@@Yuxxy420 hahaha yeah. Once that shit hit 1m views. I told him i was like, "yo jobber, thats shit is getting to 2 mil". He told me nah and we made a bet on wether it would or not. I won. Jobber owes me an Owlman video now
@@obiyofi9792 if people understood the actual premise of the concept - that the forces of the Dark Multiverse are BAD IDEAS, that were too edgelord bs to exist in canon, but are now invading canon to destroy it and assert their own existence - it would work better. But it ended up another case of “audience the satire was calling out embrace the character unironically” that so continuously plagues such attempts at meta-satire.
It really doesn't matter, because if he makes the choice to let the bomb explote, there is a universe where he made the opposite choice. Thus there is an exact replica of himself still out there planing to destroy everything.
Actually no. He was trying to make the singular action that he made that could matter. By failing to do something that mattered, it did matter. Not only was he wrong, but arrogantly so.
@@axolotl1777 if he had hope, then it would have mattered. Edit: Owlman is what bad writers think nihilists are. He is not written well, but he is well acted with snippy comments
@@FilmFlam-8008it would be a shame to think of his character as a representation of some sort of philosophical ideal instead of what it truly is, a person whom has founded his ideals on the structure of the fiction that he lives in. He's right about what he says because it really doesn't matter what happens to him, there's an infinite number of him that didn't do what he did and an infinite number that did, the only thing that could feasibly make it matter is by doing what he planned to, but he didn't, so it doesn't.
The writer for this movie(the late Dwayne McDuffie) said that the moment Owlman realized that he had a choice in deactivating the bomb, then his decision no longer mattered as it was no longer the prime Earth. Such a good movie.
@@wolfofwarframe3807 Ah. I wasn’t exactly paying attention to the other comments, but I suppose it does make that explicitly clear. The writer was always pretty upfront with answering questions in his old forum. Unfortunately, I think it was one of the biggest factor that got him released from the company despite the significant sales he contributed.
Ah, because in another timeline, he would press the button, creating another universe. So therefore, why should he make that decision. So he doesn’t need to press the button because his decision doesn’t matter
You gotta hand it to Owlman, he had conviction. Usually when faced with certain death, villains will compromise their beliefs in order to survive. Owlman did not, and when just mere seconds away from his demise, uttered out the only words that he truly believed, “It doesn’t matter.”
Not really. There will be universes where he desperately tries to save his own life. There may be even ones where he succeeds in disarming the bomb. As long as it's a non-zero possibility. His choice of accepting his fate is neither unique nor special.
@@tactishovel2247 Well, at least to the versions that wants to save their of life. That version would think him surviving would matter. I'll go on to say that the Owlmen that chooses life would be the special or unique ones.
I believe the moment Owlman arrives in Earth Prime, it became a copy. He isn’t on the original Earth anymore. And every second he and Batman existed on the planet, he spiraled away from Earth Prime faster and faster. Like he said, it doesn’t matter. It’s impossible for him to reach Earth Prime
Interesting like you can't exist in a place and time that only exist within one time. Since they exist at different periods in time like 1 second after the last second they could not have existed within earth prime. The more time passes by for them the further they exist outside of earth prime
Every move, every punch, and every choice of words Batman and Owlman made has diverged into multiple branches of Earth Prime. It will forever be out of Owlman's reach, he was doomed to fail.
That’s not how it works though he’s never been on that earth one in that time line and it started to diverge from the regular universe was before all of that other stuff that couldn’t happen in earth prime.
When you think of it like that, you would have to chase Earth Prime in a sense, but he could never catch it. If reality is a tree, and Earth Prime is a trunk, Owlman would have to run down a rapidly growing branch. The closer he gets to the trunk, the faster the branch grows never able to make it to Earth Prime because his very existence was made from a decision
@@god.usopp2yearsago115 I mean yes... Like... When I watched Oppenheimer and they were at the final moments of setting up the bomb... They asked everyone to leave the tent the "Atomic" bomb was in for safety. I'm like...why... But also... Dark humor.
@@Wr-v1i I try not too... To many "Pitch Meetings", HISHE and Everything Wrong with I love the humor. I loved this version of justice league... "We both looked into the abyss, but when it looked back at us, you blinked." Straight up 🔥🔥🔥 quote
I love how when owlman tells Batman that there are alternate versions of him that he would like its never stated that he researched other versions of him he just knows
One of the few times where the movie adaptation that attempts to make the original more high stakes and conventional actually works. The original comic and this movie can be consumed separately and enjoyed on their own without either diminishing the other. Wish more adaptations were like this.
Owlman is my favourite alternate universe “Batman” that went off the deep end. Because he maintains Batman’s strengths and social flaws but they are increased ten fold because he holds nothing back. His tech is more deadly, his standard outfit is stronger and more durable and he is stone cold. But one flaw of Batman’s that is emphasised in Owlman is arrogance, and that became his downfall in his final fight.
This is why one of my favorite lines in any Batman media is "We both looked into the abyss, but when it looked back, you blinked". Owlman is such a unique character because he thinks he understands infinity, but in reality he doesn't grasp it nearly as well as he thinks he does. He's like someone who only half understands the concept, because he is limited by his outlook on humanity. He contradicts himself by both claiming free will is an illusion, yet also that human choices are to blame for the chaos of things. The very idea he could destroy all of humanity or reality is a ultimately futile goal. Even if he succeeded, given infinite possibilities and infinite time, eventually the earth would return as would humans. If there is even the smallest possibility of something happening, it will happen, given enough time. Batman on the other hand has a much deeper understanding of infinity and free will. He understands it, but rather than tries to control it, he embraces it. Both of them ultimately come to the same conclusion that "It doesn't matter" but for Batman, that means "I'm still going to do what I think is right." Batman isn't shaken by the perceived futility of his goals, or that he will never truly rid the world entirely of evil, he just does what he can and as much as he can. Batman perceives this knowledge as liberating, where Owlman's perceives it as imprisoning.
or maybe it could be explained that we are all actors playing our predestined roles. we make choices in an illusory manner. we think we are in control when we are always doing what we are meant to do.
it wouldn't even matter if he destroyed that earth. the moment he set foot on it and made the decision to destroy it it would no longer be prime earth but a varient.
What I love about Batman is that despite his cynicism and witnessing the worst out of people every night, he refuses to give up his hope of making the world a better place for those who deserve it
No one's talking about how fitting the music is, how it adds to this quite cinematic masterpiece of a existential crisis. And how it doesn't drown out the dialogue. 10/10 video.
No real philosopher would ever put any stock in nihilism. Nihilism is a shitty non-philosophy, and everyone knows it. Even the edgelords and Onision fans who claim to practice and believe in nihilism are deceiving themselves, because nihilism... well... Isn't anything.
Imagine being an alien from a different planet and hearing some guy explain that somehow erasing Earth Prime will undo the whole universe like your choices didn't even exist.
What I admire about him is that he 100% believes what he says, even at the very end of his life he just smiles and says "It doesnt matter." that is truly respectable in a character even if he is completely nuts.
A lot of people interpret his final line as him knowing another him will succeed, I interpret it differently. To me, it's a final resignation of his effort and the only logical conclusion his character could come to. He tried to make the one choice that mattered, failed, and realized the true futility of it all. Why even try to make that choice? Why destroy it all? What's the point? He was desperately trying to do SOMETHING that mattered, but that's the thing, nothing matters. He didn't realize that all this was a futile attempt to find meaning within the meaningless until it was too late. He realized that there was no point in trying and finally gave in, failing to see the beauty in life's chaotic nature. Edit: Wanna know something cool? Almost every reply to this comment provides alternate explanations to each other, each of which disagreeing with mine. All stemming from one line...God I love this movie
While that’s true, it also doesn’t matter whether he aborts the bomb because whether he disarms it or not, there is an owl man who does make that choice now
I see it as him thinking that he could just hit abort and save his life. But since he would be stuck on that earth unable "to make the only choice that really matters", he doesn't care if he lives or dies.
@@Alistair_McCullom He wouldn't be stuck. That's the point. Batman tossed the portal-device towards him and it can be seen lying near him on the ice planet. But since disarming the bomb is a choice, it doesn't matter what he does, an alternate version of him already chose differently.
He says it doesn't matter because if he tried to abort the bomb he would just create another split in the multiverse. Him not making a choice at all is his last effort to stop another split happening
I feel the opposite. His resolve, his philosophy, he himself, all true to his goal. In order to live by what you preach, one day you must die by it. Otherwise he would have aborted and tried again. It does not matter because "x"... No, simply because truly, it does not matter. Nothing does. This is true for earth prime as much as its for every other universe, perhaps this was his final enlightenment.
@SDSwampert And here I was gonna say something stupid like "complex? he's a nihilist." But that's what makes him complex as implied with his conversation with SuperWoman about having looked at the multi-verse.
I actually based the final boss of my D&D campaign off of this line of thinking. Years ago Zephyr and his two allies began to search for ways to kill his father, who had taken over a city as the un-rightful chosen of Ra. In his search, he learned of the true nature of his world, in how it belonged to a repetitive cycle of rebirth and destruction that has been going on forever. He learned that due to this infinite nature of cycles, anything had already happened and no matter his choices, there would always be a version of this world where he did the opposite. It sickened him... Thus he plans to end the cycle, as that would be the only action that would ever matter.
I love his philosophy so much. He made the decision to make the only “decision” that would matter by ending the multiverse. Then he acknowledge someone else made a decision to stop him, ultimately making a decision that matters. Maybe there’s a version that no one decided to stop. But it doesn’t matter to him. He made his decision, and saw it through til the end, despite someone making the choice to stop him.
Well here's the neat thing. He's not on earth prime. He's on a variant of earth prime, where he decides to end the multiverse. Which is a decision and every decision has the opposite decision. When batman showed up that made another earth prime
Wait I don't get it. He wanted to do the only thing that mattered, but batman stopped him, making batman the man to do something that mattered. But why didn't he just abort and try again so HE could be the one to do something that matters?
They are different concepts. Owl man is a Batman who decided that everything is futile. A Batman who looked into the abyss of the multiverse and couldn’t accept the concept of his own futility. The Batman who laughs is what happens if the joker ever wins. A batman who became the embodiment of his greatest enemy. All the insanity and malevolence of the joker but all of the knowledge and resources of Batman.
Something that always confused me. There’s truly an infinite number of universes. Owl Man has the capability to destroy everything. Wouldn’t that mean there’s an infinite amount of people capable of destroying everything? Meaning there’s also an infinite amount of people that would have succeeded in destroying everything?
I mean yes and no, that's why multiverse is still just a theory. Because what you're saying is true but there's only ONE Earth Prime, the original. There can't be multiple earth primes which is why it was so important for him to detonate the bomb there.
And all those branches died out. This Earth Prime is the most recent common ancestor, so to speak, of all of these parallel multiverses; all those othet Earth Primes have already been destroyed by their Owl Man or someone else.
