Why does The Batman end twice?

at points in this video it may seem like I don't like the Batman or Matt Reeves or anything like that that is not the case I loved the Batman still do don't know how they did not get a cinematography Oscar nomination I mean come on Henry what are we doing here but it is specifically because I love the Batman that one part of the movie bugs me I've wanted to make a video about it for a while and now we've got a second between Marvel releases I am going to explain as best I can why I think the Batman ruins the Riddler so I talk about the three-act structure a lot especially when I used to do the rewrites it's a framework used to organize and understand stories it applies to literature theater video games all kinds of narrative storytelling but it is especially useful for understanding film most movies not all but most have three acts the First Act sets up our conflict and our characters the second follows our characters as they grow and attempt to address the conflict and in the third act they address the conflict there are all kinds of little Milestones along the way there are two plaque points where the characters make a choice they can't come back from there is a midpoint where something fundamental changes a low point at the end of Act 2 and a ticking clock in act 3 that results in the climax so let's look at the Batman see how it fits into this structure and again I don't think that it's completely necessary plenty of stories do not follow this structure but most do and understanding how a story deviates from that structure can help explain why some parts of it might not feel right act 1 super simple we meet Batman we meet the Riddler Riddler commits his first crime and Batman reacts to that crime he attempts to solve it and that's the end of act 1. act 2 is split into two parts separated by a midpoint part one pretty simple Batman follows leads meets Selena attempts to figure out what's going on at the Iceberg Lounge then the midpoint this is a little tricky I think you could make the case at the midpoint here is coulson's death it's the first time Batman comes face to face with a big villain the first Riddler crime that Batman is directly involved in Big Moment In The Narrative and Batman and loses Coulson dies Batman gets caught in the explosion and from that point on things get much worse and after that Batman becomes more proactive he works with Gordon to catch penguin who he believes is El rata a lot of rest of Act 2 is kicking Batman penguin is not the rat Alfred is bombed Riddler dumps the info on Thomas Wade and Carmine Falcone then Bruce goes to Falcone who tells Bruce that yes his father had the reporter killed and as a result Moroni killed his father also the renewal project his father set up was used as a slush fund for corrupt Gotham actors everything Bruce has known is a lie in screenwriting this is known as The Dark Knight of the soul I know adorable the emotional low point of the movie Obi-Wan dies in the Death Star Luke gets sad about it this is just like that everything goes wrong for Bruce and he's forced to reevaluate his way of thinking about things his father was a complicated man Alfred is family Bruce cries and grows he also has the realization that comes with the end of Act 2 Selena finds the recording from Anika where Falcone kills Annika because she knows the truth Falcone is the rat he controls the drugs in Gotham the City Works for Falcone and hey look all of our plots have merged Bruce's relationship with his parents Falcone who killed Annika Falcone who's controlling the crooked cops Falcone who is the Riddler after Falcone we are in the end game now 1 hour and 57 minutes in act three we have a ticking clock Selena is going to kill Falcone Bruce needs to get to Falco and save him and expose his crimes and we have our real big bad Falcon who Batman met at the midpoint yeah you thought the villain was Riddler I mean he kind of issed but the real villain of this story is Falcone so Selena goes to kill Falcon we get a bunch of big fights this hallway scene which is one of the cooler moments in the movie Selena tries to kill Falcone Bruce stops Selena and wrest Falcone and that is the emotional climax of the movie Bruce is forced to spare the person who killed his father and ruined his legacy because Justice is right and vengeance is wrong there's your lesson and all of our main characters are involved Bruce Selena Gordon penguin and Riddler in spirit the good guys win and then bang Riddler kills Falcone gets arrested Goes to Jail Batman and Riddler have their first face-to-face meeting Riddler says he won Batman says he didn't there's some falling action and that is the end of act three a perfectly structured movie claps hands goes home and not only that this ending solidifies the Batman's status as a Neo Noir film Neo Noir just means it's reminiscent of the film Noir genre and while he may not have seen many original film Noir movies from like the 50s you're probably familiar with other neo-noir movies like Blade Runner 2049 Drive Memento and Nightcrawler typically the genre focuses on stories about lonely anti-heroes usually detectives