 All right, before we get into any gritty, let's just talk about the clear influences in this. Obviously this one. Obviously this one. Obviously this one. But then there's some other ones that Ego, Matt Reeves did say he took inspiration from that. Obviously Gotham Central, some of Scott Snyder's work, both Zero City and Court of Owls, The Cult. This was actually kind of a little bit of inspiration from that, even though it's not a Riddler story. And then all of these comic books as well, there's even a move that Pattinson does in this movie that is straight out of this game. This was made by people who love Batman. Hey guys, this is my spoiler filled review about the Batman film. How I'm going to do this is I'm going to talk about the main characters of the story and talk about what I like about them and how they affect the elements of the story. Because if I were to tell you the whole thing through, this video would be like three hours long because that's how long the movie is. So first off, we'll talk about the most obvious choice being Batman. Now Pattinson had a lot on his shoulders with this film, seeing Batfleck get massive to be in a film that was subpar, if at best, really just trash. So to see him coming into this as kind of lanky as he is, there was some speculation into it. And definitely with his physique style and his general coming across the characters, there's a lot of year one influences in here because his Bruce Wayne isn't really there. And this was something that I was hearing a few people complain about. And I feel that this version of Bruce Wayne works because of the scenario, the atmosphere and the world of Gotham that we are being given. This is a completely bottomless, hopeless scourge of the earth. Gotham is a shithole. Seeing a Bruce Wayne as kind of this chauvinistic cocky kind of alternate persona to that of his Batman character wouldn't have worked. It just would have come across as really awkward and out of place. His hopelessness, his lacking want to be Bruce Wayne in any capacity, his just general, it won't be long before you've nothing left. I don't care what happens to me. It plays into his persona because he is based on the idea of vengeance. He is taking his anger, his frustration, his depression out on criminals who wronged him so long ago. I'm Vengeance. Which by the way, we gotta make a comment about that. If they took this note from Spider-Man Homecoming, give them credit for that. The fact there's no origin story in here is fantastic. It lets you just get into the character. We don't need to see another, another, another, another Batman origin story. We see him as he is. We see the influence that he's had on people, both good and bad. And we just get straight into the story. We don't have to have like a 50 minute prologue. Not to say that anything against Batman Begins. I love Batman Begins and I think that is a great origin story. By skipping that whole bit, you just get to have the meat and potatoes of the story. And then going back to the why his Bruce Wayne persona is just kind of, uh, it reflects on who he is. He even says he hates going out and doing stuff. He doesn't care what happens to him. He is bent on his mission, which he even writes down as a project. The fact that he is making notes, being near on OCD about his details and keeping track of things and going over notes and evidence really portrays the idea that the Batman is the world's greatest detective in probably the best way that's ever been done in any of the film adaptations. Animated series had a lot of it too. And you could almost say there's a detective bit in the dark night with that weird bullet thing, but this is actual detective stuff. I love it when he is going through the room and just looking at certain objects. And then he goes back to the cave and he goes over them in his notes and with his eye tracking technology, which I actually like that. I thought that was a really cool idea to the point where he's in his office, his house, and he pushes everything aside and he just makes a mess of the floor with spray paint and pictures and trying to figure out how it all leads. There are certainly plenty of comic panels that have had that kind of framing of him just overlooking all of his evidence and all of the elements. And that also leads into the sins of my father aspect, which was an element in the Court of Owls. It also was in the Telltale Batman series. The idea that Bruce Wayne's parents were all goody two shoes, I actually enjoy. At first I never thought I would like that, but Telltale did it really well and this movie does it well because it doesn't make his parents fully bad. Like they weren't fully embezzled into the crime syndicate. They just got caught in it and there's some dark past with the Arkham's and there's also the Elliot Hush kind of reference, which I'm happy that they didn't take a lot of inspirations from that comic, except for obviously Riddler being behind it all. That is something that could be possibly placed in the future. All of these tiny little elements about his character are so well done, but so subtly put there that they leave so many avenues for them to go with future films. And then the part that I got a lot of the first time, but I got much more of it the second time, is the significance of his bat rang, his bat symbol, his crest. For those of you who didn't know, it's made out of the gun that killed his parents, or at least that's what I've been led to believe of all the notes about the film. So when it comes to the end of the movie, when he's going back into the Riddler's house to find the map of all of the bombs all over the city to flood the city, it really makes a significant showing of him putting it back in his chest. And you're kind of wondering what that is, because it leads into how he