in that even in his own fantasy he couldn't take the penguin down on his own the penguin still got out and still nearly save the day still nearly save Batman Batman even in this kid's fantasy had to wake up and save himself yeah well again it's it's a fantasy that that right you know still glorifies and idealizes Batman right okay that's a go with it I'm glad I am going hi i am going so normally I like to bring up real people in real life situations to help ground the show a little bit not really a whole lot that we can talk about here except that it actually turns out Draya that Barbara J eggs are not so uncommon a target for thieves okay in fact you can find quite a few news stories just by googling them of eggs having been stolen and or found just last year an egg that had been stolen in 2009 from a Kuwait import-export firm was recovered that egg can you believe it or not valued at 1.3 million dollars so yeah so there's that who would have thought Faberge eggs actually kind of popular in fact in another story that i read a a jewel thing Eve actually robbed a jewelry store ended up actually killing the jewelry store clerk but the one thing that the robber didn't think he needed or couldn't carry or whatever tossed aside a box inside a thousand-dollar Faberge egg so like turns out these things you know often get robbed and sometimes not even appreciated for what they are so that's why the penguin was seeking this egg it was just valued at very high anyone wanted it yeah I mean it was such an important Faberge egg that it had a name the Von Ulster Faberge egg I wonder what the egg represents to Sherman yeah if a guess something pretty something something Julie something sparkly yeah this is indeed his fantasy brown hair what han Solo hair yeah he did Jones hair just wants to be normal like everybody else just wants to uh no what did you did you like the ending to this episode was it fulfilling to you um I would like to see and I don't think we will but I would like to see Sherman become part of the bad family I'd like him to yeah when when Batman needs a kid to get into some like let's say Batman needed a kid to infiltrate the underdwellers and the sewer king could he use Sherman Sherman could have been a new under dweller could have been could have been one of those little sewer rats I don't think he would have survived that well he may not have but sometimes you to meet you take the risks when you're a general you send him out there thinking they might not come back but this again taking it to a dark dark place hey you told me gingers could get PTSD and by gingers I mean anyone who was bullied as a kid ya know speaking of which if you wanted to learn more about bullying including the identification and interventions and strategies to overcome bullying check out Kerry Goldman's book bullied what every parent teacher and kid needs to know about end the cycle of fear it's a book that i have that i've been reading it's really in depth and research-based it's fantastic Carrie Goldman is the mother of the Star Wars yes the she's the mother of Katie who's the star wars girl that was bullied for carrying a Star Wars water bottle and being targeted because she she's a girl and so yeah her she came a really big social sort of social media cause absolutely an anthem for Fergie girls actually so her story is in the book again I highly recommend it a lot of interesting and usable facts and literature that tell us a lot about bullying and again how to how to strategize with teachers and parents and with kids on how to overcome this in addition you can look up the anti-defamation league online a lot of resources there as well and of course any questions you cannot get answers to try to email us we can we can certainly try to help yep and again you can find us at Arkham sessions on Twitter you can find us on Facebook where the Arkham sessions there find us like us you can also email us arkham sessions at gmail com or go to draya's website under the mask online.com and email her there I'm be Ward 028 I'm at Arkham Asylum doc and that's how you can reach us great so that wraps up episode 13 and frankly I'm happy not because this was a bad episode but because it finally brings us to another one that you and I absolutely cannot wait for BRR it's getting cold in here there must be some toros in the atmosphere I mean sorry um heart of ice next week guys this one is huge it literally defined a major villain for Batman in all mediums going forward so be sure to tune in next week for that it's the tragic and very interesting story of mr. freeze oh my god if you are looking for psych ecology and Batman put together you need to go sorry this story is essential come back for this story that's next week till then i'm brian ward I'm dr. Andrea little Mindy and you've been listening to the Arkham sessions