unraveling a dark web of conspiracies and Intrigue the morality is murky the Allies frequently beautiful women have deep dark secrets there's lots of murder overall the vibe Is Not Great there are also many Visual and auditory Noir signifiers you've got lots to Darkness Shadow plenty of rain Dutch angles and narration the genre may be best known for its Moody first person narration that sets the stage for the film it's what every parody seems to have the most fun with the Whose Line is an anyway game film Noir was all about the narration remember that that was fun anyway it's easy to see how the Batman checks a lot of these boxes versus a detective obsessed with cleaning up the streets of Gotham who gets pulled into a conspiracy that goes all the way to the top he questions his own sanity is forced to Ally with Catwoman and cooperate with the penguin Gotham is dark and dreary and Covered in Rain the camera is a skew off center and sometimes even upside down and Moody narration bookends the story it's classic neo-noir and with the climax in act 3 where Riddler shoots Falcone and tells Batman that he actually won that's a very Noir ending frequently the bad guy is able to get away with it in a Noir story The corrupt system or the real villain gets one over on the detective and that shakes the detective's perception of the world forget it Jake it's Chinatown the perfect Noir ending don't go chasing waterfalls you can't beat the system sometimes the bad guys get away so a movie where Batman arrests Falcone and saves Selena but the Riddler gets the last laugh and kills Falcone is a perfect neo-noir ending Batman's sword of one but the villain got what he wanted and the city was changed by it the corruption is weeded out but instead of a hopeful ending everything's complicated will the city be better off with Falcone dead is this what Bruce actually wanted and the big one is Batman helping or is he making things worse an even more perfect ending claps hands again Justin Hammer dance except there is another act in this movie a second third act and while I appreciate the interesting things that the fourth act did I think people realize that the movie kind of already ended it's like if you went out to a restaurant had a delicious three-course meal great appetizer entree and a tasty dessert you are all all done and then the chef comes out with another dessert one that in my opinion is not as good as the first Riddler explains to Batman that he actually wanted to get captured and there is another far more catastrophic plan than two Riddler's disappointment Batman has not yet discovered Batman investigates Riddler's apartment finds a secret map using the original murder weapon and at that very moment a series of Vans explode that destroys the Gotham sea wall and flood the city Riddler watches this and he's psyched the flood forces people to the Gotham Square Garden or whatever it is which is also the site of mayor-elect Bella Real's Victory party but little did they know that some Riddler followers will be waiting for them you see Riddler organized about 20 like-minded individuals they all got Riddler costumes and somehow snuck into the rafters of the garden don't worry about it campaign events are usually pretty chill when it comes to sneaking around with a big gun Batman arrives in time to stop the lagoons with the help of Catwoman and James Gordon and then sacrifices himself to save some people in the arena from getting electrocuted but he's okay and leads everyone to safety then in one last bit of narration we learned that Gotham is now a National Guard level disaster and Batman is a symbol of Hope also we see the Joker for a second motorcycles movie over and here's the thing I did not like this little extra ending this fourth act and I want to explain why but first I'll give this movie which again I quite like some credit here are some good things about the fourth act I think there were a few things that work in the fourth act things that are not present in the first three like the Tucker and the idea that there was one clue Batman missed is Some solid riddlering although Batman does miss one of Riddler's Clues when he brings Falcone into the light only for Riddler to shoot Falcon so that does happen already also the idea of Batman baptizing himself in the stadium Waters to save everyone is interesting I don't think it necessarily belongs in this movie but it's a cool bit the moment where Batman uses green to make himself rage on the Riddler goon good bizarre that they just threw that in there without any explanation but cool the action is Fun the score of this ending is fantastic in my opinion it's just is not worth sacrificing everything interesting about the Riddler but you may say well actually there was a good reason why we needed that second ending Batman and his dealings with the thug learns that violence is not a good thing Batman has hoped that the good people outnumber the bad and in that case the justice system is the only way to deal with criminals this idea the difference between Justice and vengeance is one of the more interesting ideas the movie presents why is Riddler wrong and Batman right and this