B-2 and destructive batman aesthetics

Christopher Nolan, not Nehru this time, may be to blame for everyone talking about the 'delicate lines and poetic menace' of the B-2 stealth bomber. You know, the US Air Force's Northrop B-2 Spirit heavy strategic bomber with stealth tech, the one that looks like a bat in a mood - thus, the visual connect with the 'dark, brooding' Christian Bale-starring, Christopher Nolan-directed Batman movie trilogy. Seven of the 21 B-2s were reportedly sent from US bases to pummel Iranian nuclear weapons-building sites on Sunday. But even pacifists - Iranian pacifists included - have been overheard to drop phrases like 'angular kineticism' and 'Brutalist elegance' after looking at pictures of the American bomber that used Iranian airspace to walk the ramp. There was a time when we used to compare luxury cars. Now we're ranking bomber silhouettes like they were Nazi leather couture.

Nolan's Batman made the Batmobile look like it came fresh from Lockheed Martin's sketchpads, blurring the line between DC Comics military design and Washington DC gadgetry. Now, water cooler conversations oscillate between the B-2's surface coating and its biomorphic shadows. Accountants compare it to a Bauhaus sofa with a vengeance complex, while HR talks about it as 'minimalism meets existential threat'. Call it postmodern deterrence chic doing its bit for proper propaganda.