The Batman (2018 DCEU film)

The Batman is an upcoming American superhero film featuring the DC Comics character Batman. Ben Affleck directed the film and stars as its titular main protagonist. It is an installment in the DC Extended Universe. The story was written by Ben Affleck and Geoff Johns, taking inspiration from storylines such as Batman: Knightfall and Batman: Under the Red Hood, as well as borrowing elements from the storyline Batman: Earth One. The film revolves around Batman reassembling his allies in Gotham City in an attempt to return to regular crime fighting, though he is perpetually haunted by his past mistakes.

Plot
After the first victory of the Justice League, Batman returns to Gotham City and attempts to reassemble his allies and return to normal crime fighting. However, his attempt to escape his past mistakes proves futile as a new yet familiar foe appears and reigns terror on him by unleashing his past to haunt him.

Cast
Courtney B. Vance portrays Lucius Fox in a minor role. John Malkovich makes a cameo in a mid-credits scene as Professor Hugo Strange. Viola Davis and Joel Kinnaman appear in a post-credits scene as Amanda Waller and Rick Flag, respectively.
 * Ben Affleck as Bruce Wayne/Batman
 * Taron Edgerton as Jason Todd/Red Hood
 * Mary Elizabeth Winstead as Barbara Gordon/Oracle
 * Steven R. McQueen as Dick Grayson/Nightwing
 * Jeremy Irons as Alfred Pennyworth
 * J.K. Simmons as Commissioner James Gordon
 * Matt Damon as Thomas Elliot/Hush

Full Synopsis
In Gotham City, Batman pursues a cargo truck driven by thugs of Black Mask, and engages in combat with Cameron Walker, Black Mask's head of security who wears a gas mask and artificial wings. Batman defeats him with the help of Dick Grayson, the former Robin now known as Nightwing. After bringing Walker and the thugs to the cops, Batman and Nightwing meet with Commissioner Gordon to discuss their next move in taking on Black Mask. After that, they return to the Batcave, where it is made clear that there is tension between Dick and Barbara.

Black Mask is furious that Batman took down Walker, though more so because he took Walker's tech after incapacitating him. His assistant, however, tells him that they've already found a new head of security. She introduces Bane, who after Sionis doubts his abilities, proves himself by taking down his entire bodyguard staff. Sionis, impressed, accepts Bane as his new head of security, and assigns him to oversee a shipment at the docks. When Sionis isn't looking, Bane plants a bug in his computer, giving Edward Nygma, a computer hacker known as the "Riddler", access to Sionis's network. Nygma then gives these details to the Red Hood.

Bruce goes to Lucius Fox with Walker's tech, and Fox shows him a new batarang modification which allows some batarangs to become explosive. Dick and Barbara talk, and Dick tries to talk about what happened between them, but Barbara just gets mad when he talks about it. In the middle of their argument, Barbara gets word of the shipment at the docks at informs Bruce. Batman and Nightwing show up at the docks and find that it has already been sabotaged by the Red Hood, who steals the arms shipment and engages in a fake fight with Bane which he wins, and Bane is taken in by the GCPD and brought to Arkham Asylum. When they return to the Batcave, Barbara reveals that the Red Hood was given the information on the shipment by Nygma, whom Batman faced before many years ago. In Arkham, two crates are snuck in with Bane, one containing several explosives and the other containing tubes, a luchador mask, and Venom.

Batman finds Nygma's hideout and interrogates him, though he is intercepted by the Red Hood. The two fight briefly before Red Hood challenges Batman to chase him. Batman pursues him through the rooftops of Gotham City, where he is joined by Nightwing. Meanwhile, Bane takes out the guards at Arkham and begins setting explosives. Batman eventually knocks Red Hood down after throwing an explosive batarang near him, after which Red Hood comments that he hasn't lost his touch, a comment which is cut off by an explosion in the distance, which Batman quickly realizes was from Arkham Island. Bane begins releasing many of the inmates from Arkham, and Red Hood disappears. The group reconvenes at the Batcave, where they locate several of the escaped inmates around Gotham. They split up the group: Batman goes after Clayface, Nightwing goes after Poison Ivy, Gordon goes after Victor Zsasz, and Alfred goes after the Mad Hatter. After taking down Clayface with the help of Barbara manning the Batwing, Batman goes after Scarecrow, who manages to inject him with fear toxin. Batman then enters a fever dream in which he relives the death of his parents, the original Red Hood falling into chemicals and becoming the Joker, the death of the Flying Graysons, Dick quitting being Robin, the Joker shooting Barbara, Gordon yelling at Batman for what happened to Barbara, and the Joker and Harley Quinn killing Jason Todd. Alfred finds Bruce, and Barbara brings the Batwing over and brings them back to the Batcave.

