Happy Hours: Are you talking about the original series or the latest bullshiat Hollywood wants me to pay $50 to see in a theater?

$50? A beej and a six pack had best be part of that package.

The commerical I saw suggested all you need is a good blow to the head and you're Batman.

how dark knight should have ended

Followed the links in the Gawker article to the original articles:
How Much Does It Cost To Be The Batman?
How much is Bruce Wayne Worth?

Then followed a link in that last one to the Forbes Fictional 15, the "wealthiest" top fifteen characters (quotes because, really, how do you compare freaking fictional riches?) Then I got to #10 on the list and the failure was complete:
Forbes Fictional Fifteen #10: Mr. Monopoly

That's Rich Uncle Pennybags, you doubly-poor excuse for a journalist! Have you never played that game, growing up in your hermetically sealed stupidity bubble, you twit?!?

akula: I like how the source article cheaps out by recommending a Humvee instead of a Tumbler... that itself drops the price by a rather significant margin. I'd figure a one-off vehicle like that would likely end up costing $10-20 million, and that's assuming you can use off the shelf technology.

Add another order of magnitude to that and you're getting closer. A recently developed radio for the Navy I work on cost over 100 million in research and development. A fully integrated weapons system like the tumbler is going to be even more.

ozarkmatt: No Such Agency: Neither of these traits are particularly common in the wealthy.

fark off.

Was he wrong?

StrangeQ: akula: I like how the source article cheaps out by recommending a Humvee instead of a Tumbler... that itself drops the price by a rather significant margin. I'd figure a one-off vehicle like that would likely end up costing $10-20 million, and that's assuming you can use off the shelf technology.

Add another order of magnitude to that and you're getting closer. A recently developed radio for the Navy I work on cost over 100 million in research and development. A fully integrated weapons system like the tumbler is going to be even more.

Ok, fair enough, but was that cost really 100 million dollars or was that the contractor making a few extra million? I'm not saying contractors don't deserve to get paid mind you.

I enjoy the linked Death Star article. Of course, building the Death Star would be ridiculously impossible for any Earth nation (or even a combined effort), but if you keep in mind that Star Wars lore indicates the Empire owned tens of thousands of worlds, it becomes small potatoes for them to achieve it. Considering the much higher level of technological advancement in that universe, a single Earth-like world would have a far greater GDP and production capacity. Factor in the countless mining worlds/asteroids, the use of slave labour and the utter lack of shiats the Empire gave about monopolizing resources, and the Death Star is more like a weekend hobby project.

I'll pay one Mitt Romney.

kudayta: StrangeQ: akula: I like how the source article cheaps out by recommending a Humvee instead of a Tumbler... that itself drops the price by a rather significant margin. I'd figure a one-off vehicle like that would likely end up costing $10-20 million, and that's assuming you can use off the shelf technology.

Add another order of magnitude to that and you're getting closer. A recently developed radio for the Navy I work on cost over 100 million in research and development. A fully integrated weapons system like the tumbler is going to be even more.

Ok, fair enough, but was that cost really 100 million dollars or was that the contractor making a few extra million? I'm not saying contractors don't deserve to get paid mind you.

You mean the one that was a giant clusterfark and had serious scope creep issues? That thing is a case study in fail.

cfreak: Why can't the link directly to the actual article instead of a crappy gawker reprint?

/ maybe I'm just surly but it seems fark is only gawker and Daily Fail links anymore :(

No you're not being surly. Fark is only days to weeks old links to Gawker and Daily Fail anymore. If you like getting your not-news several days behind everyone else, then Fark is your resource. Me? I come here for the lulz.

SN1987a goes boom: I think this begs the question, why aren't all rich guys going out and becoming superheroes? I mean they can obviously afford it.

They rather be criminal masterminds... less risk of death and greater possibilities of free cakes.

lappyx86: kudayta: StrangeQ: akula: I like how the source article cheaps out by recommending a Humvee instead of a Tumbler... that itself drops the price by a rather significant margin. I'd figure a one-off vehicle like that would likely end up costing $10-20 million, and that's assuming you can use off the shelf technology.

Add another order of magnitude to that and you're getting closer. A recently developed radio for the Navy I work on cost over 100 million in research and development. A fully integrated weapons system like the tumbler is going to be even more.

Ok, fair enough, but was that cost really 100 million dollars or was that the contractor making a few extra million? I'm not saying contractors don't deserve to get paid mind you.

You mean the one that was a giant clusterfark and had serious scope creep issues? That thing is a case study in fail.

Heh, the "one"? For a real case study in fail, all you need to do is take a look at the military's move to Comercial Off The Shelf hardware.

/Install a system intended to last for 10+ years that is running a version of Windows that will go obsolete in 7 on a motherboard that will go obsolete in 5? Brilliant!

calbert: SN1987a goes boom: I think this begs the question, why aren't all rich guys going out and becoming superheroes? I mean they can obviously afford it.

"begs the question" does not make any sense no matter how you use it. the phrase that you are looking for is "raises the question".

please educate yourself so that you are not viewed as an open-mouth-breathing idiot.