Exactly where this theory falls on its head. Earth Prime can't be destroyed because once you learn of its existence, it's no longer Earth Prime. Therefore, there is no Earth Prime. The Earth Prime that Owlman traveled to was not the real Earth Prime, but rather a copy of Earth Prime that was created upon him traveling to it. Multiverse theory gets complicated around these parts. Good thing it's not real
@@HeWhoPwnsNoobs true, there's only ONE Earth Prime. But wouldn't there be also other versions of Owlman (or at least someone similar) who would try to destroy the ONE Earth Prime? Because it makes no sense out of infinite universes, only ONE person not only found Earth Prime, but decided to destroy it
James Woods voice made this character truly epic in my opinion. Soothing, subtle and yet evil. Everything he says sounds like a lullaby cradeling you to death
One thing I find interesting here is that Batman gave owlman an out. He didn’t break the terminal, the abort was still there. He wasn’t stranded, Batman tossed the teleporter there with him. Because whether it matters or not, Batman doesn’t kill. It was entirely owlman’s decision not to save himself. He could have even gone back to “earth prime” to blow it up, but realized it wouldn’t really make a difference.
yeah you both are right the moment he had a decision is the moment where it splits off even more and he isn't on earth prime because of the decision to abort the bomb
Worst part is he realized even if he did succeed and set off the bomb, nothing would ever happen to the other universes, as there is another timeline where Batman didn’t interrupt him and he set the bomb off, meaning that his whole crusade was doomed from the beginning to end in failure
I remember being a kid watching this movie and after the end i asked my father why did he say it doesnt matter? My father replied its because he believed it. In that moment i learned what conviction was and what it meant to those who have it and are brave enough to die for it.
@PrinceTrunks92 Y'know it's sad how I keep coming across people like you who show me how smart humans can be. Yet I'm gonna leave this video and see something that'll remind me of why I assumed us humans are the dumbest species in the first place.
I came into realisation myself when I was depressed and then I realised it was the reason I didn't end myself. Nhilism is a bliss that you can only obtain when you're at the turning point in life...later i realised it was already a philosophy..😮
Really? Cause i thought the reason he commited crimes is due to his nihilistic view on the world. Edit: or he just a liar and doesn't care about his belief cause you know, only loves to spread chaos
Owlman's dilemma is so very interesting to me. He wants to reach a "prime" universe, absolutely devoid of any choice, and destroy it. The thing is, him being present in earth prime makes it open to chance, and thus no longer earth prime. It's like one of those graphs that get infinitely smaller but never reach 0, forever teetering on the edge of reachin Earth Prime. His final realization, in the end, is that it doesn't matter - he had a choice, and it made him realize that wasn't earth prime anymore - it doesn't matter if he wins or loses, his chance was already gone, and was never achievable in the first place
@@ilichbkv5913 Every time you make a decision, two parallel universes are created - one where you made that decision, and one where you didn't make it. Earth Prime is a single dimension - the original Earth where no decisions were ever made, life never started because starting life would be starting possibilities. The very presence of life in Earth Prime brings the burden of choice, and thus creates separate universes - meaning as long as life exists in a dimension, it cannot be Earth Prime
@@ilichbkv5913 because as soon as he gets back to Earth Prime, it'll stop being Earth Prime again. He'll never reach that dimension because it is conceptually unreachable
The end fight was dope. It wasn't only a clash between a favorite superhero and his evil counterpart, it was a clash of two whole philosophies; unhinged nihilism vs healthy stoicism. "Nothing matters" vs. "When the abyss looked back at us, you blinked".
@@SirToaster9330 then you don't understand stoicism. If I had to put it in the simplest way, it's about not letting an external stimulus jolt your set of emotions into destroying yourself and being accountable for your own actions.
Batman isn’t a stoic and his mindset isn’t healthy. Don’t get me wrong he is my goat. But he is by no means a stoic he constantly gets controlled by his emotions he just doesn’t kill and that’s how far he won’t go. I agree it’s two sides of the same coin dynamic tbf. Batman is unhinged in changing the world and saving everyone and he is uncompromising on this (hence no kill etc) while owl man is as you say unhinged nihilism where nothing matters and as the Wonder Woman clone convo and his death shows he is uncompromising on this belief.
That little "it doesn't matter" at the end gives me these strange chills. Owlman as a character is so fascinating to me because I can fully understand his motivations they aren't complicated per se but they are still incomprehensible like a moral illusion I can see all the parts and understand the reasoning but I can't put them together in a way that allows me to fully wrap my head around it all.
@@PosterityIslesNews Sure he does. He is someone utterly lost in the big picture, so much so that he doesn't view minor details as having any worth, and his final line is a perfect example of that. If there are infinite variations of himself, then any individual variation of him that is not currently on Earth Prime is unimportant. Think of it like this. There are 2 Owlmen right now. A variant of him that doesn't stop the bomb, and a variant that does. What does it matter to him which one he is? It is going to happen anyway. Even if he dies, there is another version of himself that didn't. *Everything* is unimportant, even his own life, because there is another universe where he *did* deem his own life important enough to be saved, and that one will continue on without him. The dude is essentially taking Darwinism multiversal, and we are following a version that opts out to let another Owlman try to survive in the barren world he's found himself in. It could also be that he realized at the very end that his plan was doomed to fail, because to blow up Earth Prime requires making the choice to blow up Earth Prime, which by its very nature would set Owlman on an alternate Earth, while Earth Prime would continue to be the empty world where he didn't make the choice to set foot on it.
I absolutely loved it when he says "it doesn't matter" before going out. Truly a badass way to die. He was kinda right too since none of his or anyone else's actions and decisions had much meaning
He’s saying “It doesn’t matter” with a smile He knows it doesn’t matter because in one of the infinite multiversus, he wins He died in that multiverse because he knows that in another, his dream did come true. Absolute mad lad
Not because of what he believes, but the fact he knows too well, nothing ever matter in his eyes, therefore the only solution to this, the whole existence in general, is to destroy it all, thus nothing ever happens therefore nothing ever matters, a man with this thought is a dangerous man.
@@Supboi no none of his versions win because prime earth still exist. He determined that if prime earth dies all of the earths in the multiverse will die
@@meurumtrain4747 Well the thing is, there will eventually be a version of owlman that will succeed. And when he does succeed, IRL that would be the day DC will end one way or another.
They writers are also making a point to show us that he still had enough time to cancel the bomb's detonation, and simply chose not to. Cuz, y'know, otherwise Batman would be guilty of directly killing him. And you can't say "Well he would've died anyway". He's a version of Batman. He can manage to survive for a few weeks or months until the JL get around to sending a robotic probe back to see if the frozen earth in that dimension still exists.
When Batman says the famous quote "We both looked into the abyss, but there's a difference between us. You blinked" or something along those lines, I believe he is referring to the way they interpret the multiverse conundrum. Even when Owlman explains the insignificance of human decision to Batman, Batman understands, but he is mentally strong enough to accept it and continue his life anyway. On the other hand, Owlman is so horribly disturbed by this discovery he can't cope with it. He begins a whole tirade to abolish all of human existence because in his words it doesn't matter. He's intending to commit infinite genocide because of his discovery. He blinked when he looked into the abyss. His humanity was so pathetically destroyed by it. That's why Batman wins the fight between them. That's why Owlman was doomed to lose. Edit: Just an update to this thread. I love the philosphical discussion between everyone and i want to chip in. Owlmans nihilism is a product of his inability to accept value or importance. His infamous line "it doesn't matter" can be flipped to expose his hypocrisy. If it didnt matter, nothing mattered, then why eradicate all of humanity and thus choice. The only answer that is sensible is that he removes choice. He states man is a cancer but he is a man and acts like a literal cancer, consuming and destroying his environment. Ultimately owlman is a hypocrtical but principled character. He is dedicated to his cause but also understands his irony when he is defeated. A brilliantly written character.
You’re an idiot if you for a second think Batman was mentally stronger than Owlman. It’s the exact other way around. The latter had the spine to accept reality. Batman needs to continue in his delusion.
I think an underrated part of the Owlman character is his purpose as a reflection of Batman. While he may not seem it, Bruce is an optimist. Believeing no person is beyond redemption and that every decision matters as a random gutless act is what birthed the Batman in the first place. Every life matters. Owlman is a pessimist. Decisions are irrelevant as there will always be another world where the opposite happened. A person's life does not matter. And never will. McDuffie was a great writer, man
To those thinking if another version of Owlman was successful because of infinite versions, there is none. Think of it this way, there are an infinite amount of numbers between 1 and 2 (1.69..., 1.500282, etc.) but none of them are 0. What Owlman basically did is he went to Earth prime and tried to destroy it. This action would be action 0 and if really successful, then all of the infinite possibilities are destroyed. So there is no and there hasn't been any successful attempts in destroying everything because there would be no DC.
As I understood it, it's choice. Multiverse splits because someone makes a choice. A man can make a choice, and still fail. Owlman failed, and alternate owlmans may have just chosen not to try.
@@theelderworm9134if i understand correctly Batman stops him from succeeding. So if there are 2 multiverses created for each decision. There is this universe in which Batman didn't make the decision to stop him, what ends up with owlman succeeding which ends up in deletion of all universes, with the one he stopped him in also.
@@niszczuu3446 I actually thought about that later. It's actually a glaring plot hole. Unless the splitting process stops when there is inter dimensional shit going on.
What a great "villain"! I remember that as a child I started watching that movie because of a casual superhero story and I ended up learning about existentialism.
I’d argue that this owl man is even more dangerous than the Batman who laughs, or at least equal, not just because of his plan, but a Batman who only exists for his own gain, neither good nor evil, is absolutely terrifying
Truly. He only wanted to do what truly mattered, what made an actual difference. He WANTED. He was selfish to the core. At the end, he knows that nothing mattered, just wanted a stab at it anyways, so he's satisfied to die that, yes, nothing mattered. What a nihilist.
The Batman who laughs tho was moustache twirlingly evil with I-am-14-and-this-is-deep levels of writing. He was a bad villain from an underwhelming series
@@zzodysseuszzbatman who laughs is also a nihilist At least almost the only thing he believes in is winning And the thing is bwl is better cos he knows how to humble himself and be an underdog while owl man is so narcissistic
The idea of "nothing matters" is so interesting since it makes a logical loop. If "nothing matters", then everything is on equal ground, meaning that _"everything_ matters". What "matters" to one person or another is merely perception, with Owlman representing the nihilistic "nothing matters" view and Batman representing the _equally_ nihilistic "everything matters" view. And if you think one to be more "realistic" or "hopeful" than the other, then that too holds a perception on their values and importance that simultaneously does and does not matter.
It's funny how, just like owlman said, only one thing could even come up with this in the first place: man. No other animal would even think about this
I do believe on the most basic level, owlman is right, nothing matters. However I think he draws the wrong conclusion, The universe does not care for the lives of those within it, which is exactly why its so important we say otherwise, that we make the choice to make things matter.
Thats not how that works. When everything doesnt matter it doesnt magically make everything mattet. It just means that everything doesnt matter. There is no "equal ground" in reality. Things either are or arent x
I loved that Owlman was doomed from the start as the second he decided to press the trigger a different reality existed where he didn’t and so he might blow up this branch but in doing so he grew another. It’s sad that the only choice he believed to matter, didn’t.
This is kind of a weird claim to make considering the entire point of owlman’s plan was that blowing up one universe would blow up all universes that branch off of it, so any universe that branches off of prime where he doesn’t push the button doesn’t matter because that universe would also be destroyed when he destroys prime. The only way to stop him is to stop every version of him that reaches earth prime and doesn’t back out of his own accord. Unless of course there is no earth prime universe and every owl man that tries to blow it up goes to a different universe, in which case this is kind of pointless to think about
@@connortg5 Yeah when you really think about it, there's no way destroying earth prime could actually wipe out the infinite universe since it'd already be dead. There would be an infinite amount of owl mans on that earth the moment owl man made the choice of going there. That's the problem with an infinite multiverse, there's always some way someone can destroy the infinite multiverse but in INFINITE possibilities it never happens.