reflects upon himself at the end of the film. When he goes and fights Riddler's goons at the top of the stadium, and at one point he is like literally beat the shit after taking a shotgun blast the chest and Catwoman looks like she's about to die, he reaches into his bat belt and grabs a stimulant, which I'm going to take a guess is Venom. Because right after he injects it into himself, he does the exact same face that is the cover of the comic for Venom. And he near on beats that guy to death. But when James Corden pulls him off and asks the guy, who are you? He says, I'm vengeance. And some people would be like, but when Pattinson looks back at him, he realizes something that the Batman comics have always kind of talked about and sort of as well just the movies, but no one's actually really had Batman fully acknowledge it, at least in film form is that he creates these personas, his violence, his mission, his purpose, at least at first in Gotham is to create fear amongst criminals, but then they become their own versions of self-righteous, their own versions of what they feel is justice. And so when he looks back and he sees the guy say, I'm vengeance, he's like, oh shit, what have I done? What have I started to create by doing this? And then when the electric box thing is up in the sky and it's like about to shock people, I thought it was a little weird that he just jumps and grabs it and kind of makes like it he might have sacrificed himself. But no, this is the Batman that the guy can take fucking bullets and a bomb to his face. He's definitely got some insulation for electricity, but the significance of him using his crest to cut the cable is that he's letting go of the part of him that started Batman. He is giving up the pure terror, the pure vengeance side of him because he needs more than that to help save this city. So when he walks over and offers his hand to the mayor who's reluctant to take it at first because of the persona he's taken, it's the mayor's son who he has had this visual connection with ever since the movie started that reaches for his hand. And he becomes a symbol of hope at the end of the film where he's helping people being evacked out of the city. But that person reaches for his arm. It's not fear of him, but fear of leaving his side of being away from him because she feels safe with him. And that is what I'd like almost the most about the movie is this turn, this representation of taking the Batman as he is and forming him into the symbol of hope. Now moving on to the next character is being Riddler. God, Paul Daniel is weird. He is so strange, but he works so well into this character because I've always found the Riddler to be while conniving his own worst enemy because of his hubris and the fact that he's just a fucking asshole. And if you guys ever say that this fucking version of Riddler is accurate, go jump in the kiddie pool because this is stupid. I have hated Jim Carrey's version of Riddler ever since I first saw it. Even me as a child knew that that was not the Riddler. Paul Daniel does take a lot of notes from Heath Ledger's character, admittedly, just the idea of him being a symbol. He views himself as an instrument against the higher ups, against those people in power, against those people who abuse their power. And Daniel's sort of BDSM mask works too. It shows him as just a regular person. He doesn't kind of equate himself to being any better than anyone else, unless it's his hubris and his ability to outsmart the cops, outsmart the politicians, outsmart Batman. Is there some parts of this movie that where he's a little bit much? Maybe when he starts singing Ave Maria because I really don't understand why that part happened. And I think Matt Reeves does have Michael the composer go, Hey, maybe just rise the track a little bit because this scene's a little bit strange, but we still need to have it in here with speaking of which Michael Ganettino's score is so good. Yes. So simplistic. Okay. So we got the keyboard here, right? And Michael likes to go all the way. But you can even go even darker because of course it's got to be the very end of this. So it's as grungy as hell. The very first opening with the Batman where we see him walking through the city with a narration. Once the symbol goes up in the sky and all the criminals are doing their thing and then they see the symbol and they start looking into dark viewless alleyways are into the dark doorways of buildings and the music starts to rise and you get the fear that he is imposed on the criminal element of this city. Just fantastic. It's not as intricate or creative. I would almost say are kind of versatile as the Hans Zimmer scores for the three Batman films. Those are grandiose. Those are orchestras, operas almost in a sense. This is a tone for the character because it's used throughout. There's so many moments where the theme just comes back. It just appears in terms of introducing the Batman character in the car, which speaking of which I do admit it was a little bit strange seeing a muscle car as the Batman car because it looks like he's got 10,000 horsepower of family in the trunk. There's always one more family. But that chase scene is so good and it literally is just two cars driving around. It's at night. It's in the rain. It helps create that sense of terror and anxiety of driving because I hate driving in the rain. I hate driving in the rain at night. So imagine doing this at high speeds when the car goes up and it goes over the explosion slams into the penguin. That's actually some very intricate editing because it does come back. It jumps back and forth in time like maybe three or four seconds. And I haven't seen an editing style like that in a little while. Timeline-wise it is like going back three seconds technically speaking with every segment