I see someone has decided to fight grammar crime on the internet.

way south: Hence companies like blackwater.

Looks like a NOLA city cop SWAT team to me, not Asswater mercs.

Suspend your disbelief, because even $2.8 million of unaccounted spending (everything off the rack; nothing custom) would trigger an IRS Audit the likes of which would make your bowels turn to water.

okay, let's not count the jet he has in the upcoming movie. That still leaves all his kevlar, the floor that he took up for his stuff including that magical bullet forensics machine and gun, the lambo (or whatever it was), the tumbler, the magical sonar cell phone thingy and including research and programing. Yah 2.8 mil.

NathanAllen: Suspend your disbelief, because even $2.8 million of unaccounted spending (everything off the rack; nothing custom) would trigger an IRS Audit the likes of which would make your bowels turn to water.

I don't think the IRS would care that much as long as you paid your taxes on that 2.8 million. I think you'd have to really worry the SEC might be all over that.

about $6000, unless the average funeral costs have gone up....

thecpt: okay, let's not count the jet he has in the upcoming movie. That still leaves all his kevlar, the floor that he took up for his stuff including that magical bullet forensics machine and gun, the lambo (or whatever it was), the tumbler, the magical sonar cell phone thingy and including research and programing. Yah 2.8 mil.

That article was dumb. On top of what the poster I quoted mentioned, it doesn't say anything about the costs it took to retrofit the batcave, adding ventilation computers and all that shiat. Plus don't use a tumbler use a Humvee was seriously stupid. Plus I think the big cost would not in building all that stuff, but doing it in secret. I mean sure if you were rich and had the skills you could probably build a batmobile in your garage. But do it in a way that doesn't attact any attention to you (ie find a place to build it i secret, and find a way to order the parts without anyone noticing) and I imagine that costs go up by a lot. Same with the computer, the suit and all the other equipment. They even mention it in The Dark Knight (and the article) that they have to order 10,000 helmets since if you just order a small number you attract way too much attention.

The cost of being Batman for a month needs to also figure in medical cost and the equipment and nutrional requirements that entails. Batman gets shot at, bludgeoned and otherwise smacked around a lot. Thats a lot of vicodin your secret mob doctor has to get for you in addition to all the nutritionist and personal trainers and equipment you are shelling out for to maintain peak physical bat-fitness.


The first time Bruce Wayne pissed blood after a rough night of crime fighting must have been quite the experience for him

HotIgneous Intruder: way south: Hence companies like blackwater.

Looks like a NOLA city cop SWAT team to me, not Asswater mercs.

So it may seem.
But with how Swat teams have been behaving on occasion, it can be hard to tell the difference.

/If 1920's Chicago suggests anything, it's that the uniform doesn't always represent who you're really working for.

mechgreg: thecpt: okay, let's not count the jet he has in the upcoming movie. That still leaves all his kevlar, the floor that he took up for his stuff including that magical bullet forensics machine and gun, the lambo (or whatever it was), the tumbler, the magical sonar cell phone thingy and including research and programing. Yah 2.8 mil.

That article was dumb. On top of what the poster I quoted mentioned, it doesn't say anything about the costs it took to retrofit the batcave, adding ventilation computers and all that shiat. Plus don't use a tumbler use a Humvee was seriously stupid. Plus I think the big cost would not in building all that stuff, but doing it in secret. I mean sure if you were rich and had the skills you could probably build a batmobile in your garage. But do it in a way that doesn't attact any attention to you (ie find a place to build it i secret, and find a way to order the parts without anyone noticing) and I imagine that costs go up by a lot. Same with the computer, the suit and all the other equipment. They even mention it in The Dark Knight (and the article) that they have to order 10,000 helmets since if you just order a small number you attract way too much attention.

Like all good billionaires, Bruce Wayne outsourced his Batmobile and Batcave manufacturing. No one in Gotham was the wiser.

or the easier answer. he had mexicans do it then murdered them all when it was done.

calbert: SN1987a goes boom: I think this begs the question, why aren't all rich guys going out and becoming superheroes? I mean they can obviously afford it.

"begs the question" does not make any sense no matter how you use it. the phrase that you are looking for is "raises the question".

please educate yourself so that you are not viewed as an open-mouth-breathing idiot.

Turning a phrase is now a grammar crime?

Bruce Wayne is a multi-billionaire, dude. You do the math.

I'll mock you when you're done.

Butlers are paid to keep their mouths shut. Some of them make a lot more than the US President.

Subtle_Canary: The cost of being Batman for a month needs to also figure in medical cost and the equipment and nutrional requirements that entails. Batman gets shot at, bludgeoned and otherwise smacked around a lot. Thats a lot of vicodin your secret mob doctor has to get for you in addition to all the nutritionist and personal trainers and equipment you are shelling out for to maintain peak physical bat-fitness.


The first time Bruce Wayne pissed blood after a rough night of crime fighting must have been quite the experience for him

Not as much as it was for Robin