The Batman: Fandome/Final(?) Trailer (Potential Bat-Spoilers)

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

So, thoughts?

 

• Dark. Liking the colour scheme and the look of Gotham.
• DARK. Bats knows he's scary as all hell and uses it. Also: Invuln/SS Tanker.
• DARRRRK... Riddler feels very Jigsaw, and is only shown obliquely in this trailer. 
• DAYUM: I will be very hacked off if they fridge Zoe Kravitz, because yes. We like. We like very much.
• DUDE? Farrell has had a massive transformation into the Penguin? (Makeup needs slightly better lighting though...)

Edited October 17, 2021 by ThaOGDreamWeaver

[Techwright]

I'm assuming if anyone is popping into this thread, they'll know the trailer spoilers are flying.  Why else would one be here?

 

I would not have realized it was Colin Ferrell.  The look is remarkable, and strangely disturbing because I feel I've seen that face before somewhere.

 

Even the coffee cup has a green stripe.  Nice touch.

 

Per IMDB, 4 villains (that we've been told), or perhaps 3 villains & 1 anti-hero/rogue.  This makes me think they'll not do a full take-down this picture, but will deal with one, maybe two, and set the stage for subsequent films. 

 

I'm hoping they've a very, very slow burn in mind for introducing the Joker to this new telling.  Batman's Rogues Gallery is the best in the business, and it's time to mine it's full depth. ( I'd love to finally have a proper, scary live-action Mr. Freeze or see Clock King brought to the franchise in full compulsive, precision psycho-genius mode. ) In fact, I think I'd rather have a cameo from Condiment King before yet another Joker appearance.

 

 

[Luminara]

37 minutes ago, Techwright said:

I'd love to finally have a proper, scary live-action Mr. Freeze or see Clock King brought to the franchise in full compulsive, precision psycho-genius mode.

 

Get out of my mind.

 

OUT.  NOW.

[Glacier Peak]

3 hours ago, Techwright said:

I'm assuming if anyone is popping into this thread, they'll know the trailer spoilers are flying.  Why else would one be here?

 

I would not have realized it was Colin Ferrell.  The look is remarkable, and strangely disturbing because I feel I've seen that face before somewhere.

 

Even the coffee cup has a green stripe.  Nice touch.

 

Per IMDB, 4 villains (that we've been told), or perhaps 3 villains & 1 anti-hero/rogue.  This makes me think they'll not do a full take-down this picture, but will deal with one, maybe two, and set the stage for subsequent films. 

 

I'm hoping they've a very, very slow burn in mind for introducing the Joker to this new telling.  Batman's Rogues Gallery is the best in the business, and it's time to mine it's full depth. ( I'd love to finally have a proper, scary live-action Mr. Freeze or see Clock King brought to the franchise in full compulsive, precision psycho-genius mode. ) In fact, I think I'd rather have a cameo from Condiment King before yet another Joker appearance.

Yes! Or Calendar Man 😃 

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

6 hours ago, Glacier Peak said:

Yes! Or Calendar Man 😃 

Calendar Man is (briefly) in James Gunn's Suicide Squad, and a key part of the Long Halloween animated movie.

 

It'd need a really good script, but if they're going for the full horror vibe: a Raimi-inspired (or Raimi-directed) Dollmaker would scare all hell outa me.

And as a lesser-known villain, they'd have more room to play with it.

[The_Warpact]

My thoughts on how dark this Gotham seems to be, there is a distinct feeling of menace coming from every direction. 

This Batman seems to be the unleashed vengeance, one from the dark multiverse. A almost wanting to go back or looking to the horizon on alot of those scenes staring at the sunset/sunrise(?), reminded me of Lord Soth pacing the ramparts searching for his lost love and the twisted anguish from it.

Farrell Penguin seems like a villain out of Dick Tracy with a DeNiro mob swagger, does he replace Falcone and if so how does this affect Catwoman?

The Riddler...well that one is a riddle a serial killer or a criminally insane mastermind?

