No one has ever accused Bruce Wayne of being a reasonable, well-adjusted person. It takes a special kind of person to dress in a Bat costume and beat up criminals every night. But if there’s one takeaway from the new trailer for The Batman shown at DC FanDome, it’s that Robert Pattinson’s Dark Knight might just be the most deranged one yet.
Let’s take a look at five reasons why the new Batman is so terrifying, and one reason why there might be hope yet for Gotham City’s brutal protector.
Fighting Like a Bat Out of Hell
The new trailer shows us an extended look at a familiar fight sequence between Batman and a group of hoods in clown makeup. As before, we have to wonder if this gang is somehow connected to the Joker, or if they’re a prelude to the rise of Gotham’s worst supervillain.
Either way, Batman is really going to town on these poor saps. We even see him bust out a Bat-taser to deal with one of his foes. The look on Pattinson’s face here suggests Bruce is struggling to contain what may well be murderous rage. Pattinson even acknowledges this rage in a FanDome interview leading up to the trailer's debut, hinting that the Batman role is rapidly consuming Bruce's life.
"He wants to inflict his kind of justice," said Pattinson. "He’s kind of compelled to do it. There is no other option."
Later, we see a car chase involving Colin Farrell’s Penguin. Oswald Cobbplepot thinks he’s destroyed Batman, only for the Batmobile to rise from the flames and slam into its prey. Clearly, Batman is at a stage in his career where he’s hellbent on eliminating crime, even if he has to savagely pummel every criminal in the city into submission.
Bulletproof Batman?
We see multiple shots of Batman shrugging off gunfire in the trailer, including one where the Dark Knight nonchalantly absorbs a volley of machine gun fire. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a bulletproof Batsuit on the big screen, but even Ben Affleck’s Batman didn’t particularly enjoy getting shot.
It could be that this younger Bruce Wayne is just cocky. He’d rather fight aggressively than use stealth and darkness to his advantage. Like Michael Keaton’s Batman, he may also be trying to create the illusion that he’s not human and bullets can’t hurt him. Let’s just hope no one aims for his face.
More disturbingly, Bruce himself says “I don’t care what happens to me.” He’s clearly got a few screws loose, and he may be so consumed by his vigilante crusade and thirst for revenge that he has an actual death wish.
Even as Bruce, he has the look of someone teetering on the edge of sanity and maybe not showering quite as often as he should.
Another shot shows some of the physical scars Bruce has accumulated in his two years on the job. This doesn’t appear to be a man who plans for a future beyond Batman.
Even Alfred seems genuinely worried about the path Master Bruce is walking. And if Alfred’s own forehead wound is any indication, Andy Serkis’ Alfred may be taking a more proactive role in Batman’s crusade than in previous movies. Or it could be a souvenir of his military past.
Riddler’s Conspiracy
The trailer opens with a SWAT team arresting Paul Dano’s Riddler, who seems happy to turn himself into police custody. If we’ve learned anything from modern blockbuster movies, it’s that getting captured is all part of the villain’s master plan.
He even confirms as much when he tells Batman “I’ve been trying to reach you.” At this point, Riddler is wearing a uniform with the word “hospital” on it, so he may be in Arkham Asylum or another psychiatric institute. He clearly wanted to get caught and pass a message to Batman. Whatever that message is, ol’ Batsy clearly isn’t happy.
To be clear, we don’t see the character’s face here, so we can’t be 100% sure Batman is talking to Riddler. The trailer clearly wants us to get that impression, but why hide Edward Nashton’s face? Is this actually another familiar villain Batman already helped apprehend in the past? For all we know, this could even be the Joker.
Both trailers paint Riddler as a Zodiac Killer-esque criminal mastermind. Riddler is on a killing spree, and his body count includes city officials like cops and even Gotham’s previous mayor Don Mitchell, Jr. We see he even livestreams some of his crimes to a captivated public.
This trail of bodies is seemingly meant to lead Batman to the heart of a deeper conspiracy linked to Gotham’s past. We see Bruce trying to untangle that knot here. The names in this chart include the late Mayor Mitchell, District Attorney Gil Colson (played by Peter Sarsgaard) and Commissioner Pete Savage (played by Alex Ferns).
This chart (which we assume was left by Riddler for Batman to find), also contains the phrase “Sins of the father,” a possible reference to the Wayne family and their involvement in this conspiracy. Did that play a part in their tragic murders?
Another phrase reads, “Renewal is a lie.” This may be referencing Jayme Lawson’s character Bella Reál, who’s running for mayor on a platform of revitalizing her dying city. Not if Riddler has anything to say about it. Maybe Gotham’s planned urban renewal would cover up exactly what Riddler is trying to expose.
Many Bat-fans have speculated this Gotham conspiracy revolves around the Court of Owls, an ancient cult that has existed in the city for centuries. There’s no direct evidence of the Court’s role here, but we wouldn’t be surprised to see them play a key role across this new Batman trilogy.
The Bat, the Cat and the Penguin
The new trailer makes it clear we’re going to see a lot of Batman romancing Catwoman in this movie. The first few shots of Zoë Kravitz’s Selina Kyle show the sexual tension simmering between the two, and prove that she can hold her own against Gotham’s scum and villainy.
Later, we even see Catwoman make one of her trademark rooftop dives to escape as Batman is attacked by a mysterious assailant.
But there’s one shot that strikes a very different tone. Here, Selina seems genuinely afraid as she watches Batman bash someone’s brains in. She seems to be both fascinated and repulsed by her new friend.
But if the shot of Catwoman loading a gun is any indication, she may have a dark mission of her own. In the comics, Selina is often depicted as the illegitimate daughter of crime boss Carmine Falcone, who’s played by John Turturro in this movie. Could she have a beef with the mob?
Selina isn’t the only Gothamite who seems a little weirded out by Batman. We see several new shots of Penguin this time, including some that appear to be set inside his base of operations, the Iceberg Lounge. This crime boss is on the rise, but is he crazy enough to handle the Dark Knight?
Lighting the Bat-Signal
Early in the trailer we see this world’s version of the Bat-Signal, which is every bit as grungy and industrial as Batman’s costume. While it definitely appears Batman and Jeffrey Wright’s James Gordon have a working relationship by this point, that alliance seems fragile at best.
Later, it appears that Batman is battling Gordon’s men, possibly after Riddler has turned the city against him.
Batman’s monologue during the lighting of the Signal should probably be taken as a worrying sign. He describes it as a warning to the city’s criminals, another sign he seems to care more about punishing the wicked than protecting the innocent.
Bruce’s arc in the film, if not the entire trilogy, may center on his need to cast aside his ego and truly become the hero Gotham needs. He needs to be a force for justice, not vengeance.
And we may see the seeds of that evolution in the trailer. This scene shows Batman carrying a flare and guiding a group of people through some sort of underground area. Is this a death trap devised by Riddler? Whatever it is, this may be the point where Bruce realizes he can be something more than just a terror of the night. He can inspire hope, and maybe tone down the psychotic rage while he’s at it.
What do you think of this deranged new Dark Knight? Let us know your thoughts on the trailer in the comments below. And for more DC FanDome goodness, be sure to brush up on Black Adam's rocky history with the JSA and the tragic history of the Injustice universe. Or dive into why the Robert Pattinson Batman needs the Riddler.
Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.