all comes together in this moment where a hero sees what Vengeance can do to a person he recognizes it in the criminal's eyes and he can see there needs to be another way oh you thought I meant that moment no no I meant this moment when Bruce convinces Selena to spare Falcone so he can face Justice Celine articulates the argument for vengeance he has to pay to which Bruce responds you don't have to pay with him Vengeance takes the part of you part of your humanity and Selena can't lose that she can't sink to Falcone's level she needs to be better so even if you believe the fourth Act is necessary because it shows Bruce that vengeance is not the way I would argue that the movie already did that with the Selena cone interaction and this confrontation with Falcone is much more personal for Bruce Falcone is the man who might have gotten Bruce's parents killed Bruce choosing to spare him and bring him to the police is the hardest Choice Bruce can make Justice over Vengeance so for me the I'm Vengeance moment in the finale is redundant Bruce has already learned this lesson hell he already had that were not so different you and I conversation with Riddler so the idea that a criminal thinks he's doing the same thing as Batman and that shocks Batman shouldn't come as that much of a surprise 10 minutes after the Riddler conversation so I find myself asking why did the movie have a fourth act what do they gain after all the movie was already on the long side if the Batman ends with the confrontation between Batman and Riddler and Arkham we're looking at two hours and 18 minutes tack on the ending where Bruce says goodbye to Selena and some credits and the movie is almost two and a half hours long and movies are not cheap and tickets don't scale a ticket to a movie that's an hour and a half long usually costs as much as one that's three hours long and that that shorter movie can screen more times in a day so it has the potential to earn way more money and assuming all other things are equal a shorter movie is cheaper to film because there's just less of it so in a year where Warner Brothers was canceling movies that were already made to pinch pennies why release the movie this long if it does not need to be I have two guesses the first is a comic thing the second is a movie thing let's start with the comic one it certainly seems like Warner Brothers or Matt Reeves or whoever wants to do a No Man's Land if you're not familiar in the late 90s Batman comics ran an event called cataclysm in which Gotham was hit by a huge earthquake the bat family tried to contain the chaos that followed but it was too great and eventually the US government declared Gotham City a No Man's Land anyone who stayed was on their own the criminals took over it was a disaster and you could see the seeds of No Man's Land being planted in the first three acts of the Batman Riddlers destroying the traditional power structures new more comic bookie villains like the penguin are taking taking over it's gonna be a slow burn but it's coming but then in the fourth act the city floods the National Guard is sent to Gotham and they declare martial law so we are doing no man's land now which would be great if it didn't happen so often you have seen this story before it plays out in The Dark Knight Rises and slightly less in Batman Begins it's also the basis for Arkham City and kind of Arkham Knight it's also the second season of the Harley Quinn show Batman media loves to do a No Man's Land I imagine it's partially because it gives you an excuse to let the bat villains run wild The Gangs take over and fight for control of this city it's very Warriors and warriors is fun it's also the easiest way to escalate a Batman story it's basically Batman's Sky beam the big cinematic catastrophe but man can this movie not wait to do a no man's land and in my eyes that's one of the biggest reasons why we got here so quickly look at what Matt Reeves has done so far Cloverfield and the Planet of the Apes trilogy see a pattern Matt Reeves seems to love stories where a cataclysm destroys civilization and characters are forced to adapt new societies are formed and no Batman story is more like that than no man's land I gave my pitch for a the Batman sequel in my video and that's what I would do but I would bet you anything that what Reeves wants to do is make the Batman no man's land I mean hell if you want to do dueling criminal factions you already have some Riddler and Joker can Team Up penguin has his own organization that'll probably be expanded upon in his show you throw in one more maybe Bane or scarecrow and you've got a perfect villain triangle that Batman needs to deal with so I definitely think part of why the movie ends this way has to do with the fact that Matt Reeves loves a good societal collapse slash rebirth but that's not the only reason and to understand why we need to look to Marvel forget Malachi forget Kai celius forget Hayward forget all of them because there was no doubt in my mind that the worst Marvel villains in the history of Marvel villains are the flag Smashers don't get me wrong acting was fine costumes were fine and they're fighting these were