Bats In The Belfry

Rid­ing on the suc­cess of The Dark Knight, there has been a whirl­wind of rumors fly­ing around about Bat­man 3!

Some are fan-​driven; mock-​ups for the new movie poster and such. There was talk of Johnny Depp as Rid­dler, Philip Sey­mour Hoff­man as Pen­guin, and Angelina Jolie as Cat­woman. Then it was Eddie Mur­phy as Rid­dler with Shia LaBeouf as Robin. Next there was talk of Rachel Weisz as Cat­woman. Another fan mocked up a pic­ture of Kris­ten Bell as Harley Quinn. The new one going around seems to be a leaked make-​up test for Hoffman.

Hon­estly, I don’t know about half of these rumors… I guess Depp could do a decent Rid­dler, but I don’t know about Mur­phy… what was his last suc­cess­ful drama? Rid­dler him­self, though… he’s a good vil­lain, but I don’t know if he fits into Nolan’s extra dark and gritty Gotham. I think it can be done, but it would be too easy to make him silly.

As for Hoff­man as Pen­guin, I can see that, espe­cially with that make-​up test. I just don’t see Pen­guin as a first-​rate vil­lain. In his cur­rent incar­na­tion in the comics, he’s a shady busi­ness­man with a night club and strong ties to the crim­i­nal world, but no grand schemes of his own. Plus, Pen­guin is sane and is dri­ven purely by finan­cial gain, which makes for a weak story.

Harley Quinn I could see as a cameo, but def­i­nitely not as the main antag­o­nist. A miss­ing Joker really works against her even being a strong lead hench­man. The strongest pos­si­ble role I could see for her would involve an attempted break­out for Joker from Arkham, but it would still be weak with­out him, and re-​casting him would just be wrong. I don’t see Nolan admit­ted that Joker died, either, so I don’t see an “out for revenge” Harley.

And Shia? I’m just not a fan of his. And I think he’s a lit­tle too old for Robin. Intro­duc­ing Robin right now wouldn’t be a good move in Nolan’s Gotham any­way. Bright col­ors just don’t fit.

Cat­woman, whether played by Jolie or Weisz, would be awe­some. I think with the way Dark Knight left off, it would inter­est­ing to see a movie focused on Batman’s devel­op­ing rela­tion­ship with her as they both toe the line between good and evil. Again, might be a weak story since Cat­woman is also moti­vated by money rather than some grand scheme for power or revenge against soci­ety. The story would have to focus on Bat­man try­ing to turn her good, and would prob­a­bly involve a lot of back and forth with some cat-​related arti­fact, but also avoid turn­ing into a heist movie.

So what do I want to see done? Of the rumored above, I think Rid­dler or Cat­woman could be done right. I want to see a focus on one vil­lain, with maybe a throw­away lesser vil­lain to open with. Per­haps Pen­guin just as an unwill­ing infor­mant? Other than the afore men­tioned, I think Zsasz (who had a men­tion in Bat­man Begins) or Black Mask would be excel­lent vil­lains who would fit well into Nolan’s Gotham with­out much work. Scar­face could be done right, but would be tricky to pull off.

What I would LOVE to see is Cat­a­clysm/<a onclick=“javascript:pageTracker._trackPageview(‘/outgoing/en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Man’);” rel=“nofollow” href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Man” s_Land_(comics)” rel=“_external”>No Man’s Landgiven the Nolan treat­ment, but that requires too much back­story. And the Lex Luthor angle would be cool lead­ing up to the JLA movie, if that ever comes into being.

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