Originally post on my ao3 -
link - but I thought I should post it here too.
A ship manifesto/meta for the ship of Ghost-Maker/Batman aka Minhkhoa Khan/Bruce Wayne.
Batman | Bruce Wayne
The man, the myth, the legend. Batman is a character created in the year 1939 by the artist Bob Kane and the writer Bill Finger. Where do I even start with this character? Surely we all know his origin story by now? Bruce Wayne’s parents were killed in front of him traumatizing him for life. That experience is what led him to eventually become the Batman. This character has 80+ years of publications behind him. I’m not even sure if he has a canon characterization anymore, so I’m going to talk about my interpretation of this character.
I see Bruce Wayne as a man of contradictions. He cares about people. He thinks life is precious, but this is also a man who’s seen the worst of what humanity has to offer. It makes him paranoid and he finds it hard to trust. He’s got contingency plans for everything because it gives him a sense of control. He’s empathetic but he’s also selfish and controlling. He carries a lot of anger and I think being Batman helps him to control it but I also think due his various mental health issues he is probably emotionally numb a lot of the time. People think he’s cold but I think he’s just numb. I also think he’s bisexual.
Although because I am going to be talking about the Tynion run, I should state that his interpretation of Batman is a person who cares about everyone and genuinely wants to help people.
Ghost-Maker | Minhkhoa Khan
Ghost-Maker is a character created in the year 2020 by the artist Jorge Jimenze and the writer James Tynion IV. Ghost-Maker is a bisexual, psychopathic crime fighter. He is from Singapore. He has a plane named the Ghost-Stream and he has an A.I. assistant named Icon. He was created to be Batman’s rival. They’ve known each other since they were teens and they’ve trained under many of the same masters. Because of his psychopathy, he doesn’t feel empathy or fear. He became a crime fighter for the art of it and thinks Bruce is weak because he cares about other people. He doesn’t have a problem with killing. He also erases himself from digital media and wears a mask most of the time. According to him, only five people in the world have seen his full face and only three people in the world know his birth name.
He showed up in Gotham after Joker War to claim the city for himself and to show Bruce that his way was better despite the fact that they had an arrangement to stay out of each other’s cities. After some fighting and talking Bruce managed to convince him to stay in Gotham to help. He even agreed to the no killing rule because Bruce framed it as a challenge to test his skills. He stayed around until Batman #118 and left Gotham to train Clownhunter. He will come back in the Joshua Williamson run but I’m going to focus on the stuff Tynion wrote.
He’s introductory arc is in Batman issues 102-105 aka the Ghost Stories arc. He also have a backup story focusing on his own rogues gallery that can be found in Batman issues 107-111 and the conclusion of that story can be found in Batman 2021 Annual #1.
Their Relationship
They are friends and rivals. They have been like that since they’ve met during their teenage years and it continued into their adult years. Tynion only gave us a few glimpses into their past together. Chip Zdarsky said he will explore the friendship between them in Batman: The Knight but we have to wait on that front, so I’ll stick to what Tynion wrote.
Pre-Breakup
We only get a few glimpses of their pre-breakup relationship through the flashbacks in Batman issues 102-105. I will list them in what I think is the chronological order. We do know that they’ve known each other since they were teenagers because Bruce says this in Batman #103 about Ghost-Maker: “He’s still upset that I made fun of him when he was fifteen years old. And he’s even more upset that I’ve beaten him every time we’ve gone head-to-head since I turned twenty.” From this line I assume that they are around the same age.
Batman #104: The flashback with Nightwing is a goldmine for GhostBat quotes. These are some of Bruce’s lines describing his relationship with Ghost-Maker to Dick:
“I was just like any young man. I didn’t know who I was, or who I would become.”
“It was a lonely road, Dick… until I met a young man.”
“His ego was unbearable, but I had never met another person who thought like I do. We would stay up late, night after night, talking about the skills we wanted to learn. The sort of technology we hoped might exist in our adult lives, and all we wanted to build. We’d each come up with unsolvable mysteries and pit them against each other, trying to stump the other.”