fine but it is the perfect example of a villain with a sympathetic and reasonable motivation who goes cruel for no reason other than to turn the audience against them and yes the show does do some work at the finale with Sam bringing their message to the GRC representatives and asking them to do better but really if the flag Smashers just steal vaccines and food there is no question they're the good guys but at the end of episode 3 for absolutely no reason Carly a character that has been careful to avoid violence where she can blows up a building full of innocent people when asked why Carly says vengeance is the only thing these people understand and I would believe that if in an earlier episode Walker and The GRC did something extreme like sure they killed a flag Smasher but even the flag Smasher they killed seemed to understand that this was the price of doing business it would make sense if Carly was reacting to an escalation because she had no other choice something like what happened to the end of episode 4 when Jon kills the flag Smasher things escalate makes sense but ideologically I do not see a path from Carly does not kill innocence too Carly callously blows up a building full of GRC workers it even shocks her flag Smasher teammate which means it's such a surprising turn that even the people closest to Carly did not see it coming and its service one specific function it makes things easier for people to understand Walker's Crusade against the flag Smashers is now Justified like a certain someone else now I do not want to be one of those people and I definitely do not support assassinating political leaders I know I know a very brave stance but I've found it difficult to argue with the fact that the Riddler like the flag Smashers was kind of right he saw a corrupt system made up of mob bosses Chiefs of police district attorneys and Mayors he determined that the system was incapable of Reform the corruption was structural you could not change things without drastic action now you could make the case of the upcoming mayoral election could change some of those things Bella real had a similar anti-corruption message and seemed to be gaining on mayor Mitchell in the polls but I think Riddler would argue that the corrupt system would not allow her to make changes she hoped for they could potentially fix the election using their connections there's even a good chance they could ever kill before the election like they might have with Thomas Wayne there is no guarantee reform would work the way real wanted this is not to say it's not without trying but the only forces in this movie working to make big political change in Gotham are Riddler and real and I think there's a possibility Real's change never comes if Riddler does not expose the corrupt Gotham politicians now you may be saying sure Riddler is well within the right if he exposes the Gotham politicians but killing him that's perhaps a bit too far and I would agree again killing politicians is wrong so brave but the Riddler is making the case that the system is so corrupt that exposing the corruption on its own is not enough he believes there is no change if the politicians in power are able to control the machine could they bury stories could they evade prosecution and without what he believes is a credible threat of violence does D.A Coulson confess maybe not so here we are the Riddler is a villain with a lot going on and a plan that perhaps people may see as sympathetic he kills the people he believes to be responsible albeit with some casualties along the way and a fair amount of Destruction but he gets what he believes the city needs the web of corruption is swept away but then the movie keeps going and I don't think I would be as bothered by the fourth act if I felt like it was The Logical end point for his character like hey it's more movie but sometimes that's not so bad but I would argue that almost everything The Riddler does in the fourth Act is antithetical to everything he has done so far and sure villains can be complex webs of contradictions that's fine but in a situation like this where the villain has behaved pretty consistently throughout the first three acts and then shifts gears completely there's usually a reason something changes the villain is forced to adapt or put into a position where he compromises his strict morality to demonstrate some sort of facade but this plan has been in place since the beginning at no point does the plan change it can't everything needs to go exactly as it has so far so does Riddler design the first three quarters of plan with a simple set of goals and methods and then the last quarter is for no reason completely different now I'm not trying to CinemaSins this thing or nitpick not unlike my podcast mostly nitpicking but real quick not to nitpick is this the first Batman movie where Batman does not throw away batarang I only bring this up because there's that moment at the end where Batman needs to cut the far away cable and he has that emblem that he's used so far as a knife and I think oh this is where he invents the batarang I'm not saying he needed to what they did make sense it's just interesting