Considering the infinite earths and his way of describing and trying to find and destroy earth prime, i like the idea that even if he destroyed it there would be 2 in which he made the choice not to destroy it or that batman decides not to stop him meaning he would only destroy a branch of the possiblities
So different from Hades too. James Woods should be one of the biggest actors in Hollywood but he committed one crime. He's a conservative. That's literally the only reason he no longer has a career. Hollywood is simply that damn petty.
One of the most underrated villains in anything dc has put out imo. I know hes still around in the comics but this specific version with this performance is one of the best villain roles ive ever seen
You know, owl man kinda reminds me of this comic called “2 inches too late” and while it doesn’t go as deep as owl man goes, it does explore the idea of parallel worlds and whether it really matter
@@CattosForLife 2 inches to the right (or left been a while) was enough to miss the stomach, meaning no crippling injury, meaning no time limit, meaning he stay all might full time, meaning that he has no need for a successor at the moment, meaning the event that sparked his choice in successors never occurred and so on and so forth It’s a pretty interesting story, not destroy all reality interesting, but very interesting
Literally never heard of this guy until now but can say he is the coolest evil version of a hero I've ever seen, and such a smart take on what Bruce would've been like if he didn't have faith in humanity
Makes me wish they made Kang into this for Phase 5 and 6 instead of the guy we got. Imagine if he was a genius philanthropist from the far future who made the earth into a literal utopia with his research and discoveries. But one day he discovered the multiverse. And in doing so he found out every choice he ever made was meaningless, thus becoming a nihilist as a result. He then proceeded to harvest all the humans in his universe and turned them into his own lobotomized army to seek out the prime point in the multiverse and destroy it, making the only choice that only he could make and unraveling reality as a result.
His performance as hades was a hilarious motor mouth with a short fuse, but his performance as Owlman was nihilistic and tragic to the point of being completely genocidal. Thats some serious contrast.
Hades talks about how stupid mankind is for associating him with the same Satan who tormented Adam, Eve, Job and so on. "Man is a cancer. And I chose to cut off the disease."
2:26 It truly didn't. Somewhere on a parallel earth, an Owlman made the opposite choice and returned to Earth Prime, but it can never truly be Earth Prime because that choice merely creates another earth. That's the paradox of Earth Prime.
I always thought Owl Man was a boring knockoff of Bat Man but this makes me want to watch and read everything about him, really interesting embodiment of a philosophical argument I’d never given much merit before
You never seen the movie? It's definitely in the top ten dc animated movies. I never read/saw any other media of him but in the movie he is one of the best "other world" characters.
LOL He was never meant to be a "boring knockoff" of Batman AT ALL, as he's meant to be an EVIL Batman from a parallel earth to him who has a nihilistic view on things that Batman would face off against.
His final words "it doesn't matter" is profound because of what he said earlier. Every decision makes a new universe. So in some universe, he actually WON and succeeded. He knew this and so even by losing, he still won
Actually no, because the multiverse still existing and being unchanged after all is said and done, proves that no matter what, Owlman couldn't simply succeed in destroying all of reality. Maybe there's a universe where he managed to destroy what he called the Earth Prime, but that only destroyed the planet because the mere action of one being aware of Earth Prime is enough to make a copy of it. The actual true Earth Prime is unreachable, Owlman was going to fail no matter what.
I am a physics student and i study the Many Worlds Theory as my main subject. Owlman is a very interesting character and I love this movie but I feel I have to point out some flaws in the science of it and share how I, as someone who faces the "does anything matter" conundrum everyday, cope. First, the thing you have to remember is that while all possibilities exist, they don't exist in equal number. When a quantum waveform collapses and new timelines are formed they form an infinite number spread according to probability. Timelines in which probable events occur are more numerous than timelines where improbable events occur. The conclusion we can draw from this is as follows: YOUR CHOICES MATTER. Yes, there will always be timelines where you made a different choice, but the timelines in which you make the probable choice will always outweigh the improbable ones. If you are likely to make good, kind choices then you will have a net positive impact on the multiverse. If you say to yourself right now, "from now on I will be kind and seek to improve the lives of those around me in whatever ways I can, both big and small" and you follow through on that promise then you will become the origin point of what I call a 'Kindness Cascade'. A Kindness Cascade begins whenever you perform a kind act and the majority of future timelines from that point onwards are influenced positively, from there the people you were kind to will be kind to others in turn, exponentially increasing the number of positive timelines (which are already infinite) to the power of infinity, those people will in turn continue this effect, stacking infinity on top of infinity for the rest of eternity. Take this in combination with what I call, 'The Logic of Least Resistance' and you discover a magical truth. Everything in the universe follows the path of least resistance. Electrons flow through the most conductive materials, gasses move from high pressure to low pressure, water flows down hill, and natural selection picks out the traits that are best at surviving. Think about it, why do parents have an instinct to sacrifice themselves for their children? One would think that a creature would evolve to preserve it's own life, after all is not the point of life survival? Yes, but survival is a group activity. A parent who sacrifices themself to save their child has passed on the genes that gave them the instinct of self-sacrifice, the child in turn will grow up and one day pass on that gene. Why is it that a creature as weak and fragile as humanity is the dominant species in a world with lions, tigers, and bears? Cooperation. Having even a single partner helping to complete a task exponentially increases the amount of work that can be done. Every additional collaborator reduces the proportional impact of an individual failure. When working alone failing means a 100% failure, but when working with a partner a failure on your part is only a 50% failure, with a group of 3: 33%, with a group of 4: 25%, and so on. Isn't it beautiful? Compassion isn't just the right thing to do, it's the winning play. If life is a game in which the goal is survival, then the best strategy we know of is kindness and love This means that across the infinitely infinite multiverse good will always outweigh evil. If kindness is the best survival strategy then evolution will select for it. If evolution selects for kindess then timelines where humanity isn't kind will die off at greater rates than timelines where humanity is kind. To me this proves, irrefutably, that humanity is intrinsically good. Each and everyone of us has the capacity for exponentially infinite good. Your choices don't just matter, they matter INFINITELY. I understand that this was long and somewhat confusing so if you remember nothing else from my words remember this: 1. Your choices matter. 2. The choice that matters most is kindness
How compelling would Owlman and the conflict he presents be if his rant was undermined by Batman going “well ACKSHUALLY infinite possibilities DOESNT mean”
You do realize that every moment during the monologue infinite earths were being created. Ever pressing of a button another world created. Every choice of word spoken another world created. So somewhere in the multiverse another owl man would follow the steps to destroy earth prime.
great writing in this movie. every character other than Owlman just seems to play at evil, Owlman takes it to its logical conclusion and proves he is the most dangerous out of all the alternate Justice League
At least the rest of the Crime Syndicate (minus Super Woman) cared about the thought of their earth being erased and believed Owlman was going way too far, to the point that even they knew he needed to be stopped and actually wanted to save their planet.
@@waynewayne8419He’s committing mass omnicide out of belief that his and everyone’s lives are meaningless in the grand scheme of things. Sounds pretty evil to me, but I guess that’s just my perspective.
@@FookMi69 There's no such thing as "good and evil," as explained by Owlman and it flew right over your head. In other words, all actions and decisions can be justified with enough words. Which is what Owlman believes. But since we all like living, he has to be stopped. By your own logic, you're probably "evil" if you're not a vegan and you believe in soap (killing bacteria and germs.)
Kinda reminds me of how The Shredder in Turtles Forever viewed the multiverse, and how it was basically pointless for him to exist if every version of himself was destined to be defeated by the turtles. He was so desperate to destroy Turtle Prime that he didn't even care about dying along with everyone else.
i like how he doesn't struggle he just decides that his death will also be meaningless and that therefore doing anything against it is meaningless and so he just doesn't
An edit I made playing around my new fast computer specs, hope y'all enjoy it, Owlman is an interesting DC character imo(tbh Nihilist villains done right are the scariest villains to me). Finally what's y'alls answer to Owlmans Nihilism?
" sir this is a Wendy's I already know I am pointless " Or " if nothing matters doesn't take away from your action in the moment, yeah in the long run of the universe everything has already happened and nothing you will do will change that. But it doesn't matter as you don't rate things importants by how much impact they have on a multiversal scale you rate them by how much impact they have on your specific life"
I was told Nihilism is the enemy of all philosophies but doesnt it all end in Nihilism? Doesnt everything become meaningless once time runs its course?
I was a kid when this was shown on TV. To me it was a simple "evil League fights good League" movie. Rewatching these scenes made me realise how hot evil wonder woman was.
I don't think I can give a answer to owl-man but I think I can give a response as to why he might do this. True individuality, What I mean is If there is an infinite amount of possibility's where he exists than he's the first to realize that which lead to owl man wanting to find others like him. he did, and he found "while only having a slight difference an infinite number of individuals just like him. he wouldn't need to look to far in there past to see the kind of people they would become when he could just look at others and see how they have become. With this however he would quickly realize he's nothing more than a copy that has managed to see the whole picture of what his existence is and with that he would do something that would really matter in his existence or at least that's how he'd see it. I don't really have an answer but I guess this is what I will say is my response
I like to think Owlman may have thought at his final moments that the earth he was in was in fact not Earth Prime, yet he stood by his ideal of "it doesn't matter" because at the end, he knew by making a choice, he understood he could not face the crushing weight of infinity, therefore, it doesn't matter
What I actually like about the ending is that the choice owlman made to not abort the destruction was the one choice he made that actually mattered considering it was the one event where he had a chance to make a choice that another version of himself couldn't choose the opposite which breaks his logic of nothing mattering and adding a very nuanced layer of irony to him choosing to die.
But he was stranded on an alien planet, his group had been beaten, and the only thing to give him company was a world bomb abort or not he would have died on that world having failed his mission, so in the end there was no choice that mattered
I always find it interesting that owlmans whole philosophy is based on the fact that all actions have already been carried out on another earth and thus no action matters. Yet when he finally tries to make a decision that will matter it fails, despite every possibility occurring. Thus meaning that there's no possibilty where he wins, because if he did everything would've died the moment the bomb went off in at least one alternate earth. In the end he proved his point, his actions truly didn't matter
I think he rather understood that his theory about earth prime is bullshit, Since destroying earth prime is a choice this means that there are other versions of him that did destroy the so called " earth prime" making it not the earth earth prime in the process! So it doesn t matter if he stops the bomb and head back to earth prime because another versions of him did it, the multi verse still exists so he was wrong and chasing a freewill that doesn t exist
I believe his philosophy was destroyed after he got defeated, the bomb matters because it destroys the multiverse, by making the bomb, and the thought that in every possibility the bomb didn’t go off, that means that the bomb mattered enough to where it never goes off, it has the power to end all universes, so the multiverse stops that, owl man effectively made something that mattered, think of it like a landmine, one slip up or one universe where he wins and everything ends, it’s important that it never succeeds, meaning it matters
To counter Owlman's Nihilism, Man is chaos and order. From Chaos came Order which reacted to Chaos. We create order in the chaos that pervades the world around us so that we can live within that chaos. It's the ability to endure and make choices we know other alternative choices made. Alternative choices made as an observation ironically means that you can keep in mind that things can be far worse if you were fall in more than just the physical sense. We have the ability to create and stand by our identities, likes, dislikes, and beliefs. That's what free will is. It's by realizing this that we begin to learn how to go up.
