Mythology Gag / The Batman (2022)

It's always nice to have the Bard in the house.

• This version of the Batsuit is said to take heavy inspiration from Lee Bermejo's "riot gear" design for Batman in works like Batman: Noël and Joker. The cowl's seams and nose patch meanwhile are influenced by Adam West's mask.
• The film's Arc Words, "I'm vengeance", reference the iconic Badass Boast from Batman: The Animated Series.
  "I am vengeance. I am the night. I am BATMAN!"
• The references to Martha Wayne’s mental health issues manifesting from her witnessing a murder could be a reference to Flashpoint, in which she becomes the Joker.
• The film depicts Riddler as a serial killer, which borrows from Batman: Earth One Volume 2 and Batman: The Telltale Series. Keeping with this theme, he is shown with a coffee cup that has the cream in the shape of a question mark, similar to a panel in the comic where the steam from the coffee cup in his hideout dramatically takes such a shape.
• Bruce is seen to be wearing black eyeshade when unmasked, referencing the previously non-diegetic makeup in previous live-action Batman films used to blend his skin into the mask, which would just disappear once he unmasked.
• Bruce is shown out of costume during daylight, but doing Batman stuff on a motorcycle and hiding his face with a helmet and scarf (and wearing eyeshade) at night, akin to Batman: Year One where he made a point of never wearing the Batsuit except at night.
• The scene where the Riddler is arrested at the diner takes some inspiration from the opening scene of Batman: Arkham Knight.
• Wayne Manor was donated to the city as an orphanage in the backstory, as in The Dark Knight Rises.
  • Like in the events of Batman Begins and its backstory in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Wayne Manor burned down at some point, and is in a rather derelict state upon being visited in the film.
  • During one scene in TDKR, Bruce Wayne visits a masquerade ball without a disguise. When someone asks him who he's supposed to be, he says "Bruce Wayne, Eccentric Billionaire". Because Batman is his real identity. ^note This was a reference to a very similar scene in Batman Returns. Similarly, in the start of this film, Bruce moves among the costumed Halloween revelers without a costume. Because Batman is his real identity.
• The simplified bat insignia◊ on this version's batsuit, which omits the tail and head, harkens back to the original Golden Age suit.
• The movie uses the villains Riddler, Penguin, and Catwoman, three of the four villains who appeared in Batman: The Movie, which Reeves was a fan of as a kid. The fourth villain, the Joker, appears in a cameo at the end.
  • A few of the guesses as to the identity of "el rata alada" feel very much like knowing winks to the movie's signature Bat Deduction scene, in particular "a penguin's got wings, too". Even the correct answer, you are el rata alada == url rataalada.com, might as well have come straight out of the 60s.
• During his interrogation, the Penguin sarcastically calls Batman and Gordon "the world's greatest detectives".
• Selina in The Dark Knight Rises had a bee in her bonnet about privileged people from her youth in poverty. This version adds "white" to the criteria. In fact, one of the corrupt guys she's complaining about is her dad, making this something of a Freudian Excuse. It's also been raised as a possibility in the comics.
• At one point, Batman attaches a grappling hook to a structure and walks down the side of a building, a lot like the famous building climbing shot from Batman (1966).
• Selina wears a lot of wigs in this film. One is pink, which was her hair color in Batman: The Dark Knight Returns. Her corset-and-boots look strongly resembles her appearance in another Frank Miller Batman comic; Batman: Year One. Especially after she loses the wig trying to murder Falcone.
• In one of Riddler's videos, he strongly emphasizes the "HUSH" money Thomas Wayne allegedly paid. Combine that with his look, and his vendetta against Thomas Wayne, and you might start to see some bits of Thomas Elliot in there. Plus, the reporter who tried to expose the Waynes is named Edward Elliot.
  • Likewise, Riddler being a Composite Character with Hush has happened before.
  • Plus, a user named "xXhushXx" comments on one of the Riddler's livestreams in this movie, hinting that Thomas Elliot could be out there in this continuity.
• In the climax, a struggling Bruce injects himself with a green drug that gets him back on his feet, but briefly drives him berserk. It looks a lot like Bane's Venom. In the comics, Bruce briefly became addicted to the drug so he could better protect people before Bane was even introduced. The incident that triggered it? He couldn't lift an obstruction to save a kid. Guess what this Bruce does shortly after he takes the green drug?
• In The Dark Knight, Joker set up a fake sniper nest to distract the police at a critical moment. In this movie, the Riddler's sniper nest is quite real, and there's no distraction at all. He wants to be caught. Likewise, this movie also has Bruce showing up too late to save an ally from a bomb going off, although unlike what happened to Harvey and Rachel, Alfred is injured but lives.
  • Like Joker in The Dark Knight, Riddler seizes the opportunity of a public funeral for one of his victims to make a show of potentially killing another high-profile figure. Unlike Joker, Riddler succeeds.
  • Also like Joker, Riddler sends amateur footage of himself torturing and killing a man while addressing the public to the news, who broadcast it with a warning that the footage is disturbing.
  • In The Dark Knight, a gang of armed copycat "Batman" take to the streets in a misguided attempt to help the actual Batman. Here the Riddler is essentially doing the same thing, and has galvanized his own gang of armed copycat Riddlers who show up in the finale.
• The bat insignia is shown to be the film's version of a batarang. In an episode of Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Batman's chest insignia is revealed to be an emergency batarang.
• The ending also draws from Batman: No Man's Land: a catastrophe — an earthquake in the comics, the bombing of a sea wall in the movie — causes a crisis and martial law in Gotham, opening up the city to (even more) crime, and implicitly giving the Penguin room to grow his criminal enterprise.
• The Riddler's Saw-style murder methods are reminiscent of the Batman: Arkham Series, which also had the character use Jigsaw-like traps on his victims. The neck bomb used to kill Colson is especially similar to the bombs he used in Arkham City and Arkham Knight.
  • His motive of exposing corrupt officials is reminiscent of his goals from Batman: Arkham Origins. His MO of terrorism while idolizing Batman (but not Bruce Wayne) and thinking that the Caped Crusader would approve of his methods is reminiscent of Anarky from that game as well.
• Wayne Tower's library is shown to have a familiar Shakespeare bust.
• The Riddler laughs a lot like Frank Gorshin.
• Falcone recounts a time he had to go to Bruce's father, Thomas, for emergency surgery after being shot because he couldn't risk going to a hospital, while Bruce (as a child) was watching from the stairs above. This exact scene was depicted in a flashback in The Long Halloween.
