Originally posted by spetznaz
Fear, like power, is a mix of the real and the implied. It is not always about who has the bigger guns, or the louder voice, or the more aggressive characteristics. It is much more visceral than that ....more like a sub-sonic hum that gets to your bones.
For instance, take power. When I am doing beauty parades (road shows in finance where I try to put forth one of our Funds- I am an emerging markets Fund Manager) we meet a lot of people. Some are loud, some are silent, some are acerbic, others are amiable.
However, it is always easy to tell who is the most powerful in the crowd, the person who has the most clout in making the final decision. Many a time it is not the acerbic person shooting forth a lot of questions (many of them quite silly), or the person with the domineering voice trying to assert his influence ....many a time it is the quiet person who speaks in a soft voice, and immediately everyone just keeps quiet and listens like a switch got flicked.
Same thing in hotels ...in the lobbys you'll see every now and then some big shot walk in with his personal scurity, and while many a time the security cadre is huge and imposing, the small dimunitive person positively EXUDES power. It is not how he walks, or how he talks ....it is something more ....well, primeval. You can actually tell who has the most money even in a crowd of people with a lot of money ....there is a certain 'ambience' that surrounds the person, even when there are others that are (on the exterior) far more bombastic.
Same thing with criminals ...or for that matter (since I am in emerging markets) third world dictators and despots. People like Pol Pot in Cambodia used to be quite polite looking. Currently, people like Kony of the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda look like calm stick figures .....commanding a guerilla army of people who look like they started sucking on steroids when they were tots, and have demeanors so nasty they could probably kill with a look.
I've had some investors come by (in my line of work KYC - know your customer - is very important, since some of these people are laundering money) ....it is almost easy to know who is 'wrong.' A strange hush comes across the room, the shadows seem to grow longer, one's breath seems to get shorter, and yet the person sitting across from you looks like you could shatter his skull with one kick.
Anyways, back to comics ....
....Batman seldom uses violence, and when he does (e.g Dark Knight Returns) it is not as bad as the violence Frank Castle uses on a normal day basis.
However, fear is not about the ability to wreak violence. It is more than that ....stemming from a part of the brain that was still there when our ancestors were amphibians. A thoroughly irrational aspect of the psyche that makes otherwise logical people quake like leaves in a whirlwind.
Batman is a man who dresses in dark threads and wears a cape ....yet he is in the JLA, and in the JLA it is said that the ONLY person who does not fear the Batman is Hal Jordan.
Why?
Also, the whole Sinestro ring incident, whereby Bruce Wayne was selected in our sector of the Universe, even though other characters existed that (on paper) appear to be much scarier.
Why?
Or criminals fleeing from Gotham to Bludhaven simply because of the Batman. Or criminals fleeing from Gotham to Metropolis, even though Metropolis has a demi-god from another planet who can fly, is bullet proof, and can hear a cricket chirping in India!
Why?
There are many examples that can be given, ranging from the small to some of the things that happened in FC.
Basically, while Frank Castle is feared and can do a lot of harm to a perp, there is something about Bruce Wayne that makes criminals prefer to face Superman, or makes Qwardian rings automatically get drawn to him even though they had an entire sector of the universe to choose from.
There is also a reason why members of the JLA, with even 'weak' members having powers that could make a X-team applaud with gusto, fear him ....and the only person who doesn't fear him is a GL who had the very epitome of fear, the Parallax creature, residing within him.
The difference between Castle and Wayne is like that between the leader of a local Crip gang, and the head of the Mafiya (Russian Mafia).
Sure, the head of the local Crips will be some violent gang-banger who will be very likely to shoot your head off if you even dress wrong in his neighborhood.
The head of the Moscow Mafiya on the other hand will be a very calm individual, who will positively make you shake in your boots simply by giving you a bored look.
Total aggression doesn't necessarily equal total power nor total fear. It goes deeper than that ...much deeper.
Guess which part of your post I fixed.
Uncool.