Again it doesn't matter, because another world where Order fails humanity or in place of Chaos causing problem but in Order instead. It doesn't matter.
@@mildanvongrius5530 You seem to not understand. Order and Chaos are architypes. Humans, and other races within the universe, are also forces of nature. Order and Chaos, as perpetual constants, require one to challenge the other and sometimes one of them has to lose to bring the other back in line. What's happening in the multiverse is too much of one or the other or a lack thereof. Order and Chaos are architypes by nature, so the result of that disruption is not too surprising. At the core, you forgot the 'why' part. It's always the 'is' but everyone always forgets the why. Owlman saw really dark shit and decided to go off the philosophical deep end. What he says isn't inherently right just because of word of mouth. There's levels to this. Seeing the really bad shit should make you hold on to your own life even more. The fact that this isn't considered at all really tells me about the people interpretating it.
@@nothingimportanthere2082 Then it really makes us wonder what led our Earth Prime send off the circle, if Order and Chaos are architypes what about Man that he mentioned about it? What did Man do/contribute during its final moment to the point that no one is alive to receive Order and Chaos? And what about the illusion of free will? And where is Order when Chaos rises? Don't know, keep me up all days about it.
I've been watching that video everytime before going to bed for a little while now. I don't exactly know why, but the idea that nothing matters, and owl man's philosophy in general is strangely calming or comforting, at least for me...
he said that for every action, there is another earth where a different action happened instead. on most earths, or on earth prime at least, man came to be
Batman didn't kill him. He just didn't have to save him. And his philosophy makes sense from the point of a view from a narcissist. Which, c'mon, look at him.
Vast majority of DC's content is on par with this. Its just that the cinematic universe constantly keeps faltering because of the mediocre directors and writers. Marvel movies also have mediocre directors and writers(except a select few), but it doesnt hinder Marvel as much as it does DC because their content is generally more geared towards 10-11 yo children with their overtly goofy style and Michael-Bayism.
When you think about it though, they don't really. Going by Owlman's way of thinking every decision can and will be made, so it doesn't matter if you do it because another version of you will or has done it.
Owlman logic is faulty or more precisely his point of view: decision matters for your universe, the universe where you live. Who cares about what your counterparts decides in their respective universes: it's what happen in your own universe that matters and where your decisions counts.
I remember watching this since there was nothing else on. I wasn't necessarily invested at first, but as it when on, I really got involved. Owlman blew me away as a kid, I thought he was right to some degree and it scared me. I remember being really glad I decided to watch it instead of going outside to play. Don't know why I haven't checked it out since, definitely will watch it again soon.
When Owlman explains the theory of a multiverse, it’s very nihilistic. But the more thought you put into it, it becomes maddening. In quantum physics and mechanics, this is called “The Many-Worlds” theory. “Schrodinger’s Cat” explains (in short) that the cat is both alive and dead at the same time, and once observed, the universe flips a coin and one outcome is selected. This is referred to as the Copenhagen Interpretation. The Many-Worlds theory suggests that instead of one outcome, the universe splits itself in two so both outcomes occur in different parallel universes. Per every single insignificant choice or event, the universe endlessly splits into uncountable versions of itself. Like I said, maddening.
Right like everything everywhere all at once if nothing matters, then the years of wasting your life, don’t matter either all the pain and regretting your life ceases to be an easy way out to be sure but an understandable one
I told you Jobber that it would hit 2 mill...
and I trust you
2 years ago is crazy tho
@@Yuxxy420 hahaha yeah. Once that shit hit 1m views. I told him i was like, "yo jobber, thats shit is getting to 2 mil". He told me nah and we made a bet on wether it would or not. I won. Jobber owes me an Owlman video now
@@WallyWestEXE bros jobbers biggest fan😭🙏
@@Yuxxy420 oh nah we are homies on discord n shit.
So much more compelling a “nihilistic Batman as multiversal threat” than Batman Who Laughs
I agree
BWL is basically "Batman with prep time wins" meme + edgy fanfic.
He didn't even turned into the Joker. Just being evil for the sake of it.
@@obiyofi9792 if people understood the actual premise of the concept - that the forces of the Dark Multiverse are BAD IDEAS, that were too edgelord bs to exist in canon, but are now invading canon to destroy it and assert their own existence - it would work better. But it ended up another case of “audience the satire was calling out embrace the character unironically” that so continuously plagues such attempts at meta-satire.
Bwl is unorginal compared to owlman who at least has an own inspiration
"The Batman who Talks is more like it"~Joker
I love how he didn't contradict himself at his final moments. Shows that he truly believed what he said.
It really doesn't matter, because if he makes the choice to let the bomb explote, there is a universe where he made the opposite choice. Thus there is an exact replica of himself still out there planing to destroy everything.
Yup
Actually no.
He was trying to make the singular action that he made that could matter.
By failing to do something that mattered, it did matter.
Not only was he wrong, but arrogantly so.
@@axolotl1777 if he had hope, then it would have mattered.
Edit: Owlman is what bad writers think nihilists are. He is not written well, but he is well acted with snippy comments
@@FilmFlam-8008it would be a shame to think of his character as a representation of some sort of philosophical ideal instead of what it truly is, a person whom has founded his ideals on the structure of the fiction that he lives in. He's right about what he says because it really doesn't matter what happens to him, there's an infinite number of him that didn't do what he did and an infinite number that did, the only thing that could feasibly make it matter is by doing what he planned to, but he didn't, so it doesn't.
The writer for this movie(the late Dwayne McDuffie) said that the moment Owlman realized that he had a choice in deactivating the bomb, then his decision no longer mattered as it was no longer the prime Earth. Such a good movie.
This confirms that there is only one Earth prime, unlike many comments suggested.
@@wolfofwarframe3807 Ah. I wasn’t exactly paying attention to the other comments, but I suppose it does make that explicitly clear.
The writer was always pretty upfront with answering questions in his old forum. Unfortunately, I think it was one of the biggest factor that got him released from the company despite the significant sales he contributed.
What is this movieeeee????
@@fuzzyacorns6855 Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths
Ah, because in another timeline, he would press the button, creating another universe. So therefore, why should he make that decision. So he doesn’t need to press the button because his decision doesn’t matter
You gotta hand it to Owlman, he had conviction. Usually when faced with certain death, villains will compromise their beliefs in order to survive. Owlman did not, and when just mere seconds away from his demise, uttered out the only words that he truly believed, “It doesn’t matter.”
He IS the foil to Batman after all.
Not really. There will be universes where he desperately tries to save his own life. There may be even ones where he succeeds in disarming the bomb. As long as it's a non-zero possibility. His choice of accepting his fate is neither unique nor special.
@@rockprime1136genius
@@rockprime1136 So what you're saying is... it doesn't matter?
@@tactishovel2247 Well, at least to the versions that wants to save their of life. That version would think him surviving would matter. I'll go on to say that the Owlmen that chooses life would be the special or unique ones.
I believe the moment Owlman arrives in Earth Prime, it became a copy. He isn’t on the original Earth anymore. And every second he and Batman existed on the planet, he spiraled away from Earth Prime faster and faster. Like he said, it doesn’t matter. It’s impossible for him to reach Earth Prime
Interesting like you can't exist in a place and time that only exist within one time. Since they exist at different periods in time like 1 second after the last second they could not have existed within earth prime. The more time passes by for them the further they exist outside of earth prime
Every move, every punch, and every choice of words Batman and Owlman made has diverged into multiple branches of Earth Prime. It will forever be out of Owlman's reach, he was doomed to fail.
That’s not how it works though he’s never been on that earth one in that time line and it started to diverge from the regular universe was before all of that other stuff that couldn’t happen in earth prime.
@@TheCrazeace such failure of man
When you think of it like that, you would have to chase Earth Prime in a sense, but he could never catch it. If reality is a tree, and Earth Prime is a trunk, Owlman would have to run down a rapidly growing branch. The closer he gets to the trunk, the faster the branch grows never able to make it to Earth Prime because his very existence was made from a decision
The final "It doesn't matter." is why owlman has my respect the way he does.
One thing I can say about this is... "One thing, I don't know why. It doesn’t even matter how hard you try.”
Ok
Owlman should be called the "batman who thinks too much."
@@redflame300he just like me fr
wait doesnt this mean theres a batman who didnt....do that so isnt the universe already destoryed then thats why he saids "it doesnt matter"
I like how a Planet Destroying bomb has a "Are you sure you want to continue?"
I mean it makes sense
@@god.usopp2yearsago115 I mean yes... Like... When I watched Oppenheimer and they were at the final moments of setting up the bomb... They asked everyone to leave the tent the "Atomic" bomb was in for safety.
I'm like...why... But also... Dark humor.
Out of all the devices, a Planet Buster needs such a switch more than any device
It's the creative ideas of people who make the films....don't take everything seriously.........
@@Wr-v1i I try not too... To many "Pitch Meetings", HISHE and Everything Wrong with
I love the humor. I loved this version of justice league...
"We both looked into the abyss, but when it looked back at us, you blinked."
Straight up 🔥🔥🔥 quote
I love how when owlman tells Batman that there are alternate versions of him that he would like its never stated that he researched other versions of him he just knows
there have to be, as he doesn't like this one... its why an infinite multiverse is so horrifying
Well, yeah, infinite possibilities means whatever you say is a concrete fact.
It's like Pi, it has every number combination there could ever be.
That’s how infinity works
What are you saying?
One of the few times where the movie adaptation that attempts to make the original more high stakes and conventional actually works. The original comic and this movie can be consumed separately and enjoyed on their own without either diminishing the other. Wish more adaptations were like this.
The television adaptations of re and halo 🌚
this back when animated comic movies were not only peak quality both in animation and art , but in writing
@@MGrey-qb5xzI agree this movie is amazing but the somewhat recent Long Halloween movie I’d say was also great
What's the movie name could you please tell?
@@FisicsKa14 JLA: Earth 2 is the comic and Justice League: Crisis on Two Earth is the animated film. Both are great.
Owlman is my favourite alternate universe “Batman” that went off the deep end. Because he maintains Batman’s strengths and social flaws but they are increased ten fold because he holds nothing back. His tech is more deadly, his standard outfit is stronger and more durable and he is stone cold.
But one flaw of Batman’s that is emphasised in Owlman is arrogance, and that became his downfall in his final fight.
I like him so much more than the batman who laughs. The batman who laughs is just a joker corrupted batman.
@@nightstar6179 I personally find that far more interesting, but to each their own. That’s not to say that Owlman is bad tho. Far from it
@@mrsoisauce9017 To be fair, it all depends on how they are used.