that this Batman is pretty much everything else figured out except Batman's signature weapon I'm not trying to poke holes in the logic of the movie to prove that it's bad I want to examine the Riddler's decision Riddler's hard pivot because it takes what is a pretty ideologically consistent villain and undermines them at the end for no reason and that's weird right because this movie is good so Riddler's plan throughout the first three acts simple he has a list of Gotham movers and shakers that are responsible for corrupting the renewal program turning it from a charitable fund and to helping the poor to a slush fund for Gotham's underworld Riddler is going to go through the big names on the list prove their guilt murder them and then publicize their crimes this will serve the dual purpose of convincing the public that these guys are bad and also scaring other criminals trying to do the same thing his actions are targeted precise he devises a carefully constructed trap one specific to each person some involve kidnapping surveillance Contraptions and even torture Riddler also manipulates the Batman and the gcpd into helping him execute his agenda by sending Batman messages while his attacks do put innocence In Harm's Way the target is always a corrupt gothamite there's one specific person Riddler is aiming to make an example of someone that he is determined is guilty and Riddler is correct the first three targets were all involved in the renewal program and Gotham corruption at a high level Riddler's attack on Bruce Wayne is supposed to act as a proxy for an attack on Thomas Wayne since Riddler believes Bruce has inherited Thomas's sins which pretty flawed reasoning but I see what he's going for but then for his finale Riddler goes completely off script up until now he's been working alone unless you count the Batman his targets have been specific and his goal has been to weed out the corruption that destroyed Gotham but in the finale Riddler is now apparently organizing a group of like-minded extremists online he tells them to bring their guns to a political rally and indiscriminately shoot attendees a rally to be clear for a candidate that also wants to reform Gotham sure she's more political non-murder reform but still same side but how maybe she's not extreme enough sure the problem is Riddler is also going to flood the city using a series of bombs planted around Gotham sea wall and that flooding will force people into the garden the same location where the rally is being held so even if the people at the rally deserve this like Riddler believes Falcone and the other corrupt gothamites did this building will be full of just people sure this is the rich part of town but that doesn't mean only rich people are allowed to go there so we go from Lone Wolf targeting specific corrupt individuals with carefully constructed death traps two extremist leader executing an arbitrary group of people using a nearly random method so why this shift well the Batman was an unusually complicated Batman movie the first one I can think of that really interrogates the concept of Batman and comes up with a new conclusion other Batman movies have tried this the Burton movies explored how becoming a vigilante causes Bruce and Selena to lose their Humanity the Schumacher movies focused on the toll living a double life takes on Bruce Wayne the businessman the boyfriend and the Father the Nolan movies played with the concept of escalation if Batman continues to exist Does that invite conflict without Batman to characters like the Joker or scarecrow or Bane come out of the Shadows to wreak havoc and the Snyder movies ask questions about how Batman is unable to process loss and cannot help but hyper fixate on power as a coping mechanism the Batman took all of these ideas and mashed them together has Bruce lost his Humanity can Bruce Wayne and Batman both exist Does the Batman's mere presence invite villains like Riddler to take the law into their own hands and are Vengeance and violence acceptable ways for Bruce to deal with his perceived lack of family and I would say the first three Acts have answers to those questions being Batman does have a negative effect on Bruce's Humanity the further into the Riddler case he goes the more obsessed he becomes and the more he pushes characters like Alfred away he doesn't sleep doesn't socialize he doesn't have a real life and Bruce is batmaning definitively did Inspire The Riddler to take action in a world without Batman there would be no Riddler not in the way that he exists in the Batman Riddler even believes he and the Batman are working together and he isn't completely wrong Batman is a part of his plan another piece on the board that can be manipulated and vengeance is not an acceptable way of dealing with Bruce's loss by the end of the third act Bruce's philosophy has shifted vengeance is selfish and self-destructive Justice while less satisfying in the moment is healthier so you could argue that the Batman believes being Batman is negatively affecting Bruce's life the presence of Batman is making Gotham more dangerous and his original Batman goal vengeance is only making all of that