I've been kicking around the notion of looking at what Terry McGinnis' most common villains reflect about him since I bought the box sets of Batman Beyond from a coworker of Alex during his years in the Town He Tries to Forget. That was a decade ago, and I just kept putting it off.
There's three villains that show up three times in the 52 episodes. Maybe four, because I don't remember Shriek showing up a third time, but the episode summaries insist there's one where he buried Batman alive and Bruce and Max have to find him. So maybe I'll get to him, but let's talk about Spellbinder.
Spellbinder's shtick in Batman Beyond is basically he's a disgruntled civil servant. More specifically, a school psychiatrist who gets fed up with listening to teenagers talk about the problems their rich parents will fix while he works for relative peanuts. So instead of using hypnosis to help them reach the root of their problems, he uses it to let them experience their fantasies, while they're actually committing crimes for him. When that first scheme fails, he tries a VR interactive experience thing that is highly addictive, so they'll willingly steal to pay for another turn. His third appearance, he gives up on getting people to steal for him, and instead tricks the police into thinking Batman killed Mad Stan (we'll probably get to Mad Stan the next time I do one of these).
Terry's thing is that he had a lot of anger about a lot of stuff. Probably the failure of his parents' marriage, certainly about his father Warren's willingness to be the good corporate drone and eat shit with a smile. Then Warren's murdered, because he was going to stand up and do the right thing, and there's even more anger. And Terry ultimately, once he's gotten his hands on Batman's suit, uses it and his anger to fight crime. Protect people from people with power who try to abuse it.
Spellbinder obviously took his grudge and his power and used it for himself, which is Villainy 101. He's also a twisted reflection of both Terry's father figures. Warren McGinnis in the sense that both of them are ultimately workers beholden to higher authorities. Spellbinder worked at a school. He's got rules and regulations he's gotta follow. Every few months, he's probably gotta bring something to put out in the break room. Chip in for community coffee even if he doesn't drink it. Be there for school dances and shit.
Terry's dad is a researcher, and a good one. But at the end of the day, he works for Wayne-Powers, and so he answers to a shitbag like Derek Powers. He doesn't have much control over his life. He's forced to do ethically questionable things or risk his job (or his family's well-being.) Warren decided to stand up against his boss, while Spellbinder decided to punch down at his patients. Differing responses to the pressure of being a cog in the machine.
Bruce Wayne is no cog. He's either the one controlling the machine, or by the time the series begins, a person with enough money to remove himself from the mess entirely. But Spellbinder mirrors Wayne in that he manipulates teenagers to do shit for him. His first two appearances are both about Spellbinder getting high school kids to steal for him, so he doesn't have to be at risk. Bruce isn't Batman anymore because he couldn't hack it. Because he didn't think he could actually protect people without becoming something he despised (a killer), not because he wasn't willing to risk himself. And Terry approached him, which makes a difference.
But Bruce definitely understands what makes Terry tick, and he certainly uses that to his advantage. Terry wanted the chance to bring his father's killer to justice, and he got that chance because Bruce Wayne let him use the suit. Just as Spellbinder can use what he knows about his students to make illusions or hypnotic suggestions that are most effective on them. Terry works better when he has something to push back against, so Bruce is in his ear all the time, giving him that something if nothing else is available. Maybe Terry would have gone off the rails badly without that opportunity, and so Wayne is ultimately looking out for him, while Spellbinder doesn't give a damn about people who are supposed to be able to trust him to help.
Although there's also that episode of Justice League Unlimited where Terry has been Batman for years and is clearly chafing under Bruce forcing him to keep secrets from Dana and do everything Bruce's ways. A universe where Bruce Wayne is a bitter, lonely old man estranged from every former love and protege, with a Gotham even shittier than his was. Basically defeated on every conceivable level. So maybe Bruce isn't looking out for Terry, and is using him as much as Spellbinder does.
But that episode also said Terry was genetically Bruce's son due to some bullshit Amanda Waller set up to try and make sure there was always a Batman, and that's honestly better left shoved into a dustbin and forgotten.
The third episode is really more about Barbara Gordon as Commissioner, and her doubts about both Bruce and Terry. She knows Terry's Batman, knows why he's Batman. Knows about his anger issues in the past. Knows from experience how Bruce Wayne can twist people around and drive them until they burn out. So it's not hard for her to think Terry could go too far and kill a bad guy. Still, Spellbinder's shifted his style a bit. Still manipulating others, but instead of targeting the relatively powerless, who inevitably lead the authorities (or Batman) right to him, he targets the authorities to send them to Batman. Plays off the fear of vigilantes. Sure, it's fun to see someone in a costume saving lives and punching bad guys, but that's only as long as you agree with who they're punching, and how much damage they're doing. It doesn't take far to tip the perception from "costumed do-gooder" to "loose cannon."
Spellbinder's ultimately the guy with no power for years, feeling put upon and powerless, who then abuses his power as soon as he gets some. (Pretty sure Darkseid made a demonstration like that once on Apokolips by turning his slaves into overseers.) The kind of person teenagers suspect most adults are; ostensibly there to help, but really there to control and condescend to them.
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