of the bit with the trucks crashing to him jumping to the penguins car flipping really helps give you every single angle of that scene. And then going to the Catwoman. I actually like Zoe in this film. I've never really found her to be that stand out of an actress in other projects. But I feel her character really does embody the persona that we got from iterations of her from year one, Long Halloween, Dark Victory. She works really well into this story and I'm happy that they didn't keep the tail because I've always found the tail looks kind of silly. Like it works in comic form but in real life for me it just looks stupid. It also looked like she'd be walking around as a giant furry. But I like her mask. I like the subtlety of it. And I like her connection to Carmine Falcone. I like that they kept that bit in from the comics. I thought that was really cool. And I like how she can show that she can stand up for herself. But it doesn't make it like obvious. It doesn't make it like a big statement or something. Sure there are maybe like one or two lines of some kind of political nature in this film. But it doesn't bring the film down in any sense I feel. I think it's embodying what is the purpose and the anger and the frustration and the confusion and the despair that this city has. And Zoe as Catwoman, Selena Kyle, does really well with what she's given. I think that her connection with Pattinson's Batman is really solid. I like their relationship especially like the end of the film where she saves him at the end. And then going on to another character who helps Batman out which I actually really liked very much so more so than I even expected was Jeffrey Wright as James Gordon. I like this version of Gordon because while he is kind of harkening to what we've known about Gordon with his kind of overly exposition reading out the cards sort of thing. You also see his relationship with Batman is more than him just like hey I've got an issue could you solve this for me? He actually puts Batman in his place a couple of times especially when they're at the precinct after the bomb goes off. This is not the way to do it. This is not how you get it done. He lays down the groundwork for Pattinson's Batman to realize what he has given himself to be in terms of how the city views him. That leads to the whole iron vengeance and the changing and for persona to an element of hope not just fear because when Jeffrey tries to put him in his place Pattinson's like you too. He accuses him because he is just so dead set on everyone being against him and Jeffrey's like no you asshole I'm trying to help you. I do like that this kind of buddy cop combo that's in this film that the penguin even makes a comment about works pretty good. I actually really enjoyed their chemistry. I enjoyed their back and forth and I'd have to say this is one of the more comic accurate versions of Gordon. I really like Gary Oldman's Gordon. He is the visual idea of what I feel is Gordon but Jeffrey Wright adds a little bit more to the character than just the simple notes that we've always had about him. Oh and then there's Alfred. He's not really much in this movie. He has a cool addition to the story. He helps Batman solve the ciphers and it looks like he trained him as well. He makes a comment about it but he's also got a few scars on his face so you see this is an Alfred who's been through some shit and even when you thought he almost died my buddy and I both thought that we're like oh my god did they actually just kill him and then when you see him in the hospital bed we both were like but him hiding the history of Bruce Wayne's parents in a somewhat sense also does work into his character. That part of the element of the story really works out well and they reconcile by the end of the film. We don't get to see Alfred at the end of the movie. We just see the last time we see him is in the hospital but I do like how Alfred is a helpful element to to Bruce. Hell the phone and the maid from the Adam West television show series. I didn't really even pick that up until I watched it the second time. I was like oh yeah Adam West stuff. Let's talk a little bit about the side characters. Colin Farrell absolutely steals the show as Penguin. It's really funny now to think about it because he is impersonating I feel his best funny version of Robert De Niro so when you think about what Tim Burton could have done sure Danny De Vito is a good visual representation of the penguin being short and whatnot but having De Niro in his prime being the penguin actually might have been really fun to watch. But one of the parts I like it the most about the penguin is his mixture of both being a comic book element character with his visual look but he's not enough that you couldn't find him unbelievable. He's not big and fat and huge. He doesn't wear a top hat. He doesn't waddle all over the place even though he does do that one waddle at one point during the movie which was really funny and then him seemingly taking over the crime syndicate at the end of the film really builds that up because it's also based on the show that's going to be coming out. Like this is an actual show that I will want to watch. It's going to be the building blocks towards the next movie. Then Carmine Falcone John Thoretto. Well he's good. I didn't actually know he was even in this movie until I think a few minutes before I saw it I saw that he was on one of the promotional pieces like oh he's going to be in this movie and even though it's really hard to see John Thoretto is anything other than threatening because I just like the actor so much. I liked his take on the character Carmine. He had a much more believable version of this kind of silver tongue devil that has everyone in his pocket and I actually thought it worked that he wore