The Batman is soggy, gloomy, dank, rank, filthy, and forbidding. And so I really liked it. It’s not quite as searing or unsettling as Joker, but it pushes further in that direction than any big-budget comic-book movie yet, and after the cutesy kiddie contrivances of Spider-Man: No Way Home, The Batman is as bracing as a shot of whisky after a grape Slushee.
Director Matt Reeves, who made two first-rate Planet of the Apes movies, recreates the feel of a creepy David Fincher thriller rather than an action adventure, and for three slowly paced hours the film is mostly enthralling. The sin-signifying rain of Seven drenches Gotham City, which is also plagued by murderous ciphers that recall Zodiac and Fight Club–style thug armies of disaffected youths aching to be activated in a program of terror. I don’t think Reeves is as visually gifted as Fincher, nor does he have Christopher Nolan’s ability to choreograph action scenes, so I wouldn’t rank The Batman at the absolute pinnacle of comic-book movies, but its chilling, nightmarish quality earns it a spot at the grownups’ table. The Batman certainly can’t be dismissed as yet another meretricious superhero caper.
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