Seeing this nocturnal bat-themed vigilante leaping rooftops and upending the villains’ most nefarious plots against Gotham and its citizens makes the Riddler feel compelled to take him down a couple of notches. In the comics, the criminal mastermind is a psychopath who is obsessed with flexing his intellectual dominance over Gotham City, its people, the police, and – most importantly – the Batman himself.

Rampant narcissistic and egomaniacal behavior, an obsessive-compulsive disorder, and a colossal superiority complex are perhaps the biggest defining traits of the Riddler. With Batman and his villains excelling in practically every medium when tackling tightly scaled, gritty stories centered around crime noir, Reeves use of acclaimed indie actor Paul Dano to put a Zodiac -like spin on the Riddler could be the concoction necessary for a successful theatrical redemption. The Riddler has seen such takes in both comics and on screen, ranging from cartoonishly narcissistic to dangerously grim. Like how Nolan also redeemed Two-Face from Batman Forever ’s tonally unfaithful Tommy Lee Jones version, Matt Reeves could be doing the same for that movie’s zany and aggressively silly Jim Carrey take on the Riddler.Ĭomic book characters as a rule can be open to multiple interpretations while keeping the core of what makes them instantly recognizable.

Though director Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight Trilogy was widely acclaimed for reinventing the superhero’s dense world and characters in a modern, more grounded setting – and redeeming his theatrical reputation after the maligned mid-to-late-’90s movies – The Batman seems set to do something excitedly different by using similar narrative approaches.

Laying down a foundation for the future.

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