@@nightstar6179 fair
Guess you could say he blinked
This is why one of my favorite lines in any Batman media is "We both looked into the abyss, but when it looked back, you blinked". Owlman is such a unique character because he thinks he understands infinity, but in reality he doesn't grasp it nearly as well as he thinks he does. He's like someone who only half understands the concept, because he is limited by his outlook on humanity. He contradicts himself by both claiming free will is an illusion, yet also that human choices are to blame for the chaos of things. The very idea he could destroy all of humanity or reality is a ultimately futile goal. Even if he succeeded, given infinite possibilities and infinite time, eventually the earth would return as would humans. If there is even the smallest possibility of something happening, it will happen, given enough time. Batman on the other hand has a much deeper understanding of infinity and free will. He understands it, but rather than tries to control it, he embraces it. Both of them ultimately come to the same conclusion that "It doesn't matter" but for Batman, that means "I'm still going to do what I think is right." Batman isn't shaken by the perceived futility of his goals, or that he will never truly rid the world entirely of evil, he just does what he can and as much as he can. Batman perceives this knowledge as liberating, where Owlman's perceives it as imprisoning.
or maybe it could be explained that we are all actors playing our predestined roles. we make choices in an illusory manner. we think we are in control when we are always doing what we are meant to do.
@@chloegrobler4275 You missed the whole point
@@balaambaca4514 no, that's the whole school of thought behind fatalism and pre-determinism.
@@balaambaca4514 im offering an alternative not the direct explanation.
it wouldn't even matter if he destroyed that earth. the moment he set foot on it and made the decision to destroy it it would no longer be prime earth but a varient.
What I love about Batman is that despite his cynicism and witnessing the worst out of people every night, he refuses to give up his hope of making the world a better place for those who deserve it
@Robotfromouterfuckingspacelmao it isn’t just joker his whole rouges lmao
Batman existenialism vs owlman nihilism
@Kayrannkanal20 from owlman perspective theres another universe where batman kicks his ass and wants to destroy the universe
It doesn't matter
No one's talking about how fitting the music is, how it adds to this quite cinematic masterpiece of a existential crisis. And how it doesn't drown out the dialogue. 10/10 video.
song ?
@@spiritualprepper3896 its from the Stranger things S4 Ep 7 last 20 min music
@@spiritualprepper3896 pruit igoe & prophecies, mainly knew it from watchmen 2009 but guess stranger things used it too
@@alevillanueva100 yeah i am kinda disapointed not more people know watchman its just such a good movie
This is actually by Philip Glass, featured in this banger, revolutionary documentary:
ua-cam.com/video/cOA_dOrm_Mk/v-deo.html
James Woods did an amazing job for the voice of Owlman. Calm and yet you can almost hear the seething rage and anger under the surface.
James Woods is a crazy person with bad politics, but he’s an amazing voice actor
@@BenGoldNYC i remember reading an article about his high...not that it Matters😛😛😛😛
@@BenGoldNYC It's true, man is batshit insane but he's got talent
No rage. Only knowledge.
real
As a wise man once said:
*"The greatest villain is a person with a philosophy major."*
Wait that’s an awesome quote who said that??
@IAMURXAVIOR e I don't know I also saw it from somewhere else, probably from a video of Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths
Ever heard of Joseph Goebbels?
No real philosopher would ever put any stock in nihilism. Nihilism is a shitty non-philosophy, and everyone knows it. Even the edgelords and Onision fans who claim to practice and believe in nihilism are deceiving themselves, because nihilism... well... Isn't anything.
Johan Liebert from Monster .
Imagine being an alien from a different planet and hearing some guy explain that somehow erasing Earth Prime will undo the whole universe like your choices didn't even exist.
Owlman final words:
"It doesn't matter"...
171%
What I admire about him is that he 100% believes what he says, even at the very end of his life he just smiles and says "It doesnt matter." that is truly respectable in a character even if he is completely nuts.
Yeah, the only victory afforded to him is that he struck true to his guns.
bro its philosophically sound. xD dudes right 100%
Or maybe it's just a teenage-level coping mechanism: "Ugh, whatever..."
@@chloegrobler4275 if you’re a fucking loser maybe
@@chloegrobler4275
In the context of the DC universe, he is wrong because unlike actual reality, they have evidence of a higher power.
A lot of people interpret his final line as him knowing another him will succeed, I interpret it differently.
To me, it's a final resignation of his effort and the only logical conclusion his character could come to.
He tried to make the one choice that mattered, failed, and realized the true futility of it all. Why even try to make that choice? Why destroy it all? What's the point? He was desperately trying to do SOMETHING that mattered, but that's the thing, nothing matters.
He didn't realize that all this was a futile attempt to find meaning within the meaningless until it was too late. He realized that there was no point in trying and finally gave in, failing to see the beauty in life's chaotic nature.
Edit: Wanna know something cool? Almost every reply to this comment provides alternate explanations to each other, each of which disagreeing with mine. All stemming from one line...God I love this movie
While that’s true, it also doesn’t matter whether he aborts the bomb because whether he disarms it or not, there is an owl man who does make that choice now
I see it as him thinking that he could just hit abort and save his life. But since he would be stuck on that earth unable "to make the only choice that really matters", he doesn't care if he lives or dies.
@@Alistair_McCullom He wouldn't be stuck. That's the point. Batman tossed the portal-device towards him and it can be seen lying near him on the ice planet.
But since disarming the bomb is a choice, it doesn't matter what he does, an alternate version of him already chose differently.
He says it doesn't matter because if he tried to abort the bomb he would just create another split in the multiverse. Him not making a choice at all is his last effort to stop another split happening
I feel the opposite. His resolve, his philosophy, he himself, all true to his goal. In order to live by what you preach, one day you must die by it. Otherwise he would have aborted and tried again. It does not matter because "x"... No, simply because truly, it does not matter. Nothing does. This is true for earth prime as much as its for every other universe, perhaps this was his final enlightenment.
Didn't quite understand this as a kid. As an adult though, I have an immense amount of appreciation for owlman as a villain. Such a complex character
@SDSwampert
And here I was gonna say something stupid like "complex? he's a nihilist." But that's what makes him complex as implied with his conversation with SuperWoman about having looked at the multi-verse.
Yeah i mean, when you have that sort of understanding about the multiverse anyone would become a little nihilistic.@@DemonicRemption
He's not complex he's depressed.
@@Peepshow789 Men will literally bring an end to the multiverse instead of going to therapy.
@@PlanetDiablo16967Because therapies don't tend to work for men
I actually based the final boss of my D&D campaign off of this line of thinking.
Years ago Zephyr and his two allies began to search for ways to kill his father, who had taken over a city as the un-rightful chosen of Ra. In his search, he learned of the true nature of his world, in how it belonged to a repetitive cycle of rebirth and destruction that has been going on forever. He learned that due to this infinite nature of cycles, anything had already happened and no matter his choices, there would always be a version of this world where he did the opposite. It sickened him...
Thus he plans to end the cycle, as that would be the only action that would ever matter.
I love his philosophy so much.
He made the decision to make the only “decision” that would matter by ending the multiverse.
Then he acknowledge someone else made a decision to stop him, ultimately making a decision that matters. Maybe there’s a version that no one decided to stop. But it doesn’t matter to him.
He made his decision, and saw it through til the end, despite someone making the choice to stop him.
Well here's the neat thing. He's not on earth prime. He's on a variant of earth prime, where he decides to end the multiverse. Which is a decision and every decision has the opposite decision. When batman showed up that made another earth prime
@@brodyratliff7441It's not the quantum idea of multi-realities. In DC all realities are fixed and frozen. He was in Earth Prime
@@mawinstallation6626 he said that each and every decision made a new universe in the movie
Wait I don't get it. He wanted to do the only thing that mattered, but batman stopped him, making batman the man to do something that mattered. But why didn't he just abort and try again so HE could be the one to do something that matters?
@@BerylliumBronzebecause it doesn't matter
Owlman is a better Batman Who Laughs than the Batman Who Laughs will ever be.
They are different concepts. Owl man is a Batman who decided that everything is futile. A Batman who looked into the abyss of the multiverse and couldn’t accept the concept of his own futility.
The Batman who laughs is what happens if the joker ever wins. A batman who became the embodiment of his greatest enemy. All the insanity and malevolence of the joker but all of the knowledge and resources of Batman.
Hell nah
@@srinivasanbalaji4867 hell yeah,batman who laughs is a weak edge lord fanfiction brough in comic form
@@toniotrussardi8126I wish i saw more people with this view
@@melosjaha8897
There’s too many idiots with that view
Something that always confused me.
There’s truly an infinite number of universes. Owl Man has the capability to destroy everything. Wouldn’t that mean there’s an infinite amount of people capable of destroying everything? Meaning there’s also an infinite amount of people that would have succeeded in destroying everything?
That’s probably why he said “It Doesn’t Matter” in the end, and ceased his attempt to defuse the bomb
I mean yes and no, that's why multiverse is still just a theory. Because what you're saying is true but there's only ONE Earth Prime, the original. There can't be multiple earth primes which is why it was so important for him to detonate the bomb there.
And all those branches died out. This Earth Prime is the most recent common ancestor, so to speak, of all of these parallel multiverses; all those othet Earth Primes have already been destroyed by their Owl Man or someone else.
Exactly where this theory falls on its head. Earth Prime can't be destroyed because once you learn of its existence, it's no longer Earth Prime. Therefore, there is no Earth Prime. The Earth Prime that Owlman traveled to was not the real Earth Prime, but rather a copy of Earth Prime that was created upon him traveling to it. Multiverse theory gets complicated around these parts. Good thing it's not real
@@HeWhoPwnsNoobs true, there's only ONE Earth Prime. But wouldn't there be also other versions of Owlman (or at least someone similar) who would try to destroy the ONE Earth Prime?
Because it makes no sense out of infinite universes, only ONE person not only found Earth Prime, but decided to destroy it
James Woods voice made this character truly epic in my opinion. Soothing, subtle and yet evil. Everything he says sounds like a lullaby cradeling you to death
It's perfect because it's the exact opposite of Batman's.
Shame that James Woods fell into a vat of radioactive tinfoil hats.
It's the furthest thing from evil actually
@@Mdksupreme1 He's just.......cold.
@@SinHurr God forbid he has different opinions than the almighty YOU..
One thing I find interesting here is that Batman gave owlman an out. He didn’t break the terminal, the abort was still there. He wasn’t stranded, Batman tossed the teleporter there with him. Because whether it matters or not, Batman doesn’t kill. It was entirely owlman’s decision not to save himself.
He could have even gone back to “earth prime” to blow it up, but realized it wouldn’t really make a difference.
He couldn't go back to earth prime it was closed off
yeah you both are right
the moment he had a decision
is the moment where it splits off even more and he isn't on earth prime because of the decision to abort the bomb
Worst part is he realized even if he did succeed and set off the bomb, nothing would ever happen to the other universes, as there is another timeline where Batman didn’t interrupt him and he set the bomb off, meaning that his whole crusade was doomed from the beginning to end in failure
I remember being a kid watching this movie and after the end i asked my father why did he say it doesnt matter? My father replied its because he believed it. In that moment i learned what conviction was and what it meant to those who have it and are brave enough to die for it.
@PrinceTrunks92
Y'know it's sad how I keep coming across people like you who show me how smart humans can be. Yet I'm gonna leave this video and see something that'll remind me of why I assumed us humans are the dumbest species in the first place.
All Hail Princess Trunks
@domvasta not cool dude
Bro I'm not fucking kidding the exact same thing happened to me, my dad gave me a similar answer back then
@@PrinceTrunks92dude its an adventure time reference. "princess trunks" is a character
A nihilistic villain is truly a interesting idea. I’d like to see more spins on that idea.
