The Bruins Biggest Bear

by tim sale

down BatCat memory lane Batman: Gotham Adventures #50

I don’t have the official answer either but I am thinking no, since Selina didn’t know who Batman was in that timeline? I think what they’re trying to do with the Doc Manhattan stuff is push toward restoring the “old” timeline. So not really a reboot as much as a return to.

That’s a good point. To further confirm, or make things more confusing, we get this from today’s Batman:

This leads me to believe that the mob boss thing has indeed been retconned, since Selina inherited her mob faction from her father in New 52, Rex Calabrese. In Batman Eternal Selina mentioned that her father abandoned her at a young age and resented him for that. Previously in Batman #11 (Rebirth) Selina told Bruce that her parents abandoned her at a young age and she never knew why. It could be that that was the abandonment she was referring to in Batman Eternal and Batman #11, however, and here’s where things get messy, Rex had mentioned that Selina had been raised by “the Kyles” afterward, and that she wasn’t really Selina Kyle implying that that was an assumed identity and the Kyles were some sort of surrogate family. 

As we all know in Rebirth Selina grew up in an orphanage that was later destroyed by terrorists, and the fact that she is now claiming that she didn’t know her father seems to confirm that her New 52 “origin story”, and the mob boss thing by extension, has been retconned (I highly doubt that Tom King was keeping up Selina’s New 52 story anyway). In her Pre-Flashpoint origin she definitely knew who her father was, so it could be something in between or completely different. Who knows. 

I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that Douchbag Kyle wasn’t Seline’s bio dad (I know I’ve read it in the Long Halloween verse, cause in that world Carmine Falcone’s is her bio dad, but you know how comic book origins change for the side charas), so that could explain the line in Batman #35. 

This was the premise of Catwoman: When in Rome. Catwoman believed that she was actually the daughter of Carmine Falcone but was unable to prove it, but Jeph Loeb left the ending open ended enough for it to still be potentially true. 

Catwoman still identified Maria and Brian (who is the doucebag Kyle you’re referring to??) as her parents sporadically in the Pre-flashpoint, the latter not being a very fond remembrance. 

I’m not sure if Selina ever really considered Carmine Falcone to be her “father” because he had never been a part of her life. It’s plausible that was referring to him, but just based on way she described her parents in Batman #10 it sounds more like she was referring to a two parent unit. 

But on that same note by King’s description her parents, for whatever time they spent with her, sounded loving by Selina’s account, which is very contrast to the Pre-Flashpoint Kyle family dynamic.

King kind of cycled back on this in Batman #35 when she said that she didn’t know her father. She either meant that she didn’t know him at all or that she barely remembers him therefore she didn’t know him, which would make more sense given the context from Batman #10*. It’s definitely open to interpretation since we’re working with very scant details here. King’s implications sounds to me like something closer to her Pre-Flashpoint parentage with Maria and Brian, but it does sound markedly different. So I’m guessing it’s somewhat similar in terms of the family unit, not violent like in her PF origin, and that she was abandoned before her formative years hence she has little memories of her parents. 

*I mis-cited the issue reference in my previous post. It’s from Batman #10, not #11

I think it is far more likely that King is just ignoring it because the continuity doesn’t fit the story he wants to tell. I mean, it’s what he did with Ivy; saying she isn’t a villain and has never killed, even though she killed in The Cycle of Life and Death a few times (and The Cycle of Life and Death was brought up in Trinity). If they retconned Genevieve Valentine‘s run, then that’d just be a shame; since it was fantastic. How Valentine doesn’t have a book right now is beyond me. She’d be perfect for Wonder Woman; anything to get Robinson off the book would be nice.