worse in other words the first three acts of the Batman make a pretty strong case against the Batman and this is what I find so fascinating about this movie the first three acts are a real deconstruction of the character using classic Noir principles and the third act ends with an uncertain Bruce he really doesn't know if the Riddler beat him and if Batman's staying out of all this would have stopped it all together would the Riddler just be another loner with an ax to grind but no one to show him how to swing it and I fundamentally do not think Warner Brothers would let that movie exist they would not let anyone make a movie about how Batman might be a mistake in the same way that Disney won't let Marvel make a movie where the villain makes meaningful change it is not in their interest now I'm not saying I believe they came in and changed Matt for Eve's script or anything like that I have no evidence to back that up but why would a company like Warner Brothers take their most profitable character besides Black Adam of course and make a movie that ends with the main character saying hey maybe I'm the problem that is not going to sell toys or green light sequels it would be like making a sequel to Nightcrawler or Memento so I think intentionally or on intentionally the Batman gave us the easy way out the fourth act sets everything where it should be at the end of a big superhero movie Bruce makes a big sacrifice sets an example and saves the city the Batman is unambiguously a Force for good and that's why I so dislike the fourth act it takes the most interesting thing the Batman is doing and dismisses it in favor of a safer simpler ending and the part that kills me is that this could have worked say you wanted the Riddler of the first three acts and also a big exciting action finale where Batman fights a bunch of goons at Gotham Square Garden I believe this ending could have been the logical end point of that story if Riddler did not do it the whole movie is about Batman's effect on the city he's feared by the criminals the cops don't trust him is he making things worse should there be a Batman and Riddler is doing roughly the same thing as Batman he's using his detective skills to learn who's responsible for all of Gotham's troubles and taking action these specific action bolts they're taking is their biggest difference Justice Vengeance that's the movie and one of the biggest differences between those approaches is that Justice follows rules the law it needs to be controlled whereas vengeance is chaotic there are no rules and every single person understands Vengeance their own way Batman's Justice is clear the bad people face the legal system but Riddler's Vengeance where does it end when is it enough can it be satisfied so why not have the movie address that I think it would be a far more interesting movie if at the end of act 3 Batman and Riddler are talking in prison and then boom the Vans explode starting to flood and Riddler is confused he didn't do this his plan was over his Vengeance was done but perhaps Riddler had some unintended consequences maybe some other disaffected young men saw his example and decided to take matters into their own hands they made a plan to flood the city and shoot everyone at the rally and now this strange fourth act makes sense it feels weird because the movie should be over but that's not how Vengeance works it never ends and it keeps creating Riddlers and Batman needs to show these guys another way or it will never end but not because Riddler set this in motion on purpose because he did it accidentally and cannot control it but enough about Batman let's talk about Superman because as you know James Gunn is working on a new Superman movie called Superman Legacy so I have made an entire video fan casting the Man of Steel himself I look at so many actors and in the end I do arrive on one who I genuinely believe would make the best Superman and that video will be on YouTube eventually but you can watch it right now on nebula you know the story about nebula it is a creator-owned subscription streaming service that I helped create your favorite creators my YouTube friends are all there you've got Patrick willins Scott from nerdsync Hello future me Captain Midnight so many great creators and there's all kinds of stuff you're only going to find on nebula all my videos go up there ad free and early nebula is always one Nando V movies video ahead there's also nebula classes which is not just part of nebula so you can watch my class on turning your fandom into a career or Patrick's on making a movie and their nebula Originals like Abigail Thorne from philosophytube made an entire play called the prince which was put up in London and you can watch it now on nebula and if you sign up for nebula using the link below you can get nebula for a little over two dollars and fifty cents a month it is now the best way to support the channel and 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Channel: Nando v Movies

Views: 315,084

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Id: Rl_wcPLfDFk

Length: 27min 52sec (1672 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 22 2023