I came into realisation myself when I was depressed and then I realised it was the reason I didn't end myself. Nhilism is a bliss that you can only obtain when you're at the turning point in life...later i realised it was already a philosophy..😮
Joker can be a good example of a good nihilistic villain
@@muhammadalifto8076not really, he loves anarchy, not nihilism
@@muhammadalifto8076He’s more of an absurdist than a nihilist.
Really? Cause i thought the reason he commited crimes is due to his nihilistic view on the world.
Edit: or he just a liar and doesn't care about his belief cause you know, only loves to spread chaos
Owlman's dilemma is so very interesting to me. He wants to reach a "prime" universe, absolutely devoid of any choice, and destroy it.
The thing is, him being present in earth prime makes it open to chance, and thus no longer earth prime. It's like one of those graphs that get infinitely smaller but never reach 0, forever teetering on the edge of reachin Earth Prime.
His final realization, in the end, is that it doesn't matter - he had a choice, and it made him realize that wasn't earth prime anymore - it doesn't matter if he wins or loses, his chance was already gone, and was never achievable in the first place
Can you explain why there is no earth prime anymore? Why couldn't he come back and destroy it?
@@ilichbkv5913 Every time you make a decision, two parallel universes are created - one where you made that decision, and one where you didn't make it.
Earth Prime is a single dimension - the original Earth where no decisions were ever made, life never started because starting life would be starting possibilities.
The very presence of life in Earth Prime brings the burden of choice, and thus creates separate universes - meaning as long as life exists in a dimension, it cannot be Earth Prime
@@eldritch_whispers1654 but owlman still has portal gun, why he couldn't teleport back to earth prime?
@@ilichbkv5913 because as soon as he gets back to Earth Prime, it'll stop being Earth Prime again. He'll never reach that dimension because it is conceptually unreachable
@@eldritch_whispers1654 thanks
The end fight was dope. It wasn't only a clash between a favorite superhero and his evil counterpart, it was a clash of two whole philosophies; unhinged nihilism vs healthy stoicism. "Nothing matters" vs. "When the abyss looked back at us, you blinked".
stoicism isn't healthy it's all about repression of you emotions
@@SirToaster9330 then you don't understand stoicism. If I had to put it in the simplest way, it's about not letting an external stimulus jolt your set of emotions into destroying yourself and being accountable for your own actions.
Batman isn’t a stoic and his mindset isn’t healthy. Don’t get me wrong he is my goat. But he is by no means a stoic he constantly gets controlled by his emotions he just doesn’t kill and that’s how far he won’t go. I agree it’s two sides of the same coin dynamic tbf. Batman is unhinged in changing the world and saving everyone and he is uncompromising on this (hence no kill etc) while owl man is as you say unhinged nihilism where nothing matters and as the Wonder Woman clone convo and his death shows he is uncompromising on this belief.
@mrfilmreviewcriticman4110 You don't understand Batman at all. Batman isn't unhinged, and he is definitely stoic.
It’s also brother vs brother (in owl man’s world he’s Bruce’s older brother)
That little "it doesn't matter" at the end gives me these strange chills. Owlman as a character is so fascinating to me because I can fully understand his motivations they aren't complicated per se but they are still incomprehensible like a moral illusion I can see all the parts and understand the reasoning but I can't put them together in a way that allows me to fully wrap my head around it all.
tbh its cause he doesn't make sense
@@PosterityIslesNews Sure he does. He is someone utterly lost in the big picture, so much so that he doesn't view minor details as having any worth, and his final line is a perfect example of that. If there are infinite variations of himself, then any individual variation of him that is not currently on Earth Prime is unimportant.
Think of it like this. There are 2 Owlmen right now. A variant of him that doesn't stop the bomb, and a variant that does. What does it matter to him which one he is? It is going to happen anyway. Even if he dies, there is another version of himself that didn't. *Everything* is unimportant, even his own life, because there is another universe where he *did* deem his own life important enough to be saved, and that one will continue on without him.
The dude is essentially taking Darwinism multiversal, and we are following a version that opts out to let another Owlman try to survive in the barren world he's found himself in. It could also be that he realized at the very end that his plan was doomed to fail, because to blow up Earth Prime requires making the choice to blow up Earth Prime, which by its very nature would set Owlman on an alternate Earth, while Earth Prime would continue to be the empty world where he didn't make the choice to set foot on it.
Moral Illusion is a wonderful term
His right, but i wonder why no owlman in all existance has ever attempted to destroy prime earth and succeeded, wat if prime earth controls the story
When i was at my most depressed, i genuinely felt this way. It's hard to explain.
I absolutely loved it when he says "it doesn't matter" before going out. Truly a badass way to die. He was kinda right too since none of his or anyone else's actions and decisions had much meaning
He’s saying “It doesn’t matter” with a smile
He knows it doesn’t matter because in one of the infinite multiversus, he wins
He died in that multiverse because he knows that in another, his dream did come true. Absolute mad lad
Not because of what he believes, but the fact he knows too well, nothing ever matter in his eyes, therefore the only solution to this, the whole existence in general, is to destroy it all, thus nothing ever happens therefore nothing ever matters, a man with this thought is a dangerous man.
@@Supboi no none of his versions win because prime earth still exist. He determined that if prime earth dies all of the earths in the multiverse will die
@@meurumtrain4747 Well the thing is, there will eventually be a version of owlman that will succeed. And when he does succeed, IRL that would be the day DC will end one way or another.
They writers are also making a point to show us that he still had enough time to cancel the bomb's detonation, and simply chose not to. Cuz, y'know, otherwise Batman would be guilty of directly killing him.
And you can't say "Well he would've died anyway". He's a version of Batman. He can manage to survive for a few weeks or months until the JL get around to sending a robotic probe back to see if the frozen earth in that dimension still exists.
When Batman says the famous quote "We both looked into the abyss, but there's a difference between us. You blinked" or something along those lines, I believe he is referring to the way they interpret the multiverse conundrum. Even when Owlman explains the insignificance of human decision to Batman, Batman understands, but he is mentally strong enough to accept it and continue his life anyway. On the other hand, Owlman is so horribly disturbed by this discovery he can't cope with it. He begins a whole tirade to abolish all of human existence because in his words it doesn't matter. He's intending to commit infinite genocide because of his discovery. He blinked when he looked into the abyss. His humanity was so pathetically destroyed by it. That's why Batman wins the fight between them. That's why Owlman was doomed to lose.
Edit: Just an update to this thread. I love the philosphical discussion between everyone and i want to chip in. Owlmans nihilism is a product of his inability to accept value or importance. His infamous line "it doesn't matter" can be flipped to expose his hypocrisy. If it didnt matter, nothing mattered, then why eradicate all of humanity and thus choice. The only answer that is sensible is that he removes choice. He states man is a cancer but he is a man and acts like a literal cancer, consuming and destroying his environment. Ultimately owlman is a hypocrtical but principled character. He is dedicated to his cause but also understands his irony when he is defeated. A brilliantly written character.
You’re an idiot if you for a second think Batman was mentally stronger than Owlman. It’s the exact other way around. The latter had the spine to accept reality. Batman needs to continue in his delusion.
Scp 5000 type of shit
Damn ✒️🔥
Ooh, that's real good. Real juicy stuff. I gotta remember this.
Wonder what would have happened if Batman blinked and owlman stared instead 🤔
I think an underrated part of the Owlman character is his purpose as a reflection of Batman. While he may not seem it, Bruce is an optimist. Believeing no person is beyond redemption and that every decision matters as a random gutless act is what birthed the Batman in the first place. Every life matters. Owlman is a pessimist. Decisions are irrelevant as there will always be another world where the opposite happened. A person's life does not matter. And never will.
McDuffie was a great writer, man
because Owlman is Thomas Wayne Jr and Batman is Bruce Wayne
I say the galactic nihilism fuled the fire that was the hate for mankind owlman has
If a random person on UA-cam can understand than clearly it’s not so complex a concept that writing it makes you a good writer.
@@zzodysseuszzterrible take, the more that understand, disproves your very argument.
To those thinking if another version of Owlman was successful because of infinite versions, there is none. Think of it this way, there are an infinite amount of numbers between 1 and 2 (1.69..., 1.500282, etc.) but none of them are 0. What Owlman basically did is he went to Earth prime and tried to destroy it. This action would be action 0 and if really successful, then all of the infinite possibilities are destroyed. So there is no and there hasn't been any successful attempts in destroying everything because there would be no DC.
As I understood it, it's choice. Multiverse splits because someone makes a choice.
A man can make a choice, and still fail. Owlman failed, and alternate owlmans may have just chosen not to try.
@@theelderworm9134 also by that logic one has to succeed eventually
@@mitchellphillips9166 perhaps. But choosing doesn't mean success. Maybe more will try, and maybe, someone will pull it off.
@@theelderworm9134if i understand correctly Batman stops him from succeeding. So if there are 2 multiverses created for each decision. There is this universe in which Batman didn't make the decision to stop him, what ends up with owlman succeeding which ends up in deletion of all universes, with the one he stopped him in also.
@@niszczuu3446 I actually thought about that later. It's actually a glaring plot hole.
Unless the splitting process stops when there is inter dimensional shit going on.
What a great "villain"! I remember that as a child I started watching that movie because of a casual superhero story and I ended up learning about existentialism.
It’s a pretty depressing ideology honestly but I see why some people believe it
He IS a villain, entiely so.
I’d argue that this owl man is even more dangerous than the Batman who laughs, or at least equal, not just because of his plan, but a Batman who only exists for his own gain, neither good nor evil, is absolutely terrifying
A Chaotic Neutral Batman is a terrifying one
@@cameronballz6154 you took the words out of my mouth I didn’t even have
Truly. He only wanted to do what truly mattered, what made an actual difference. He WANTED. He was selfish to the core. At the end, he knows that nothing mattered, just wanted a stab at it anyways, so he's satisfied to die that, yes, nothing mattered. What a nihilist.
The Batman who laughs tho was moustache twirlingly evil with I-am-14-and-this-is-deep levels of writing. He was a bad villain from an underwhelming series
@@zzodysseuszzbatman who laughs is also a nihilist
At least almost the only thing he believes in is winning
And the thing is bwl is better cos he knows how to humble himself and be an underdog while owl man is so narcissistic
The idea of "nothing matters" is so interesting since it makes a logical loop. If "nothing matters", then everything is on equal ground, meaning that _"everything_ matters". What "matters" to one person or another is merely perception, with Owlman representing the nihilistic "nothing matters" view and Batman representing the _equally_ nihilistic "everything matters" view. And if you think one to be more "realistic" or "hopeful" than the other, then that too holds a perception on their values and importance that simultaneously does and does not matter.
It's funny how, just like owlman said, only one thing could even come up with this in the first place: man. No other animal would even think about this
@@thomashaeyen6942 no earth animal, anyway. i wonder what kind of philosophy intelligent alien species have.
I do believe on the most basic level, owlman is right, nothing matters. However I think he draws the wrong conclusion, The universe does not care for the lives of those within it, which is exactly why its so important we say otherwise, that we make the choice to make things matter.
Thats not how that works. When everything doesnt matter it doesnt magically make everything mattet.
It just means that everything doesnt matter.
There is no "equal ground" in reality. Things either are or arent x
@@gearhead743 pain seems to matter when you're the one getting put through it.