From these quotes we can see that they were good friends and that they were emotionally close. Bruce felt comfortable enough to tell Ghost-Maker about his parents’ deaths and about his mission, which is when Ghost-Maker got super mad and tried to kill Bruce. Ghost-Maker felt betrayed because he had thought Bruce was someone like him, someone who was doing it for the art. To feel that level of anger and betrayal meant that Ghost-Maker was emotionally invested in his relationship with Bruce. This also plants the seed for their big breakup years down the line.
Batman #102: We see them fighting over a potential mentor in Dublin, Ireland, with Ghost-Maker making fun of Bruce and Bruce upset at Ghost-Maker for something he did to their master in Morocco. Here Ghost-Maker is already wearing that cloth mask he wears when he’s out of costume in the present. I’m placing this flashback here because he’s only wearing the mask and not the rest of his costume, it feels like a transition period between not wearing a mask/costume at all in the Batman #104 flashback and the full costume in the Gobi Desert flashback. This also feels transitional because Ghost-Maker is making fun of Bruce’s motivations rather than trying to convince him to do it for the art. I would also like to note the Ghost-Maker being at the same place at the same time as Bruce is implied to be not to be a coincidence but rather because Ghost-Maker wanted it to be that way.
Batman #103: We see them in the Gobi Desert on the anniversary of the Waynes’ deaths, Ghost-Maker wants to fight but Bruce tells him it’s the anniversary of his parents’ deaths. Ghost-Maker sits down besides Bruce and tells him that the training exercise is to be aware of every grain of sand and not to brood. He tells Bruce that his emotions make him vulnerable and weak, Bruce disagrees and they fight.
This flashback is great - Bruce is shirtless in the desert, sitting under a starry sky and telling Ghost-Maker “Not tonight.” Ghost-Maker sitting down besides Bruce and saying the right words to provoke Bruce into a fight. Also please note that this time Ghost-Maker explicitly sought Bruce out for a fight, which means he has a way of tracking Bruce.
The Breakup
The first 5 pages of Batman #105 is what I call their dramatic breakup in the rain. This is where they made the deal to stay out of each other’s cities. This happened years ago at the end of Bruce’s journey around the world. It was a stormy night in an airport in Argentina, Bruce was going to board the plane to go back to Gotham to finally start his crusade against crime when Ghost-Maker called out to him and tried to get him to stay. There’s some great quotes in these 5 pages, including Ghost-Maker calling out the flaws in Bruce’s motivation and how it will whittle away at his soul. Ghost-Maker then proposes that they start with a small city in Southeast Asia and slowly work their way up to a city like Gotham. When Bruce rejects the idea, Ghost-Maker calls him a coward. Bruce retaliates by saying there is a part of Ghost-Maker that is broken and he is just angry that Bruce wasn’t broken in the same way. This causes Ghost-Maker to punch Bruce in the face, telling him “No! You don’t get to say my name again. You don’t get to see my face again.” This is when they make the deal to stay out of each other’s cities.
First of all I need to point out that trying to stop someone from leaving just as they are about to board a plane is a popular romantic trope and so is breaking up with someone in the pouring rain. The scene got even more romantic when Ghost-Maker proposed that they can be crime-fighters together. He wanted a future with Bruce but when Bruce rejected the idea and claimed that he had no interest in becoming like Ghost-Maker, Ghost-Maker became enraged and denied Bruce the privilege of seeing his face and using his name again. That feels very much like what people would say during a breakup. There’s no indication that Bruce wanted to sever their relationship during the argument but as soon as Ghost-Maker said that he couldn’t see his face or use his name again, Bruce told Ghost-Maker to stay out of Gotham. And for the most part they stayed away from each other and had their own adventures. Read the Ghost-Make backups to see what he’d been up to for all these years.
