Basically. To some extent this is the company's own fault, deliberately cultivating fandoms to see this as sophisticated and allowing creators to do that, but then slamming the breaks to keep it from getting a bit too far from To Sell Toys.
Like the best example of this is Knightfall.
This is what most recall. Bane broke the back of Batman. Months of comics where Batman was pushed to the edge by a new foe who was stronger, smarter, and more determined. Bane did not just beat up Batman he made the caped crusader stay awake for almost a week and then fight nearly all of his foes only to then strike at him inside of Wayne Manor.
On my wall right now is #500 of Batman comics. It is special to me as it was the first comic I bought. On the cover is batman but you fold it (it was the 1990s and dear lord the crap they sold us) and you saw this...
To understand this you need to go back to the 1990s when Image seemingly took over the comics market. Edgy, brooding, dark heroes who killed, smoked, slept around and took no names. DC editor Dennis O'Neil HATED Image. He hated the idea that superheroes needed to be killers or dark and brooding. He was focused on "these are fun escapism... why make it depressing?" Finally he had enough of folks asking or demanding for Batman or DC to "get with the program."
His idea was "Knightfall." Batman breaks his back as planned and a NEW Batman arises. Jean-Paul Valley took up the cowl, armored the batsuit, added tech, and endless number of pouches, all the while ignoring the secret identity, partners, and working with cops. No this Batman was taking out Gotham's worst. Now we get the "IDEA" and the "Mandate." The Idea of O'Neil was that for at least six months Bruce Wayne is never seen. We may get Robin or Nightwing but they are not Batman's allies but people who also fought crime. Batman would be dark brooding anti-hero who focused only on the crime. No more detective stories (O'Neil was going to have Robin and Harvey Bullock handle detective crimes) and no more "fun" Batman (Nightwing would become more serious with Barbra and in effect closer to Gordon with Dick becoming a Gotham district attorney - O'Neil hated the idea of Dick Grayson a billionaires kid taking some blue collar job). Just a fixated and obsessed crime fighter.
To O'Neil this would not be a change but allow people to see why this idea just does not work for Batman. Make new characters, show new relationships, let characters evolve but in a very DC corporate growth where the world improves but stays the same.
Almost instantly this was met by DC corporate with a really loud "but Batman Returns is coming out in a few months people will be EXCITED for more Batman! We cannot get rid of Bruce Wayne!" Mind you this was mapped out in 1991 so Batman Returns is out in 92 and does not do as expected but the mandate is in. So O'Neil always a good company man does as asked.
The end result is a muddled story in which the focus is on AzBats (Jean-Paul Valley's Batman), post injury and in recovery Bruce Wayne, Dick, Tim, Barbra, Alfred and more. It was not so much a comment upon how violence and single minded focused anti-heroes were killing the fun of comics but how DC saw this as a chance to make a single minded anti-hero out of Batman and sell some alternate covers and prestige format books to make more and more money.
All in all it was just another pointless exercise in early 90s comics. But I always enjoy the history as it was rooted in trying, so hard, to remind readers that comics are "supposed" to be silly wild adventures and not dark depressing poorly drawn Rob Liefeld worlds. It sounds better when Dennis O'Neil explains the "narrative" he wanted. Guy really wanted to pick his five best writers give them one batman related book a piece and they all would have "elements" of Batman while the main Batman book would just be the Image style Batman. He hoped it would show sales improved on the more character driven stories.