I loved that Owlman was doomed from the start as the second he decided to press the trigger a different reality existed where he didn’t and so he might blow up this branch but in doing so he grew another. It’s sad that the only choice he believed to matter, didn’t.
This is kind of a weird claim to make considering the entire point of owlman’s plan was that blowing up one universe would blow up all universes that branch off of it, so any universe that branches off of prime where he doesn’t push the button doesn’t matter because that universe would also be destroyed when he destroys prime. The only way to stop him is to stop every version of him that reaches earth prime and doesn’t back out of his own accord.
Unless of course there is no earth prime universe and every owl man that tries to blow it up goes to a different universe, in which case this is kind of pointless to think about
@@connortg5 Yeah when you really think about it, there's no way destroying earth prime could actually wipe out the infinite universe since it'd already be dead. There would be an infinite amount of owl mans on that earth the moment owl man made the choice of going there.
That's the problem with an infinite multiverse, there's always some way someone can destroy the infinite multiverse but in INFINITE possibilities it never happens.
Considering the infinite earths and his way of describing and trying to find and destroy earth prime, i like the idea that even if he destroyed it there would be 2 in which he made the choice not to destroy it or that batman decides not to stop him meaning he would only destroy a branch of the possiblities
One of the best voice acting performances by the great James Woods.
Right up there with when he voiced Hades in Disney’s Hercules.
I was wondering if it was his voice. No idea he did these kids of films.
So different from Hades too. James Woods should be one of the biggest actors in Hollywood but he committed one crime. He's a conservative. That's literally the only reason he no longer has a career. Hollywood is simply that damn petty.
Owlman is my Favorite member of the Crime Syndicate and is one of the coolest Villains.
“There is a difference between you and me. We both looked into the abyss, but when it looked back you blinked.”
Try spinning thats a good trick
One of the most underrated villains in anything dc has put out imo. I know hes still around in the comics but this specific version with this performance is one of the best villain roles ive ever seen
You know, owl man kinda reminds me of this comic called “2 inches too late” and while it doesn’t go as deep as owl man goes, it does explore the idea of parallel worlds and whether it really matter
Korhol oh I'm defo gonna read that
I swear I've heard of that somewhere
Would it happens to be set in MHA?
@@pj3750 I think yes I heard of it
Its all might injury being smaller with 2 inches
So deku never becameral his succesor
It is
@@CattosForLife 2 inches to the right (or left been a while) was enough to miss the stomach, meaning no crippling injury, meaning no time limit, meaning he stay all might full time, meaning that he has no need for a successor at the moment, meaning the event that sparked his choice in successors never occurred and so on and so forth
It’s a pretty interesting story, not destroy all reality interesting, but very interesting
Literally never heard of this guy until now but can say he is the coolest evil version of a hero I've ever seen, and such a smart take on what Bruce would've been like if he didn't have faith in humanity
Makes me wish they made Kang into this for Phase 5 and 6 instead of the guy we got.
Imagine if he was a genius philanthropist from the far future who made the earth into a literal utopia with his research and discoveries. But one day he discovered the multiverse. And in doing so he found out every choice he ever made was meaningless, thus becoming a nihilist as a result. He then proceeded to harvest all the humans in his universe and turned them into his own lobotomized army to seek out the prime point in the multiverse and destroy it, making the only choice that only he could make and unraveling reality as a result.
@A Real Lobster With An Internet Connection I don't know what your talking about, I'm a marvel guy, but not for much longer
He's actually Bruce's brother Thomas
@@Cons-Cat so I've read, I thought he was literally a Bruce from another dimension
@@LobsterwithinternetI think that second half kind of beats the point of him being a conqueror, doesn't it?
James Woods gave two of the best vocal performances for a villain, even with the two characters differing in almost every way
Who is the other one, besides Owlman?
@@lucasthelegolas8682 Hades from Disney's Heracules
His performance as hades was a hilarious motor mouth with a short fuse, but his performance as Owlman was nihilistic and tragic to the point of being completely genocidal. Thats some serious contrast.
Hades talks about how stupid mankind is for associating him with the same Satan who tormented Adam, Eve, Job and so on.
"Man is a cancer. And I chose to cut off the disease."
His performance as James Woods in hit television series Family Guy.
2:26 It truly didn't. Somewhere on a parallel earth, an Owlman made the opposite choice and returned to Earth Prime, but it can never truly be Earth Prime because that choice merely creates another earth. That's the paradox of Earth Prime.
I always thought Owl Man was a boring knockoff of Bat Man but this makes me want to watch and read everything about him, really interesting embodiment of a philosophical argument I’d never given much merit before
You never seen the movie? It's definitely in the top ten dc animated movies. I never read/saw any other media of him but in the movie he is one of the best "other world" characters.
We call this philosophy nihilism and apathy
LOL He was never meant to be a "boring knockoff" of Batman AT ALL, as he's meant to be an EVIL Batman from a parallel earth to him who has a nihilistic view on things that Batman would face off against.
His final words "it doesn't matter" is profound because of what he said earlier. Every decision makes a new universe. So in some universe, he actually WON and succeeded. He knew this and so even by losing, he still won
What I love about him, he was never hypocritical. He knows who he is and accepts it
There's nothing profound about Owlman.
He's lika a neckbeard redditor version of batman
Actually no, because the multiverse still existing and being unchanged after all is said and done, proves that no matter what, Owlman couldn't simply succeed in destroying all of reality.
Maybe there's a universe where he managed to destroy what he called the Earth Prime, but that only destroyed the planet because the mere action of one being aware of Earth Prime is enough to make a copy of it.
The actual true Earth Prime is unreachable, Owlman was going to fail no matter what.
@@goyonman9655 lol. Owlman is cool asf. You just mad
@@sting0262
Owlman is cringeworthy and lame
So is his philosophy and are his motivations
I am a physics student and i study the Many Worlds Theory as my main subject.
Owlman is a very interesting character and I love this movie but I feel I have to point out some flaws in the science of it and share how I, as someone who faces the "does anything matter" conundrum everyday, cope.
First, the thing you have to remember is that while all possibilities exist, they don't exist in equal number. When a quantum waveform collapses and new timelines are formed they form an infinite number spread according to probability. Timelines in which probable events occur are more numerous than timelines where improbable events occur.
The conclusion we can draw from this is as follows: YOUR CHOICES MATTER. Yes, there will always be timelines where you made a different choice, but the timelines in which you make the probable choice will always outweigh the improbable ones.
If you are likely to make good, kind choices then you will have a net positive impact on the multiverse. If you say to yourself right now, "from now on I will be kind and seek to improve the lives of those around me in whatever ways I can, both big and small" and you follow through on that promise then you will become the origin point of what I call a 'Kindness Cascade'.
A Kindness Cascade begins whenever you perform a kind act and the majority of future timelines from that point onwards are influenced positively, from there the people you were kind to will be kind to others in turn, exponentially increasing the number of positive timelines (which are already infinite) to the power of infinity, those people will in turn continue this effect, stacking infinity on top of infinity for the rest of eternity.
Take this in combination with what I call, 'The Logic of Least Resistance' and you discover a magical truth.
Everything in the universe follows the path of least resistance. Electrons flow through the most conductive materials, gasses move from high pressure to low pressure, water flows down hill, and natural selection picks out the traits that are best at surviving.
Think about it, why do parents have an instinct to sacrifice themselves for their children? One would think that a creature would evolve to preserve it's own life, after all is not the point of life survival? Yes, but survival is a group activity. A parent who sacrifices themself to save their child has passed on the genes that gave them the instinct of self-sacrifice, the child in turn will grow up and one day pass on that gene.
Why is it that a creature as weak and fragile as humanity is the dominant species in a world with lions, tigers, and bears? Cooperation. Having even a single partner helping to complete a task exponentially increases the amount of work that can be done. Every additional collaborator reduces the proportional impact of an individual failure. When working alone failing means a 100% failure, but when working with a partner a failure on your part is only a 50% failure, with a group of 3: 33%, with a group of 4: 25%, and so on.
Isn't it beautiful? Compassion isn't just the right thing to do, it's the winning play. If life is a game in which the goal is survival, then the best strategy we know of is kindness and love
This means that across the infinitely infinite multiverse good will always outweigh evil. If kindness is the best survival strategy then evolution will select for it. If evolution selects for kindess then timelines where humanity isn't kind will die off at greater rates than timelines where humanity is kind. To me this proves, irrefutably, that humanity is intrinsically good.
Each and everyone of us has the capacity for exponentially infinite good. Your choices don't just matter, they matter INFINITELY.
I understand that this was long and somewhat confusing so if you remember nothing else from my words remember this:
1. Your choices matter.
2. The choice that matters most is kindness
life is precious
this should be pinned
Being kind and making good choices is the winning play. But how is that an irefutable proof that humanity is good?
How compelling would Owlman and the conflict he presents be if his rant was undermined by Batman going “well ACKSHUALLY infinite possibilities DOESNT mean”
great comment
For anyone who wants to know the song is called "Prophecies" By Philip Glass.
The different between batman and owlman
Batman says: I am BATMAN
Owlman says : it doesn't matter
His last words tells us how much he was dedicated to his beliefs
You do realize that every moment during the monologue infinite earths were being created. Ever pressing of a button another world created. Every choice of word spoken another world created. So somewhere in the multiverse another owl man would follow the steps to destroy earth prime.
You gotta appreciate a villain that is logically consistent! That end part went hard in the paint
great writing in this movie. every character other than Owlman just seems to play at evil, Owlman takes it to its logical conclusion and proves he is the most dangerous out of all the alternate Justice League
At least the rest of the Crime Syndicate (minus Super Woman) cared about the thought of their earth being erased and believed Owlman was going way too far, to the point that even they knew he needed to be stopped and actually wanted to save their planet.
“We both stared into the abyss, but the difference between you and me, *you blinked* “
-Batman
This is how you write a straight up evil character we don't need to feel sorry for, with a plan and logic for his end goals that makes sense
He’s not evil. He’s simply seeking to stop our human destruction.
Don’t see how that is evil.
@@waynewayne8419he literally wanted to kill everyone, ever.
@@waynewayne8419He’s committing mass omnicide out of belief that his and everyone’s lives are meaningless in the grand scheme of things. Sounds pretty evil to me, but I guess that’s just my perspective.
@@FookMi69
There's no such thing as "good and evil," as explained by Owlman and it flew right over your head.
In other words, all actions and decisions can be justified with enough words. Which is what Owlman believes. But since we all like living, he has to be stopped.
By your own logic, you're probably "evil" if you're not a vegan and you believe in soap (killing bacteria and germs.)
@@FookMi69 from the perspective of humanity he is evil
Kinda reminds me of how The Shredder in Turtles Forever viewed the multiverse, and how it was basically pointless for him to exist if every version of himself was destined to be defeated by the turtles. He was so desperate to destroy Turtle Prime that he didn't even care about dying along with everyone else.
i like how he doesn't struggle he just decides that his death will also be meaningless and that therefore doing anything against it is meaningless and so he just doesn't
An edit I made playing around my new fast computer specs, hope y'all enjoy it, Owlman is an interesting DC character imo(tbh Nihilist villains done right are the scariest villains to me). Finally what's y'alls answer to Owlmans Nihilism?