I would also like to point out that this breakup was inevitable due to the way Ghost-Maker kept on trying to get Bruce to give up on his mission and his emotions. Bruce found this to be irritating and might be part of the reason he rejected Ghost-Maker’s proposal. What I’m most interested in is how Ghost-Maker kept on emphasizing that Bruce was going to fail and get killed if he continued to care about other people. He told Bruce that his emotions made him vulnerable, that he can’t save everyone and he can’t save himself from a crime that’s already happened. This really shows that he is emotionally attached to Bruce and he understands Bruce’s motivations but he doesn’t want Bruce to die. So he is trying to fix things the only way he knows how, which is by beating Bruce into submission and Bruce does not appreciate that.
Post-Breakup
Batman #104: We learn from Nightwing that once during his Robin years, he and Batman were following a small-time nuisance on par with the Penny Plunderer who was fleeing to Singapore. When they landed in the country Ghost-Maker was waiting for them on the tarmac, he and Batman argued in the pouring rain as Robin watched on from the batplane. Batman returns to the plane and tells Robin that they were leaving and that Ghost-Maker will ship the villain back to Gotham. Robin gets confused and Batman explains his relationship with Ghost-Maker to him and calls Ghost-Maker “Probably the most selfish, arrogant person I have ever met in my life.” which really sounds like what someone would call an ex after a bad breakup. Bruce also admits to Dick that he misses Ghost-Maker. Which is why I think Bruce pursued the small-time villain all the way to Singapore, he went there knowing there’s a chance that Ghost-Maker would show up. He wanted to see his friend. This part of the flashback echos the flashback in Batman #102 but with Bruce creating the meeting conditions instead of Ghost-Maker.
Nightwing also said that Bruce reached out to Ghost-Maker when he started Batman Incorporated, but it didn’t go well. This echos the flashback in Batman #104 but with Bruce tracking down Ghost-Maker instead of the other way around. I would also like to point out that Pre-Breakup has Ghost-Maker seeking Bruce out and Post-Breakup has Bruce seeking out Ghost-Maker.
Also this quote from Nightwing is great: “I had it in my head that he was Bruce’s real first partner, and I want to beat him up. Y’know. Prove I was the better crime-fighter. But then it was just the fact that Bruce never talked about him. I honestly can’t think of anybody else he has that kind of relationship with.”
Reconciliation
Outside of the flashbacks, issues 102-105 is their reconciliation arc. It starts with Ghost-Maker popping up in Gotham city giving a speech on how much he hates the city and questions why anyone would want to live in it. It really sounds like Ghost-Maker is bitter that Bruce chose Gotham over him. Ghost-Maker hacks some computers, kills some bad guys, he and Batman clash, argue on how to deal with Gotham’s various problems. Ghost-Maker claims that he solved a bunch of crimes in Gotham before he even got off of his plane and wants to kill Clownhunter in order to prove to Bruce that his way was better. Long story short he kidnaps Harley Quinn, Batman and Clownhunter and puts them in an abandoned wing of Arkham Asylum.
Batman awoke to Ghost-Maker patching up his wounds and Ghost-Maker tells him that “I want you to understand that I’m doing all this for your benefit. It’s beyond time you faced your weakness and overcame it.“ Since this is the reconciliation arc their biggest personal conflict is going to be addressed, mainly caring about other people and killing criminals. Ghost-Maker doesn’t care about other people but he seems to be very attached to Bruce, thus he keeps on trying to force his ideals onto Bruce. Bruce is very empathetic and can’t stop caring about other people, so he keeps on rejecting Ghost-Maker’s attempts which Ghost-Maker saw as a rejection of himself as a whole but from what we can see Bruce never rejected Ghost-Maker as a person. He just rejects the way Ghost-Maker fights crime.
