The Batman's Riddler Plan Repeats Indiana Jones' Oldest Movie Complaint
Warning: Contains spoilers for The Batman.
Matt Reeves The Batman appears to make a mistake with its Riddler storyline that repeats one of the older issues with Indiana Jones’ first outing in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Bruce Wayne and Batman have long storied histories which, while varied, can be expected to hit certain beats. However, The Batman’s treatment of Batman’s pursuit of the Riddler does something truly different but in a way that might feel frustrating.
The Batman sees the Riddler (Paul Dano) summon Batman (Robert Pattinson) to crime scenes over Gotham as he reveals a web of corruption that permeates Gotham. Manipulated by the Riddler, Bruce Wayne plays into his hands by unwittingly bringing Carmine Falcone (John Turturro) out of hiding so that Riddler can kill him. Even after this, Batman is blind to the larger picture of Riddler working to flood Gotham and can only provide damage control against his plan to kill the newly elected mayor because one of Riddler’s goons fails to make an initial killshot.
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This issue in The Batman where Bruce Wayne actually does nothing to prevent the Riddler’s plans and, if anything, only makes them worse, is eerily similar to a long-standing criticism of Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981). In the original movie, Indiana Jones (Harrison Ford) is trying to stop the Nazis from taking the Ark of the Covenant back to Germany. However, if you were to remove Indiana Jones from the film, it has been argued that the events would play out in exactly the same way. At best, the only difference would be that the Ark would make its way to Germany and be opened in front of Hitler and his generals potentially
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