The Joker horde, well thats interesting has Joker been caught already and this is his gang or fan boys? Or is he a urban legend like slender man and these are murderous groupies?

 

Personally, I love the dark vengeance filled Batman, Keatons was too cartoony, Batfleck tried too hard, and Bales didn't go far enough. The rest sucked so much I'm not going to respond on them.

 

Now all that being said, I would love to see the Scarecrow in this world. Now that would be dark and scary asf.

[Techwright]

11 hours ago, Glacier Peak said:

Yes! Or Calendar Man 😃 

 

I've been holding back one I'd dearly love to see:  Bookworm.  Pretty sure he's only been in the '66 Adam West series, so a very campy version, but I can see great potential of a Bookworm reinvented as a information junkie with photographic memory, scanning fantastic amounts of webpages and e-books, and with a mind capable of collating all sorts of minutia collected from his readings into master plans. As a result he's a master hacker, blackmailer, and manipulator on a Big Brother scale.  I only wish Roddy McDowell was still alive to play this serious version of him.

[Glacier Peak]

I think the last time Batman went this dark/delves as deep into rogues gallery outside of the comic medium was in the magnificent and highly acclaimed Batman Animated series. 

[Techwright]

On 10/16/2021 at 7:23 PM, Techwright said:

Per IMDB, 4 villains (that we've been told), or perhaps 3 villains & 1 anti-hero/rogue.  This makes me think they'll not do a full take-down this picture, but will deal with one, maybe two, and set the stage for subsequent films.

 

I forgot to note one rumor floating around which is, at some point expect to see the Court of Owls.  If so, this will mark their first live action appearance.  I'd expect it would likely be a cameo, perhaps of the Court taking notice of Batman for the first time, setting yet another stage for another movie.   And if this all is true, having the Gotham Knights video game come out, with it's focus on the Court might help bring awareness of this group to a wider audience.

[Triumphant]

I approve of the muscle car bat mobile.  Maybe I can fast-forward through the parts were Pattinson has the mask off, so that I can forget it's Pattinson under the mask.

 

Maybe.

 

Why didn't we get to see the Riddler?  Or was that guy with messed up face supposed to be him?

[Glacier Peak]

3 hours ago, Techwright said:

I forgot to note one rumor floating around which is, at some point expect to see the Court of Owls.  If so, this will mark their first live action appearance.  I'd expect it would likely be a cameo, perhaps of the Court taking notice of Batman for the first time, setting yet another stage for another movie.   And if this all is true, having the Gotham Knights video game come out, with it's focus on the Court might help bring awareness of this group to a wider audience.

I was actually a huge fan of the introduction of the court of owls in the mid-2010s run of Batman. It was a satisfying new take on not just a Batman villain group, but one that had so much history in Gotham and could be plausibly believed to have such power. My appreciation for Batman content goes:

 

Comics (when he's not fighting an interdimensional god, like seriously these are the worst issues)

 

Animated Series and animated films (Kevin Conroy is the voice of Batman!! And Mark Hamill is the Joker voice - this is not up for debate)

 

Video Games (Arkham series, but there have been a lot of duds/stinkers)

 

Live Action version (Films have been hit and miss. I hated that they made Batman such a focus in the CW Gotham show, I would've loved to have just watched a series about Detective Gordon as he rose up through the ranks)

Edited October 18, 2021 by Glacier Peak

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

8 hours ago, Techwright said:

I forgot to note one rumor floating around which is, at some point expect to see the Court of Owls.  If so, this will mark their first live action appearance. 

 

Not to "actually" you or (Bat-ctually?) but the Court of Owls showed up in Gotham season 3 and were effectively creepy, led by veteran character actor Ray Barry...
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Characters/GothamCourtOfOwls

Spoiler

...and were responsible for the deaths of Thomas and Martha Wayne in that continuity. However, they got fridged pretty quickly, per TVTropes: The showrunners admit in the season 3 DVD extras that the whole reason for having them killed off so suddenly is to make Ra's Al-Ghul look more impressive on his arrival in Gotham.