• The general story very loosely follows The Long Halloween, beginning on Halloween and most of the victims being associates related to Falcone (in the comic, they're his blood relatives, but here they're just dirty politicians and police officers on his payroll), leading up to Falcone himself being murdered. Although, outside of beginning on Halloween, there's no holiday motif afterwards.
• A recording of Thomas Wayne announcing his investment into the renewal fund has him saying, "I believe in Gotham" which is the first line said in The Long Halloween, itself a shoutout to the first line said in The Godfather. It also echoes, "I believe in Harvey Dent" in Harvey's campaign for District Attorney in The Dark Knight, a line that was also used earlier in The Long Halloween.
• Near the end, Falcone gains the scratch mark scars on his right cheek he has in the comics when Selina claws his face. The circumstances are a little different though; in the comic, she scratches him as she's fleeing from his home in an attempted robbery, but here, her clawing him was because Falcone tried to strangle her to death.
• Arkham Asylum is renamed Arkham State Hospital here, similar to Joker (2019).
• Just like in Batman: The Telltale Series, Thomas and Martha Wayne have some dirty business that the villain tries to exploit, with Bruce being targeted because of Sins of Our Fathers. However, it turns out this Thomas was a good man who simply made a reckless choice to protect his family, and he didn't intend for his renewal fund to be used by corrupt officials and gangsters, in contrast to Telltale's Thomas, who really WAS a ruthless mobster who had Esther Cobblepot driven insane and committed to Arkham for her land.
  • Some scenes are also highly reminiscent of ones from the Telltale Series: Falcone having a oddly friendly talk with Bruce while playing billiards is a notable one. In the first season, Bruce also goes to see Falcone in the hospital to get more information about his father's history with him, and confronts Alfred about not telling him about it. In the movie, it's Alfred in the hospital bed instead. Finally, both stories have Falcone be killed unexpectedly by the main villain, with Bruce unable to stop it despite watching it happen.
  • Even the Riddler's design and MO appears to take some elements from the main villain of the Telltale Series' first season: A radicalized terrorist with a hatred of Gotham City (especially the wealthy elite and Thomas Wayne in particular) who recruits other disaffected people to their crusade, wears a gimp-esque mask and makes video announcements to the city with an electronically-modified voice? Sounds pretty familiar.
• Wayne Tower is designed to be like its comic counterpart during Grant Morrison's tenure, with its spires emulating Batman's familiar silhouette.
• The film's version of the Batcave is shown to be an old train station underneath Wayne Tower. This makes it a fusion of Dick Grayson's Bat Bunker during his tenure as Batman and Batcave South-Central, which is a safehouse repurposed from an 1880s subway station.
• One of Reál's campaign posters promoting the upcoming election night uses the slogan "Election Night Returns".
• Batman's contact lenses, which allow him to record footage to review later and use facial recognition, are seemingly a nod to Detective Vision from the Arkham games.
• Riddler's final plan of initiating a flood and blackout on Gotham by obliterating the dam so as to cut Gotham off from the world borrows from Batman: Zero Year, especially with his bogus justification of doing it as a call for Gothamites to improve the city on their own, when in reality, it's just a thinly veiled excuse to punish what he believes to be an uncaring corrupt city. This also borrows from Bane and Talia Al Ghul's scheme in The Dark Knight Rises, who first intend to punish the devious elites and leave Gotham in a destitute communist squalor isolated from the world, letting the citizens grow increasingly desperate to survive, but ultimately mean to obliterate the city with a thermo-nuke, with the express (yet dubious) purpose of purifying it. The difference is that Gotham, while devastated, is not left isolated, but rather the National Guard actually does come to their aid, placing it under martial law and more or less enabling the city to function partially during a restoration effort, rather than remaining helpless under Edward's thumb or with threat of further destruction like from the remaining League of Shadows.
• The main theatrical poster as seen on the main page is a nod to the◊ iconic◊ comic◊ covers◊ where a giant Batman stands over a castle/city skyline.
• The Riddler's glasses are nearly identical to the ones worn by pre-Riddler Edward Nygma in Batman Forever. And in an ironic twist, Jim Carrey's Riddler was a Loony Fan of Bruce Wayne, while Paul Dano's version despises Bruce and idolizes the Batman.
• The opening shot features a wealthy-looking couple and their young son that the viewer could easily mistake for the Wayne family, just like the opening shot of the 1989 film.
• Thomas Wayne was running for Mayor prior to his murder, just as he was in Batman: Earth One and Joker. Like in the latter, Thomas was trying to conceal a secret about a romantic partner who'd been in an institution.
• When Batman brings Falcone out to Gordon, Falcone asks him "Are you with Zorro here?", referring to the movie the Waynes went to see on the night of their murder.
• As Selina prepares to leave town after Gotham is flooded, she mentions Bludhaven as a city she's thinking of moving to. She should have checked the city's information more closely, though: Bludhaven is supposed to be even worse than Gotham.
• Bruce has to talk a distraught Selina in her civilian attire out of shooting the object of her revenge with a small pistol, which also happens (albeit with much less struggle) in Batman Returns.
• One that also doubles as foreshadowing— the final sentence of Riddler’s diary entry is “I know now what I must become”, and several seconds later, there’s a particularly long shot of Edward’s pet bat.
• Robert Pattinson regresses to his best Christian Bale voice when giving Riddler his "The Reason You Suck" Speech.
• Michael Giacchino's Batman leitmotif shares a lot of parallels with past Batman scores, evoking similar elements to Danny Elfman's Batman (1989) theme and Shirley Walker's Batman: The Animated Series theme, as well as incorporating the "na na na na na na na na Batman!" horns of the Batman (1966) theme for its A Bat in the Rafters arrangement.
• Joker's introduction has him say "One day you're on top, the next you're a clown," which seems to be a vague paraphrasing of the iconic The Killing Joke line, "All it takes is one bad day to reduce the sanest man to lunacy."
• Joker's riddle to Edward, "the less of them you have, the more they're worth", is an inversion of Alexander Knox's observation of Wayne Manor's expensive decorations ("the more you've got, the less they're worth") in Batman (1989).
  • It's also the same riddle that the Riddler gave to Batman in the animated version of Hush.
• Like Arkham Origins, Bruce is young, angry, heavily armored, and in his second year of crimefighting.

