Yahoo News Was this photo of a Scottish man called 'Wayne Bruce' really the inspiration for Batman?
When you think of Batman, you no doubt think of a gravelly-voiced American, soaring high over the mean, rain-slicked streets of Gotham City on his never-ending quest to fight crime.
However, a viral photo that has been doing the rounds for a number of years now has a different take on the caped crusader: claiming that the inspiration behind the character was actually a Scotsman called "Wayne Bruce." Batman is the alter-ego of billionaire Bruce Wayne in the DC comics.
The picture, which shows a bearded man wearing what looks like Batman's iconic headgear appears to have been taken in the late 1800s, and is usually shared alongside a caption that reads: "A little known fact: Scotsman Wayne Bruce, a descendant of Robert The Bruce) was the inspiration for the Batman comic.
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"Wayne would wear the disguise and used his inheritance to take on criminals in the 1880s. This is also why Glasgow was used to depict Gotham in the movies."
The claims even caused "Wayne Bruce Scotland" to trend on X (formerly Twitter) and Google recently.
So, is the rumour true? Sadly not, though we wish it was. Although parts of 2022 movie The Batman, which starred Robert Pattinson as the caped crusader, were filmed in Glasgow: that bit of the claim is accurate.
However, the bearded "Batman" photo is originally from a website called Foto Marvellini, which was founded in 2011. The image is captioned "Batbarbone" on the site. The website specialises in creating photoshopped pictures that have a vintage look to them.
The photo made its way to social networking site Reddit in 2017, and since then it's gone viral numerous times, with the claim that "Wayne Bruce used his inheritance to fund his crime fighting" and that "Glasgow was the inspiration for Gotham City" being the latest additions to the hoax.
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The character of Batman was actually created by the artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger, and debuted in the 27th issue of Detective Comics in 1939. Kane and Finger said that they drew inspiration from pulp fiction characters like the Shadow - a fictional vigilante - as well as legendary literary detective Sherlock Holmes.
However, at no point were they inspired by a bearded Scotsman called Wayne Bruce in a bat mask, as he didn't actually exist.
Sorry to burst everyone's bubble, but even if it isn't true it's certainly an entertaining idea. Maybe STV should commission a Glasgow-set series called ManBat about a bearded vigilante named Wayne Bruce.
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