I think that's the part that seems to hurt me most. In several stories already I had a viable yet simple reason that Hatman wasn't directly involved, because at the time, his involvement wouldn't have been as much of a struggle as some of the peripherals. The simple premise is he can't be everywhere, and sometimes people just don't tell him what's going on because they think they can deal with it.

This last time, I had an even more unique one where he was kept in the dark purposely by people who thought they had a better idea without Hatman going into unnecessary and futile heroics.

It seems to be generally assumed, though, that Hatman always knows even if nobody tells him, he never sleeps, and no matter where he is at the moment, he can get to wherever the action is in time. That somehow, he'll always find out and he'll always be there. The only thing that's accepted, for taking him out of the action, is bringing in someone even more powerful to physically incapacitate him or keep him busy. And even then, that's risky, because you run into "there's no way he could beat Hatman like that".

If I don't go to that extreme, though, it seems to make the story harder for people to believe. That's one thing that trips me up over and over again - that I believe Hatman is not an omnipresent superman, but at the same time, he has to be, or people don't accept it.

I know some people may just say that if I can't accept Hatman as an omnipresent superman I should avoid writing him, and stay out of his territory because within it he'll always be involved, but I believe there can be more dimension to the character if that's not true. Maybe I'm wrong.

I believe if I can't challenge Hatman with characters physically, a little psychological torture will work just fine, especially since it's harder to fight an enemy you can't punch with your fists.





The way I see it:

1. Liu Xi admitted to Hatman what she did, and she went through a whole mourning process and vowed to make herself a better person, which she did. That doesn't make the killings okay, though, and even she doesn't believe it does.

2. Hatman likely isn't happy about it, but he's willing to accept a tradeoff. Liu Xi has become a better person, so it's not worth destroying her all over again for the sake of Justice (with a capital "J").

That second part is where quite a few would disagree with me. There's also bound to be a lot of disagreement over what happens if the family of one of her victims comes out of the woodwork. Would Hatman hand her over blindly and say "goodbye, but sorry, you deserve it"? Or would he protect her?

The disagreement likely over this questions is why I've steered clear of that territory.