Deleted Arkham Scene *Spoilers*

• The Joker's grotesque look brings to mind his Titan sickness from Arkham City, complete with his bulging cheeks reminiscent of victims of the Titan serum.
  • It also brings to mind Jeremiah Valeska's final design in Gotham. Jeremiah/Mr. J also had scarring all over his body (with the most notable being in his face) and a near-bald head with the only strands of hair left being dyed a green-ish tone.
• Several to Heath Ledger's Joker:
  • Barry Keoghan's line deliveries seem to invoke Ledger, sharing his lisp, slurring, lip smacking, and mouth breathing.
  • Joker laughs that Batman is usually "ahead of the curve", and adds that he wants to talk about him instead of the Riddler because he's "so much more fun."
  • When obscured due to the Depth of Field of the camera, Joker looks like he has Ledger's Glasgow smile.
• Batman visits the Joker because he thinks a criminal's perspective might help in this serial killer case. This brings to mind his visits to Calendar Man in the previously-mentioned Long Halloween story.
• The oddly peaceful attitude that Batman takes when visiting calls to mind the opening scene to The Killing Joke, where Batman visited the Joker in an attempt to appeal to his better nature.
• At one point, Joker bares his grotesque mouth in a Gross-Up Close-Up, invoking Lee Bermejo's cover art for Brian Azzarello's Joker graphic novel.
• The Joker bears a permanent smile on his face, never changing expression even once, and Word of God implies that the smile drove him mad. This is very reminiscent of Jack Nicholson's Joker, who lost all sense of sanity upon realizing that his handsome face has been warped into a clown with a permanent grin because his surgeon couldn't repair the nerves around his mouth.
• His mutilated face and too-wide mouth may also be a reference to his inspiration, The Man Who Laughs.

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