It’s categorically false to say “Batman movies aren’t superhero movies.” However, it’s undeniable that Batman movies are the least superhero-y superhero movies. The most grounded in reality. Which, perhaps, is why whenever a new Batman drops - at least, since the start of Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy - it feels like a cultural vibe check.
Side Note: I don’t care to litigate the value (or lack thereof) of superhero (specifically: Marvel) movies in the the cultural zeitgeist. I can’t believe how much energy and column space has been wasted on the topic. Popular mainstream entertainment reflects the desires of the masses and, for many understandable reasons (see: post-9/11 paranoia; complete economic instability for 99% of the country; the insane lie of “post-racial” harmony'; about 500 other reasons) most Americans opt for art that infantilizes and coddles. The world will always need plane movies and Marvel has mastered the art of making ‘em. I’m far more interested in discussing how it seems the Marvel movie machine really hit its stride around the same time most airlines started installing personal seat back televisions on most planes… Coincidence? That’s for another time. But I digress…
The Nolan Batman films, at their core, are about the power of collective antagonism. It is the ultimate post-9/11 piece of mainstream fiction. Each of Nolan’s movies interrogate the idea of fear - be it intensely personal (Batman Begins), rooted in existentialist anarchism (The Dark Knight) or an essential tool of governmental and societal institutions (The Dark Knight Rises) - as a weapon employed for both good and evil. That’s why when Christian Bale’s Batman realizes he can never fully protect the people of Gotham City from fear, he staves off societal collapse by rallying people around a common enemy. Hate doesn’t rebuild what we’ve lost, but it does distract from fear. This is the whole “not the hero we deserve, hero we need,” thing. Nolan’s reinterpretation of the Bush-era idea that we, as a nation, would benefit more from indulging each other’s hatred of the unknown, shadow-y “other” that attacked us instead of actually processing a shared trauma based in fear of that unknown.
Now, is the Dark Knight trilogy an opus of conservative, fascistic ideology, as some critics have argued? Lol. No. A decade later, the trilogy plays like a relatively clear-eyed meditation on the prevailing national psyche of a post-9/11 America. A country of secretly terrified people who mistook their own grieving for weakness. People who hated the helplessness of their fear and preferred the powerful feeling of anger and hatred.
Side Note #2: If anything, Marvel is the real champion of using superheroes to push conservative, fascistic ideologies. The Marvel Cinematic Universe outwardly stated its dedication to principles of American exceptionalism and infallibility no less than 45 minutes into Iron Man, when the titular Man of Iron first uses his powers to blast a bunch of background actor Afghanis to smithereens in a Middle Eastern cave.
Which brings me to Matthew Reeves’ The Batman. A movie that - unlike the Affleck-era Batman films, which feel like bizarro manifestations of the post-Obama election, mostly politically disengaged, “racism is over” era with its whole, “Why don’t we make Batman fight Superman?” thing - reckons with the legacy of Nolan’s films. In many ways The Batman both checks in on and calls out the danger of many ideas presented in Nolan trilogy.
***(There be spoilers from here on out)***
My friend said I’m giving the movie more credit than it deserves, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence The Batman is filled with distinct 2000s trauma imagery. Characters are pulled out of steel wreckage and rubble (9/11). Gotham City citizens take refuge in an arena as a flood wrecks their city (Hurricane Katrina). The Riddler (played by the most wonderfully punchable actor alive: Paul Dano) stalks his victims using thermal imaging telescope cameras (drone warfare).
Reeves seems to present the audience with familiar imagery of era-specific trauma as a question: Has America actually processed any of this shit? Did we become so preoccupied trying to suppress our fear with anger that we forgot the traumatic events that shaped our collective psyche? And, most interestingly, did we, as a country, ever stop to consider if our collective hate/anger was pointed in the same direction?
The answers are: No. Yes. No.
The world of Reeves’ The Batman is full of contradiction. Initially, I found this incredibly frustrating. The Batman never settles into any of its convictions. What at first feels like an “all cops are bastards” approach morphs into a “but not all cops” narrative. The same poor and downtrodden who are figures of pity in some scenes are terrorists in the next. Good guys who break bad are victims of circumstance but bad guys who occasionally do good are never in the right.
It feels messy and disorganized until a pivotal moment where it becomes obvious: this is Reeves’ point. We were so busy being angry as a collective nation we never stopped to check in if we’re all in the same page. It’s why, towards the end of the movie, Riddler truly believes Batman is abetting his crimes, not trying to stop them. Why in one scene a have-nothing degenerate waxes about eating the rich to none other than good ol’ billionaire Bruce Wayne. We’ve been so angry for so long at so many different moving targets it’s impossible to tell who’s fighting for what team. The collective anger that staved off initial calamity in Nolan’s universe has only divided us in further Reeves’ world.
Reeves presents his thesis one last time towards the end of the film when Robert Pattinson whines (in a good way!) over Nirvana’s “Something In The Way.”
Those scars can destroy us, even after the physical wounds have healed.
I don’t know if The Batman is a good movie. I like a lot of the performances but it’s way too long, visually meh and tenuously plotted. Nevertheless, I’m appreciative that, for the first time in what feels like forever, a Blockbuster movie actually reckons with the real world instead of just trying to distract us from it.
DEFINITIVE ALFRED RANKINGS
Michael Caine
Michael Gough
Ralph Fiennes (Lego Batman Universe)
Jeremy Irons
Unfortunately, there are not more people I can put before Andy Serkis.
RECOMMENDATIONS
Five Came Back: A Story of Hollywood and the Second World War by Mark Harris
Buying bots to follow your friends on Instagram as a prank
Rewatching Good Time, in which Robert Pattinson gives one of the best comedic performances of the 21st century thus far.
Beach House’s Once Twice Melody
Larry Fitzmaurice’s Last Donut of the Night substack