Batman, Turkey, Sues Warner Brothers, Chris Nolan

Mayor Huseyin Kalkan of Batman, Turkey, is suing both Warner Brothers and Vhris Nolan, the director of Batman: The Dark Knight for using the name of his town without permission. On the face of it, this seems like another silly lawsuit.

One stated reason for the suit is name infringement, even though the name of the town is actually short for Batý Raman and has nothing to do with a disturbed billionaire dressing up like a bat and manhandling criminals. Batman is the capital of Batman Province and is in an oil producing region in Turkish Kurdistan.

The other stated reason for the law suit is that Mayor Kalkan is blaming the influence of the Caped Crusader for the high rate of female suicides. Many of these female suicides are "honor suicides" which are like "honor killings" but involves a girl being forced to kill herself instead of being killed for the sin of having sex outside of marriage, dressing in an immodest manner, getting raped, or even casually glancing at a male not her close relative.

If course a number of questions arise due to the Batman, Turkey, law suit. First, as Variety suggests, the law suit comes about seventy years too late:

"No one from the town of Batman has explained why it took so many years to take legal action. Batman first appeared as a comic book character in 1939 and the "Batman" TV series started in 1966. Tim Burton's first big screen rendition for Warner Bros. came out in 1989."

Doubtless one reason is money. Chris Nolan's Batman: The Dark Knight has made just over a billion dollars so far. No doubt Mayor Kalken of Batman, Turkey, sees an opportunity to get a slice of the action.

The other reason likely has to do with the female "honor suicides." Turkey has officially been a secular country since its founding in the wake of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. The fact that the town of Batman, Turkey, is having a problem with Islamist inspired female suicides must be fairly embarrassing to Mayor Kalkan. Added to the fact that Kalkan is a member of the Democratic Socialist Party, suspected of having ties with the Kurdish terrorist group PPK, the plague of female "honor suicides" might cause undue attention to be directed toward Kalkan by the government in Ankara.

So the Batman lawsuit, besides being an obvious money grab, is also a CYA attempt to shift blame for the female "honor suicides" from the Mayor, responsible for law enforcement in Batman, Turkey, to Hollywood and a fictional, comic book super hero. That's a pity, since perhaps Mayor Kalkan's efforts would be better spent putting a stop to these "honor suicides" and improving the lot of his female citizens.

Source: Mayor of Batman sues WB, Nolan, Ali Jaafar, Variety, November 11th, 2008