 

Side note... not sure why there's bad Bat-titude about Gotham generally. It took the key characters and quite a few deep cut ones too, and used the whole thing as a sandbox to tell new and different stories. Plus loved Shaun Pertwee as ass-kicking Alfred, Mazouz and Bicondova held their roles well and should have a great future...

 

...and when I think of the Penguin these days, it's not DeVito, Paul Williams or even the great Burgess Meredith. Robin Lord Taylor's Oswald Cobblepot was a fully-fledged character with depth, bathos, sympathy, multiple great arcs, and even a degree of charm.

 

5 hours ago, Triumphant said:

Why didn't we get to see the Riddler?  Or was that guy with messed up face supposed to be him?

 

I think they're going for a very slow-burn reveal of the Riddler.

 

Slightly spoilery stuff ahoy:

Spoiler

From reading previous articles about this, they've basically written a serial-killer movie using the Batman universe as their toybox. 

 

Paul Dano is wearing a heavy and somewhat kinky mask in the publicity shots that have been let loose so far - again, much more Jigsaw than a Carrey-type grinning lunatic.

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2021/may/21/paul-dano-the-riddler-the-batman

As one Twitter correspondent notes, there's a similarity to the Zodiac Killer's somewhat childish sketches of himself - which does make sense as a reference.

 

Edited October 18, 2021 by ThaOGDreamWeaver

[ZacKing]

Looks interesting.  I'm looking forward to Robert Pattinson's take on the character.  He's an interesting choice.  

[Xeres]

OK, so here are my thoughts:

 

1. I am so not interested in another Batman movie.  It may turn out to be good, but good luck following the Dark Knight trilogy.

 

2. I almost feel that Batman is DCs crutch.  When in doubt, break out another Batman movie.  Of all the DC heroes, DC usually does Batman the best (with exceptions of course).

 

I think the movie will be pretty good actually, and I am a fan of Batman (fav male superhero), but I'm not interested in this right now.

[Techwright]

14 hours ago, ThaOGDreamWeaver said:

 

Not to "actually" you or (Bat-ctually?) but the Court of Owls showed up in Gotham season 3 and were effectively creepy, led by veteran character actor Ray Barry...
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Characters/GothamCourtOfOwls

 

Thank you for that correction.  I only saw part of season 1 of Gotham, so clearly I missed that.

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

So, The Batman - all near-as-dammit-3-hours-of-it is here, and a very nervy first post(?)pandemic trip for me. Kudos to my local flick pit for using the I WEAR THE MASK TO PROTECT THOSE I LOVE tagline, and the usher who'd retrofitted theirs into an actual Bane mask.

 

Curtains up: Bat-spoilers ahead.

Spoiler

• Zoe Kravitz steals this movie. Yes. Really. Let's just get that out of the way, shall we? Yes, slink, yes, style, yes, not a dry seat in the house, but the acting is note-perfect and has real depth. Shows just what you can do when you put real actors (and writers) in a comic book story. Franchise, please.
• See also: Andy Serkis, as a combative but protective Alfred who clearly thinks his young charge has gone bonkers. Maybe correctly.
• Rob Pattinson and his epic jawline carry the role off well, but oddly highlights that the Bat - IMnpHO - isn't always the most interesting character in his canon, but a great foil for everyone else. Glittery he ain't. Fans of the DARKNESS NO PARENTS Bat-style should be happy.
• Colin Farrell. You've not seen this much wild prosthetic work since Dick Tracy (or maybe Jared Leto in House Of Gucci), but he makes it play. Bravo.
• Editing note. The fake ending and "third act" takes the movie much longer than it needs to be - I would have hinted at that as the credits rolled, nd maybe had the events start to unfold, for an EXTRA DARK NO PARENTS AND NEITHER HAVE YOU ending...
• ...which could be resolved in a sequel (which should be near inevitable anyway).
• DOUBLE SUPER SPOILER: outside of the Harley Quinn series and Titans, no-one's really taken on the No Man's Land ideas and run with them. Given that we've had a few little apocalypses going on the last couple of years, maybe too much on the nose, but it'd be good to see them take that forward.