Bane finds the Joker and Harley Quinn, and asks them to cause chaos in downtown Gotham and attract Batman's attention. In the Batcave, after recovering from the fear toxin, Bruce immediately wants to take care of the Joker, though Alfred advises him not to go out in his condition, and Nightwing goes instead. Remembering how the Joker already killed Jason, Bruce disregards Alfred's advice and leaves shortly after Nightwing heads out. Nightwing takes on the Joker and Harley in downtown Gotham, and eventually is knocked down for a short moment. However by that time, Batman already got there and began dealing with Joker himself. While Batman starts beating the Joker to a pulp, he is intercepted by Bane. Batman and Bane engage in hand to hand combat, while Gordon and the GCPD show up and bring in the Joker and Harley. Batman and Bane take to the rooftops, where Bane then activates the Venom, making him enormous and muscular. Bane takes advantage of Batman in his exhausted state and proceeds to wail on him, eventually ending the fight by slamming Batman down on his knee, breaking Batman's back. Bane throws Batman down to the streets, but slowly afterwards he is tranquilized and captured by ARGUS forces.

Nightwing and Alfred get Bruce back to the Batcave, where they quickly determine that Bruce's spine is snapped and he is paralyzed from the waist down. The next day they have a meeting, where he tells the whole team that he won't be in Gotham for a little while, as he is going to look for a way to heal himself. He tells Dick that Batman cannot disappear, and gives him the mantle. Bruce and Alfred take a private jet to Tibet, and Bruce tells Alfred about how the Red Hood seems to know him. While he is asleep, he dreams of Jason's death again, which promptly shakes him awake.

Dick continues the crusade against Black Mask and his thugs as Batman, and meets with Gordon frequently to update him, though Gordon notices that it is not the same Batman. Eventually Dick and Barbara finally have a talk where Barbara reveals that he is still upset over their breakup, specifically how it seemed that he broke up with her just because she stopped being Batgirl, but also because he never came to see her after she was paralyzed. Dick tries to tell her that he was caught up with stuff, but Barbara just says he's full of excuses. This provokes Dick and he starts yelling at her, though amidst their argument they start to kiss. Barbara stops it after a few moments, and Dick goes back on patrol.

Meanwhile, in Tibet, Bruce takes the audio recording from his cowl of the night of the Arkham breakout and finds out that when the explosion happened, it prevented him from hearing that the Red Hood specifically said, "You haven't lost your touch, Bruce", which proves his theory true that the Red Hood knows him. The next day Bruce goes over the real story of what happened with Alfred, including how Bane was a mole for Red Hood, and how Bane made sure which inmates attracted the most attention, including Scarecrow and the Joker. Alfred deduces that the Red Hood must be a former ally, as he knows that Batman would want to go after Scarecrow and the Joker himself rather than let another ally go instead, he also comments that they only have one former ally, hinting at Jason. Bruce acts like this thought is ridiculous, but Alfred comments that they've seen resurrection happen before (referencing Superman). Bruce then goes to Nanda Parbat where he meets with Ra's al Ghul, his former mentor and leader of the League of Shadows. Bruce asks him about what happened, and Ra's reveals that the Lazarus Pit, the pool of healing liquid which he uses to keep alive, had been rumored to be able to bring someone back from the dead. Ra's states that he revived Jason as an intended act of good will after their many years of rivalry, though the results were not as expected. Disgusted with this, Bruce leaves Ra's and refuses to use his pit to heal his back. He instead goes to Lady Shiva, another martial artist from his past who allegedly mastered ways of meditation which allow someone to self heal.

Back in Gotham, Black Mask is furious at the amount of times he's been played, and decided that he needs to take drastic measures to take down the Red Hood. He gets his guards to break into Blackgate Penitentiary and set up a meeting with the Joker. Sionis asks Joker to help him kill the Red Hood, and the Joker shows that he agrees by killing all of Sionis' bodyguards.

Shiva eventually puts Bruce into a dream-like state with a special flower he retrieved from the top of a mountain. There, Shiva teaches Bruce to confront his past mistakes and own up to them, as it is the only way to heal his soul. When Bruce awakes, his back is healed. Shiva then begins to train him to get him back into shape. When Bruce is prepared to leave Tibet, he thanks Shiva for her help. But then Ra's appears and says he should be thanking him instead, as in reality Shiva had taken Bruce's unconscious body to Nanda Parbat and put part of him into the Lazarus Pit, as it was the only way to heal such an injury. Bruce is furious with Shiva, but Ra's tells him to consider it a real act of good will, and then tells him that he better get back to Gotham soon.