I would also like to point out that Ghost-Maker took off Batman’s top in order to stitch up his wounds and Batman spends the most of issue #104 and issue #105 shirtless. Ghost-Maker didn’t take away the utility belt which is how Bruce frees himself and Harley. Harley gets her moment to shine and essentially talks Clownhunter into leaving her alone. Batman and Ghost-Maker fight again. This time with Bruce saying that if he just killed all the criminals he encountered then no one would learn anything and nothing would change. Eventually Batman drops the sword and says that he didn’t want to fight Ghost-Maker anymore. Ghost-Maker loses interest and goes to leave through the window, stating that he had wanted to see the batmobile. Bruce stops him from leaving and asks him to stay in Gotham because he could use the help. He even gets Ghost-Maker to adhere to the no-killing rule by stating that it made things harder. Did I also mention he’s still shirtless in this scene? Because he is and he only puts the top half of the batsuit back on once Ghost-Maker indicates that he was going to stay.
I honestly love issue #105 because it starts with the flashback of the two of them breaking up in the rain and it ends with the two of them running off to fight crime together. Remember how Ghost-Maker wanted them to be a crime-fighting duo? Well, now they are! It just took them a while to finally get there. It had to be Bruce to make the proposal this time because he rejected Ghost-Maker the first time around. I think Bruce knew Ghost-Maker wouldn’t say no because he knew if Ghost-Maker didn’t care at all then he wouldn’t have come to Gotham and wouldn’t have tried to make Bruce see things his way and besides we know that Bruce misses Ghost-Maker.
Post-Reconciliation
Issues 106 - 117, plus the Batman 2021 Annual is what I call their Post-Reconciliation phase, we get to see more of Ghost-Maker and Bruce’s dynamic play out. This is where they have silly bets like who can get back to the townhouse faster and fun banter with each other.
Batman #106: We see Bruce and Ghost-Maker hangout in the garage of Bruce’s townhouse and Ghost-Maker is showing his whole face which throws out the whole “You don’t get to see my face again.” thing right out the window. They also discuss what’s going on in the city whilst sparring together.
Batman #109: Ghost-Maker shows Harley Quinn his base called the Haunt which he designed to top the batcave. It’s got a bigger dinosaur. Ghost-Maker reveals a couple of things about himself such as he was diagnosed with psychopathy when he was eight and decided to challenge himself by trying to fix the world. He also reveals that only five people in the world had seen his whole face and only three people know his birth name. Which is probably why he denied his face and name to Bruce during the breakup, because he felt like Bruce didn’t deserve that knowledge anymore.
Batman #110: This chapter shows their tacit understanding with Batman setting off a series of bombs which he knew Ghost-Maker knew how to decode and trusting Ghost-Maker to get in position in time to catch him as he falls out of the building. Ghost-Maker jumps out of the plane, catches Batman and gets them both to safety, despite the risks involved and then chiding Batman for being irresponsible. Ghost-Maker patches Bruce up in the Ghost-Stream and reveals that he has an extra batsuit lying around which leads to this hilarious conversation:
Ghost-Maker: I have an extra suit of yours in the back when you’re ready…
Batman: You stole one of my batsuits?
Ghost-Maker: We can have that conversation later.
Batman #113: This is yet another great chapter for GhostBat, in this chapter they go inside of Bruce’s mind in order to see what Scarecrow had implanted in his psyche. What could be more intimate than going inside someone’s mind with permission? Ghost-Maker also comments in this chapter that he could see why Bruce has some many proteges running around because keeping up with what’s going in Gotham is exhausting. Once again their banter is great:
Ghost-Maker: Why are you asking me?
Batman: There’s a risk of burning out the moral center of the user’s brain. Only a small one. But enough.
Ghost-Maker: Ah, so only a psychopath would do.
Batman: Maybe I’m just more okay with using you as a guinea pig.
Ghost-Maker: Hah. Just to warn you -- I’m likely to plant a deep, subconscious inferiority complex of myself in your mind.
Batman: No, you won’t.
Ghost-Maker: Why not?
Batman: You’d never know when you beat me honestly, or if you only beat me when cheating.