 

Not perfect, but two dark, kevlar-gloved thumbs up.

 

Edited March 7, 2022 by ThaOGDreamWeaver

[TheOtherTed]

I might see it.  Eventually.  I managed to skip the whole Affleck run by accident, so I'm overdue.  Probably won't see it unless it comes out on one of the two streaming services I have.

 

I dig the "Nighthawks" shout-out with the diner scene, though.

 

On 10/17/2021 at 7:58 AM, The_Warpact said:

Keatons was too cartoony

Maybe so, but for my money, it's the only Bat-flick in which Gotham itself felt like a character itself.  Every big-screen version of Gotham since then has felt sort of dead and sterile, you know, just another NY or Dallas clone, move along, nothing to see here.

 

Plus Elfman's music was phenomenal.  My brain still keeps it on tap for when I need a burst of inspiration.  Conversely, I had to look up the soundtracks for the Nolan films.  Much as I liked them, the music didn't impact me at all.

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

16 minutes ago, TheOtherTed said:

Plus Elfman's music was phenomenal.  My brain still keeps it on tap for when I need a burst of inspiration.  Conversely, I had to look up the soundtracks for the Nolan films.  Much as I liked them, the music didn't impact me at all.

 

Elfman - and Prince! - will always be the go-to Bat-Soundtrack for my Batmobile moments.

 

That said: this particular Bat-flick has one Michael Giacchino on board. Starts out funereal, turns into something soaring but solemn.

Not as instantly catchy, but definitely fits the brief.

 

 

Side note: I do love the epic, petty, funny rivalry with David Arnold.

https://edithbowman.com/2019/10/episode-164-composers-michael-giacchino-and-david-arnold/

 

[battlewraith]

This is the best Batman film imo. It's very well crafted to make the idea of Batman and what he does grounded in reality and plausible. It has some superhero action movie bits but the majority of it is like a suspense drama. He actually does detective work. He's also relatively new at it and makes mistakes. I wasn't too thrilled based on the trailers but I'm really pleasantly surprised with this one.

[ThaOGDreamWeaver]

Small bonus for Bat-fans. If you've followed the Batman's twitter or other socials, or sat through to the end credits, you'll have spotted a link to https://www.rataalada.com/

 

Answer the riddles three and you'll get a deleted scene. Or cheat wildly by opening my spoiler tag below:

Spoiler

The answers are HA, JOKER, and PUNCHLINE. 

(I guessed two out of three, the third I thought was something else - so I Googled it, which the site duly mocked me for.)

 

Anyhow, you get a deleted scene with Barry Keoghan - listed as Unseen Arkham Prisoner on IMDB, but it's Mistah J.

Looking distinctly the worse for wear.

 

It's revealing in a way: the Joker being one of Batman's earliest catches (apparently it's their one year anniversary. How sweet).

And obviously quite intelligent and analytical.

 

That said, I'd say it's extremely fair that this got cut, even given the bladder-busting running time of the finished movie. Barry's Joker seems unusually amenable, friendly even. The facial makeup just doesn't cut it, the performance feels like it needs more work, it feels a bit like the writers wanted someone to vocalise some specific themes they wanted said out loud (or an exec sent a note and insisted they explain) and the overall effect is of a slightly low-rent Silence Of The Lambs ripoff.

 

(Not that Clarice would have been dumb enough to hand Lecter a file with paper clips still in it. Bad move, Batsy).

 

A fun little curiosity, certainly - though if they're planning on franchising with him, he needs a lot more fleshing out.

Literally. 

 

More interesting: the site previously had a Thomas Wayne campaign video (with a few annotations from the Riddler.)

 

Along with some other ARG-style stuff that's now been removed, it hints that the Riddler's been working with Hush. 

Now that... I can see working.