The Joker gets Red Hood's attention by turning against Black Mask. Dick as Batman saves Black Mask and his henchmen from getting killed by the Joker, meanwhile Red Hood swoops in and captures the Joker. Dick quickly follows, but he is led into an ambush and he is taken by Red Hood as well. Red Hood brings them both to an abandoned apartment, and he begins beating the Joker with a crowbar.

Bruce returns to Gotham and grabs one of his old suits (the suit he wore in Batman v Superman) and tells Alfred that he is going to end it. Alfred and Barbara try to reassure him that what happened to Jason wasn't his fault, but he has none of it. He tells Gordon to light the Bat signal at the GCPD, and then he goes to Crime Alley, both the place where his parents were killed and the place where he first met Jason. Red Hood shows up in the alley and they begin to fight. Eventually Red Hood slips Bruce's mask off, after which he decides to make it even, so he removes his helmet and reveals that he is indeed Jason Todd. They continue fighting until they reach the abandoned apartment, where Jason reveals what his plan was all about. He tells Bruce that he forgives him for his inability to save him, but that he does not forgive him for letting the Joker live after all the things that he's done, especially considering that he had killed criminals in his war against Superman, and that it is hypocritical to suddenly return to a no-kill rule. He reveals that his plan was to unleash his past upon him and then to break him, as a way to show that he can never undo what he's done and that there is no use in trying to do so. He knew that Bruce would return, and that hopefully he would come to his senses. But Bruce tells Jason that it is actually quite difficult to refrain from killing, especially the Joker, and tells him that during the war against Superman he was paranoid and bloodthirsty, and that he had abandoned all that Batman stood for, and that if he were to return to killing, he would never come back. Jason then reveals that he has the Joker and an unconscious Dick. Jason throws Batman a gun and says that he has to kill the Joker or else he will kill Dick and the Joker, and that if he doesn't want the Joker to die, he'll have to kill Jason. Batman drops the gun and walks away, which angers Jason and he shoots at Batman. After Jason shoots, Batman throws an explosive batarang at Jason's gun, injuring his hand and sending him backwards. The Joker finds Batman's genius hilarious yet ironic, as Jason then sets off a bomb timer similar to the one which killed him. Batman then tries to grab all four of them and dive out of the apartment, but after it explodes he only finds Dick and the Joker, who lies in the rubble hysterically laughing.

About a week later, Nightwing meets Gordon at the Bat symbol, where he says that Batman will probably be calling his own shots for a couple of weeks. Before Nightwing leaves, Gordon tells him that he has no problem if he wants to date Barbara, and asks what the problem is. Nightwing responds that he'll figure it out, and zips away. In the Batcave, Bruce suits up to go bring in more escaped Arkham inmates, and Alfred asks if they should remove the Robin memorial suit in light of recent events. Bruce responds that nothing has changed, and then goes out on patrol. Alfred looks at the defaced suit, then looks at a picture of Jason in the suit on the Batcomputer, and smiles.

In a mid-credits scene, Hugo Strange walks through the wrecked Arkham Asylum and claims that it is actually an opportunity rather than a tragedy.

In a post-credits scene, Amanda Waller and Rick Flag find Jason Todd in Hub City and tell him that if he wishes to bring justice by killing, that he should join Task Force X, something which she also says that Bane has joined since his incarceration.

Sequel
A sequel titled The Batman: No Man's Land has been announced. As the mid-credits scene indicated, the main antagonist will be Hugo Strange, and the plot will combine elements of the No Man's Land comic book arc and the storyline of the game Batman: Arkham City. The film will feature Harvey Dent/Two-Face and the Penguin as major villains. The Joker, Harley Quinn, and Black Mask will return. Tim Drake, the third Robin, will be introduced in the movie.

Trivia

 * The film includes the first live-action theatrical appearances of Hush, the Jason Todd, and Hugo Strange.
 * The last live-action theatrical film that featured Dick Grayson and Barbara was Batman and Robin, however in that film Barbara was named Barbara Wilson and was related to Alfred rather than Commissioner Gordon, so technically speaking this film is the first live-action theatrical appearance of Barbara Gordon. It is also her first live-action theatrical appearance as Oracle, as well as the first for Grayson as Nightwing.