They go inside of Bruce’s mind and find the Scarecrow’s subliminal programming. Bruce is incapacitated as a result and Ghost-Maker had to do the deprogramming part and I wish I could quote the entire speech but I’m scared that I might just quote the entire issue. Some highlights include “You trained alongside very handsome rivals.”, “And you made some very good cars.” and “You’ve already gone through the Fear State and survived.”
And whilst they were psychically connected (Ghost-Maker called it “A real communion.”) Ghost-Maker showed Bruce a memory of his own. Turns out Ghost-Maker had met with a young Jonathan Crane in order to learn about the nature of fear. He did this because Bruce told him that his lack of emotions held him back. And there’s also this quote from Ghost-Maker: “I wanted to understand you better… and I wanted to understand your fear.” The emotional investment is strong in this one.
Batman #116: Ghost-Maker is only in a couple of pages but boy do they show just how important Bruce is to him. Because he says this as he takes on the Peacekeepers: “How very rude… you all coming at me for the kill, when I’ve made a promise to a dear friend not to kill anyone.”
Batman 2021 Annual #1: I’m not sure where to place this because they are dealing with Firefly in this one and it’s mostly Ghost-Maker’s backstory. We finally learn that his name is Minhkhoa Khan and he is from Singapore. We see the conclusion of his story from the backups and we see why he was so determined to bring down Madam Midas. He went after Madam Midas because years ago her father forced his parents into selling their company to him. Maybe he and Bruce aren’t so different after all. There’s also some great quotes from this chapter, including the moment when Bruce calls Ghost-Maker “Khoa” which means that Ghost-Maker is allowing Bruce to use his name again. The chapter ends with them going off to race their cars. They are so cute together.
“You can pretend all you want, Ghost-Maker, that your brain chemistry means you’re only doing this for glory. But I know you better than that.”
“You spent years focused on a single crime lord. That dedication isn’t about glory or efficacy. There’s a reason this victory matters to you. A reason why you care.”
“Your theory does not make sense. I am the Ghost-Maker. I don’t care about anything.”
“Khoa…”
I love how indulgent Bruce is with Khoa’s in the Post-Reconciliation issues. There’s multiple times where Bruce agrees to Khoa’s bets and contests. As soon as Khoa commented on how he wanted to see the batmobile Bruce tells him that he’s building a new one. He agreed to the sparring match in issue #106 as soon as Khoa claimed that he was bored. And I love how they bounce ideas off of each other and discuss what’s going on in Gotham during Fear State.
And then Ghost-Maker left Gotham in Batman #118 because Joshua Williamson had taken over as writer but he is coming back in Batman #121.
Conclusion
Ghost-Maker’s run in the Batman comic was a short one but I really liked his interactions with Bruce. I love their banter and levity it brings to the story. I like the way they understand each other but don’t necessarily agree on everything. I like this type of relationship for Bruce. Ghost-Maker is an equal, a rival and a foil who isn’t a villain. I also see the romantic overtures of their relationship. Just the way Bruce described their relationship to Dick in issue #104, about how they used to stay up late just talking about stuff and coming up with mysteries to stump each other. It really felt like one of those ‘my love interest was great until I discovered their terrible secret’ plot twists.
I already mentioned their dramatic breakup in the rain, about how Khoa had basically asked Bruce to elope with him to Southeast Asia only to be rejected. Agreeing to stay out of each other’s cities is like how couples would avoid each other after breaking up. Bruce reaching out to Ghost-Maker for Batman Inc. is evidence that he wanted to make up with the man. In the end it took a combination of Ghost-Maker breaking their agreement by coming to Gotham and Bruce reaching out to Ghost-Maker by asking him to stay for them to reconcile and be on speaking terms again. I see them operating as a great team and I definitely see them as the type of couple who finds taking down criminals together romantic. I also think that they are very much emotionally attached to each other within the text of the comic.
What I’m saying is that if you’ve read this far then you should really give shipping them a try and please go read the issues I mentioned in this meta so you can see the gayness for yourself.
Thank you for reading my ramblings. Leave me a comment if I managed to convince you or if you just wanted to scream about this ship with me.
The End
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