" sir this is a Wendy's I already know I am pointless "
Or
" if nothing matters doesn't take away from your action in the moment, yeah in the long run of the universe everything has already happened and nothing you will do will change that. But it doesn't matter as you don't rate things importants by how much impact they have on a multiversal scale you rate them by how much impact they have on your specific life"
In my opinion it doesn't matter
Dont flee the abyss...embrace it :)
I was told Nihilism is the enemy of all philosophies but doesnt it all end in Nihilism? Doesnt everything become meaningless once time runs its course?
He was right all along. In the end, it doesn't matter. Existential nihilism is the key
I love how calm James Woods plays the character the tone and how he speaks is amazing
My favorite iteration of a multiverse. It really makes you think about every decision you’ve made and will make in your entire life.
Yeah and every decision you make in this world, there is an alt version of you that made the opposite choice etc I think
If I didn't poop today, other me pooped today
So on so on
I was a kid when this was shown on TV. To me it was a simple "evil League fights good League" movie. Rewatching these scenes made me realise how hot evil wonder woman was.
The only possible realization, I wouldn't mind having my ribs broken by her.
😂😂😂😂😭😭💀
That was Mary Batson tho, she used to be one of the Shazams
Lmao the last line. Real one
The writers followed their curiosity and attempted to undo the meaning of humanity. Owlman's portrayal here is quite commendable.
“We both looked into the abyss; but when it looked back at us…you blinked.” 😎
I don't think I can give a answer to owl-man but I think I can give a response as to why he might do this. True individuality, What I mean is If there is an infinite amount of possibility's where he exists than he's the first to realize that which lead to owl man wanting to find others like him. he did, and he found "while only having a slight difference an infinite number of individuals just like him. he wouldn't need to look to far in there past to see the kind of people they would become when he could just look at others and see how they have become. With this however he would quickly realize he's nothing more than a copy that has managed to see the whole picture of what his existence is and with that he would do something that would really matter in his existence or at least that's how he'd see it. I don't really have an answer but I guess this is what I will say is my response
There's a difference between you and me, we both stared into the abyss, but when we stared back, you blinked.
not but when we stared back it's but when it stared back
I like to think Owlman may have thought at his final moments that the earth he was in was in fact not Earth Prime, yet he stood by his ideal of "it doesn't matter" because at the end, he knew by making a choice, he understood he could not face the crushing weight of infinity, therefore, it doesn't matter
This is TO THIS DAY the best explanation of a Multi-verse in media
I just wanna say I absolutely love Owl Man and Prophecies just makes his speech all the more woefully beautiful and tragic.
James Woods performance also added greatly, a solid casting choice.
This isn’t pruit Igoe, it’s prophecies
@@CruelPizza213 Oh yeah! Thanks for correcting me. :)
What I actually like about the ending is that the choice owlman made to not abort the destruction was the one choice he made that actually mattered considering it was the one event where he had a chance to make a choice that another version of himself couldn't choose the opposite which breaks his logic of nothing mattering and adding a very nuanced layer of irony to him choosing to die.
But he was stranded on an alien planet, his group had been beaten, and the only thing to give him company was a world bomb
abort or not he would have died on that world having failed his mission, so in the end there was no choice that mattered
I always find it interesting that owlmans whole philosophy is based on the fact that all actions have already been carried out on another earth and thus no action matters. Yet when he finally tries to make a decision that will matter it fails, despite every possibility occurring. Thus meaning that there's no possibilty where he wins, because if he did everything would've died the moment the bomb went off in at least one alternate earth. In the end he proved his point, his actions truly didn't matter
I think he rather understood that his theory about earth prime is bullshit,
Since destroying earth prime is a choice this means that there are other versions of him that did destroy the so called " earth prime" making it not the earth earth prime in the process!
So it doesn t matter if he stops the bomb and head back to earth prime because another versions of him did it, the multi verse still exists so he was wrong and chasing a freewill that doesn t exist
I believe his philosophy was destroyed after he got defeated, the bomb matters because it destroys the multiverse, by making the bomb, and the thought that in every possibility the bomb didn’t go off, that means that the bomb mattered enough to where it never goes off, it has the power to end all universes, so the multiverse stops that, owl man effectively made something that mattered, think of it like a landmine, one slip up or one universe where he wins and everything ends, it’s important that it never succeeds, meaning it matters
The physical bomb doesn’t matter, the idea of it succeeding does
"Does it matter" and "Nothing matters" goes so hard for some reason.
Anyone ever think one reason he say it doesn’t matter is because he is sure that there is a version of him that will succeed?
Maybe in another Multiverse. But not this one. The Justice League was probably always destined to win, a fixed point in time that is unchangeable.
Yep
There isn't an Owlman that succeeded tho, there's still a multiverse. Earth Prime is unreachable.
@@Joe-uk4vu That in itself makes a multiverse to be paradoxical.
I think he said it doesn’t matter because as he said nothing matters
To counter Owlman's Nihilism, Man is chaos and order. From Chaos came Order which reacted to Chaos. We create order in the chaos that pervades the world around us so that we can live within that chaos.
It's the ability to endure and make choices we know other alternative choices made. Alternative choices made as an observation ironically means that you can keep in mind that things can be far worse if you were fall in more than just the physical sense.
We have the ability to create and stand by our identities, likes, dislikes, and beliefs. That's what free will is. It's by realizing this that we begin to learn how to go up.
Who is to say chaos is a bad thing?
@@madnightguard6296 Not always. Order and Chaos are just that. Forces of nature.
Again it doesn't matter, because another world where Order fails humanity or in place of Chaos causing problem but in Order instead. It doesn't matter.
@@mildanvongrius5530 You seem to not understand. Order and Chaos are architypes. Humans, and other races within the universe, are also forces of nature.
Order and Chaos, as perpetual constants, require one to challenge the other and sometimes one of them has to lose to bring the other back in line. What's happening in the multiverse is too much of one or the other or a lack thereof. Order and Chaos are architypes by nature, so the result of that disruption is not too surprising.
At the core, you forgot the 'why' part. It's always the 'is' but everyone always forgets the why.
Owlman saw really dark shit and decided to go off the philosophical deep end. What he says isn't inherently right just because of word of mouth. There's levels to this.
Seeing the really bad shit should make you hold on to your own life even more. The fact that this isn't considered at all really tells me about the people interpretating it.
@@nothingimportanthere2082 Then it really makes us wonder what led our Earth Prime send off the circle, if Order and Chaos are architypes what about Man that he mentioned about it? What did Man do/contribute during its final moment to the point that no one is alive to receive Order and Chaos? And what about the illusion of free will? And where is Order when Chaos rises? Don't know, keep me up all days about it.
What’s cool is they made Owlman an actual fleshed out villain with interesting motivations
Batman’s silence at the “you know better” is perfect.
I like how he understood in the end that it doesnt matter that by making the actions he did he created other strains in the multiverse
This was an awesome animated movie from DC. All the voice actors were great in their parts, but James Woods KILLED it as Owlman!
owlman cutting batman off with “you know better, man is a cancer.” is the most menacing thing i have ever seen from the dc universe
I've been watching that video everytime before going to bed for a little while now. I don't exactly know why, but the idea that nothing matters, and owl man's philosophy in general is strangely calming or comforting, at least for me...
one of the best death quotes ever, love that he smiles
Imagine a character with Owlman's mindset and Dr. Manhattan's super powers.
What if owlman was the darkest knight
@@rockythewerepuppy2253he actually is
Would he just unalive himself?
Would he just unalive himself?
@@AmericanBrit9834he would unalive everyone and everything including himself
1:46 he said the meme
1:00 Doesn't that contradict with the world that had only fish?
I guess the fish world would go into the “defy comprehension “ territory
Well one day man will step on those land anyway
@@RHQ_W Owlman literally said: "no fish was ever brave enough to crawl up on land and humans never evolved."
he said that for every action, there is another earth where a different action happened instead. on most earths, or on earth prime at least, man came to be
Batman didn't kill him. He just didn't have to save him. And his philosophy makes sense from the point of a view from a narcissist. Which, c'mon, look at him.
can’t believe they managed to make “destroy the world” a compelling villain motivation
A villain that deserves more acknowledgement
Owlman is literally every Marvel fan after the MCU introduced the multiverse concept - It doesn't matter.
If this is the kind of story being told in DCU. I would have become a fan sooner. Some DC cartoon is way ahead of its time.
Vast majority of DC's content is on par with this. Its just that the cinematic universe constantly keeps faltering because of the mediocre directors and writers.
Marvel movies also have mediocre directors and writers(except a select few), but it doesnt hinder Marvel as much as it does DC because their content is generally more geared towards 10-11 yo children with their overtly goofy style and Michael-Bayism.
@@bronzejourney5784 Dc animation in particular is amazing. The films are hit or miss
@@andergarcia4953 Yeah i agree. So far only Nolan managed to capture the true vibe and potential of the DC universe in a movie adaptation.
@@bronzejourney5784 I remember when I first watched beneath the red hood, that movie was really good
I swear watching this all the time when I was 8 gave me unrealistic expectations for the quality of superhero dialogue when I grew up
This is a rare gem to be sure most are not of quality at all but this one is exceptional
I would argue that everything matters. If one decision can create a whole other universe, then that decision mattered.
that's actually a very good way to put it damn, you got me thinkin
When you think about it though, they don't really. Going by Owlman's way of thinking every decision can and will be made, so it doesn't matter if you do it because another version of you will or has done it.
Going by Owlman's logic, that once again leads to the conclusion nothing matters because literally everything can cause another reality to exist.
Owlman logic is faulty or more precisely his point of view: decision matters for your universe, the universe where you live. Who cares about what your counterparts decides in their respective universes: it's what happen in your own universe that matters and where your decisions counts.
@@DarkAlex1978 That doesn’t mean he doesn’t have a point because it doesn’t contradict how he sees things.
This is so poetic and well done.
I remember watching this since there was nothing else on. I wasn't necessarily invested at first, but as it when on, I really got involved. Owlman blew me away as a kid, I thought he was right to some degree and it scared me. I remember being really glad I decided to watch it instead of going outside to play.
Don't know why I haven't checked it out since, definitely will watch it again soon.
it just shows how amazing this animated feature is, people are still talking about owl man till this day
When Owlman explains the theory of a multiverse, it’s very nihilistic. But the more thought you put into it, it becomes maddening. In quantum physics and mechanics, this is called “The Many-Worlds” theory.
“Schrodinger’s Cat” explains (in short) that the cat is both alive and dead at the same time, and once observed, the universe flips a coin and one outcome is selected. This is referred to as the Copenhagen Interpretation.
The Many-Worlds theory suggests that instead of one outcome, the universe splits itself in two so both outcomes occur in different parallel universes. Per every single insignificant choice or event, the universe endlessly splits into uncountable versions of itself.
Like I said, maddening.
Btw Schrödinger's Cat was meant to be a joke about how absurd it is to think that the universe "flips a coin when you observe the result"
Its always entertaining to see a philosophical villain that can question the morality of the hero and goes on a debate while fighting to death.
Imma be honest, i find the idea that nothing matters and all choices are meaningless to be very relieving instead of depressing.
Until you hit reality where you realize that things do in fact matter.
@@SaintSC05 which is why i like the *idea* but that's it, it's only an idea cause reality is different
Right like everything everywhere all at once if nothing matters, then the years of wasting your life, don’t matter either all the pain and regretting your life ceases to be an easy way out to be sure but an understandable one
@@TheoDimitry Denial can be relieving temporarily I suppose.