sunglasses all the time. You never saw his eyes. He always was wondering what was behind those glasses what was going on in his mind and he hides that soulless coldness of himself. So those are the why thoughts on the characters of this film and I'll finish up with a little bit of my final thoughts about the film itself. I made a comment in my review that I feel has really stuck it's been the thing that I've copied and pasted everywhere is that there are good movies with Batman in them and then this is a good movie about Batman. This has a lot of respect to not only who the character is but the people who helped build his persona and his character, his traits, his legacy. The idea of taking elements from the classic go-to comic books of Batman's legacy to also kind of unknown ones like the 66 era, some of the 90s era, a lot of Dennis O'Neill novels, as well as some of Scott Snyder's work. There's a lot of rumors going around that the court of owls might be the next movie or a Mr. Freeze which I would love to see a Mr. Freeze movie done well but the only way I think you can do it well is if you took almost note for note everything about the Mr. Freeze from the animated series. That is still my favorite version of the villain I've ever seen. He beats all of the comic iterations of that character, he beats obviously, I don't know if it's Swiss or Niger even though that guy is very funny to watch. But I would love to see a Mr. Freeze movie done right because that is a polarizing villainous character who doesn't do what he's doing for monetary gain, he doesn't do it for glory gain or just power gain, he's doing it all to save his wife. And that gives you humility and relatability to that villain. But hey, going back to the film itself, I like how we talk about how Batman is the world's greatest detective, we show how he sees the world, we show how he isn't just a beat-em-up force, he doesn't rely just off of tools but he also has to rely off of his own intelligence, his own intuition into how things play out. And it's a good detective story too. Sure, the kick of how the story unfolds isn't as strong the second time around because it is a mystery story. You're never going to get the same hit the second time, you're never going to get the same hit from watching Usual Suspects the second time, you're never going to get the same hit from watching Seven the second time, which by the way Riddler's house is totally homage to Kevin Spacey's place from the seven, 100% even down to the crazy wacky notes. And his character works really well in terms of the grunginess and the shithole that is Gotham. And something that a lot of people have made clear and obvious notes about, which 100% deserves it, is Matt Reeves' visualization of Gotham. It's probably the most comic accurate version we've ever seen. Batman Begins kind of had it a little bit, but then this movie just blows it out of the water in terms of just all of the garbage, the trash, the homelessness, the unfinished construction buildings, and then also taking a lot of the neo-gothic architecture that was obviously inspired by Tim Burton's Batman movie, which was then taken into the animated series. My issues with the Tim Burton Batman movies aside, I will always thank those movies for giving the animated series the visual element that it needed to be as good as it is. And they take that to an extent in this movie with using everything from how the city is structured to Wayne's Manor, which is the top of the Wayne Tower. Something that actually I didn't even really notice and that didn't bother me at all is that there isn't really a Wayne Manor in this film. It's in the Tower. Kind of makes sense. It definitely has more of a believability of Batman being able to be in the city at all times and being able to conduct his project, whereas you'd have to keep on driving, what, like 30 miles out of the city? I'd like driving, but admittedly the commute to just going back and forth for criminal stuff would just be so annoying. But either way, I still stand by my rating of seven out of seven for this movie. However, I will make one slight note about my rating is that it is a seven out of seven in terms of a comic book accurate and dedication. It is a great, fantastic, even Batman comic book movie. As a movie itself, I could see people having some issues with it. There are a couple elements here and there, kind of expecting people to know this stuff about Batman, like for instance, like the venom injection into his leg. If you did not know what that was, you would not have had any kind of indication from anything in this movie. They never indicated he just uses it, but that is very much an indication to the venom storyline, which if that's in here, that means that maybe a Bane character might come around too. And then there's maybe some parts where James Gordon is kind of unnecessarily reading the cards over and over again several times, but I feel that that works in terms of who Gordon is because he's reading it for the audience as well. I don't get bothered by that at all, but I could see why filmgoers, just regular filmgoers, people who aren't that well versed in Batman can get bothered by some of these issues and others. But otherwise, I still feel that this is the best Batman, Batman character movie that's ever been done. And I'll stand by that. Then anyways, guys, those are my thoughts. That's my spoiler filled review about the Batman. Apologies for the length, but I really wanted to talk about this movie. I haven't done one of these kind of videos in a while because I always find that I rattle on, but I feel I was a little bit directed this time around, was I? But either way, I hope you guys enjoyed the video. If you did, leave a like and if you're interested in more subscribe. And until then, see you guys next time.