Batman: Arkham City/Headscratchers: Difference between revisions

*** You remember the Scarecrow sections in Asylum? They weren't just cool set pieces -- theypieces—they illustrated just how ''tenuous'' Batman's grip on sanity is. He dresses up in a rubber bat suit to fight crime. Not exactly Mr. Mental Health. The most interesting Batman stories have always portrayed him as a man on the edge, constantly honing his iron will to keep from going as crazy as his nemeses. True to form, it seems like ''everyone'' in this game is conspiring against Batman to get him to snap, and forcing him to kill is treated as the trigger because of his rejection of murder as a solution. It's the ultimate compromise of his morality, and proves he's no better than the people he tries to stop. Ra's and Talia want him to kill so he'll join them in their crusade. Strange wants Batman to kill so Batman will recognize his superior intellect and acknowledge his way is the right way. The Joker wants him to kill to break his psyche so he'll go nuts and join the Joker in insanity. Even the very idea of Gotham turned into a city-sized prison and its destiny as the site of Protocol Ten is a corruption and mockery of everything Batman stands for. But in the end, despite all the stressors of immortal fascists, being poisoned with TITAN and slowly dying, seeing the love of his life held at gunpoint (twice!), Batman manages to reject everyone's designs and machinations for him, and never gives in or sacrifices his commitment to the principles of law and order, even when the legal forces of order (i.e. Hugo Strange, as an appointee of Mayor Sharp) do. ''That's'' what makes Batman right. Not that he can physically beat up Hugo Strange.

** Even psychologists are vulnerable to [[Villainous Breakdown]]. By this point, Strange was so used to thinking he was in control that he was arguably unable to accept the idea that Batman could singlehandedly stop him. Not to mention, he had his ace in the hole, in the form of {{spoiler|Ra's al Ghul}}. The fact that {{spoiler|Ra's}} pulled a [[You Have Failed Me...]] wasn't part of his master plan.

*** ^ Exactly this. Even if Batman had captured Strange, Strange's "powerful friends" would've (or were supposed to have) broken him out and put him back in power within a day.

** Don't they mention in the game that Lucius Fox had managed to create enough to give to the hospitals? I'm sure of it.

** In several spots in comics and animated episodes, it is explained that Joker is immune to a large variety of poisons. He walks through clouds of his laughing gas unaffected, wearing a gas mask only in the most toxic varieties. Of course he would be significantly more resistant than Bruce, much less normal people.

** Okay, guys, I think I got it. Ra's has, after consistently failing, decided that his best bet is to initiate a backlash against superheroes-- theysuperheroes—they can't function without public support. The natural place to start is Gotham, since Batman doesn't have any powers (other than being Batman) and the populace is incredibly cynical/stupid. So, Strange executes Protocol 10 and in the aftermath the "investigation" into why things went wrong shows that Batman was the culprit, either running or backing criminal gangs. The reference to other Arkham Cities in Metropolis and Keystone City is simply an attempt to antagonize Batman-- itBatman—it makes no sense to announce them over a PA, after all. Had the gambit been successful, then other schemes tailored to undermine other heroes would have been undertaken, with the public primed for them by Batman's seeming responsibility for Arkham City. And if it fails, eh, Ra's is a patient man and at least he took out a few hundred lowlifes. Strange may not have been aware of the full plan.

** A central tenet of [[Fascist Italy|fascism]] is that humanity is weak, and needs a strong leader figure to guide them, guard them, and weed out 'undesirable' elements for the good of society. Whether the people ''like'' what the guardian class are doing is irrelevant, because, under [[Insane Troll Logic|fascist thought]], the people will naturally gravitate towards weakness and degeneracy if left unchecked. It's basically [[The Spartan Way]] for society as a whole (Mussolini and Hitler were quite open about this). Hugo Strange is much the same -- hesame—he's trying to whip humanity into shape, and he's quite confident that, being sheep, once they see how much better life is under his guiding hand, they'll appreciate what he's done for them. And if you think that's far-fetched, remember: Mussolini held power for ''twenty years''.

** As to the fingerprints thing. This is ''Hush'' we're talking about. He may be off his rocker, but he's actually quite patient, taking months or years putting the pieces of a plan together before enacting it. He likely already had the fingerprints thing done long before the ID thief killings--whichkillings—which would by necessity be the final part of the plan. He's not exactly poor, and likely has connections with those with the means--Lexmeans—Lex Luthor in particular doesn't exactly like Bruce Wayne. He'd help in a frame up plan in a second so long as he was sure it couldn't be traced back to him. As for the scars thing. Again, he's patient. He'll let the scars heal up before enacting his plan. Finally, the first witness didn't confuse the killer for Bruce Wayne, he confused the victim. Since Hush was making a Bruce Wayne face, it'd only be natural that his victims would bear a certain resemblance.

** Whether it's lasting immortality or needs to be re-used, and even if Batman stops him that particular time after he's done, letting the Joker know where there's a convenient place right in the city where he lives where he can go to to essentially rejuvenate and become immortal if he just takes a swim in it whenever he feels like it is still practically the dictionary definition of 'a very bad idea'. The League of Shadows might be badass assassins, but the Joker is a genius level intellect with an insane brilliance that practically works on it's own level -- youlevel—you can't predict what he's going to do, which gives him an edge even over the League {{spoiler|(as witnessed by the fact that he manages to get the drop on Talia al Ghul -- herself no slouch in the 'badass assassin' stakes; Batman even tells her that she's out of her depth with him and completely underestimating him)}}. Letting him have the opportunity to be reinvigorated this time means he's probably going to want to do it again in future, and if the Joker wants something bad enough, he's going to figure out a way to get to it, and in this case letting the Joker have access to the ability to remain youthful and invigorated whenever he wants or needs it means that the Joker's going to be around to cause more chaos, death and misery for as long as he wants. Plus, in this case, the whole point was that Batman was trapped and wouldn't be able to stop him.

*** Pretty much this and escalation: As [[Batman: Year One]] and [[The Long Halloween]] demonstrates before Batman came to Gotham the criminal underworld was run primarily by traditional mob families. But once Batman came to town the 'freaks' like [[The Joker]] started popping out of the woodworks. Some gaining power due to the Mob beginning to rely on them to deal with problems.

** The quick cutscene showing Batman figuring it out explains this. If you pay attention, Batman gets jumped from behind by {{spoiler|a healthy-looking Joker, or rather, Clayface}} in the mill while investigating the dead, sickly-looking Joker. The scene then shows that {{spoiler|that one is the real one; he was playing dead with a rigged heart monitor}}.

** From the "reveal"/flashback cutscene where we {{spoiler|See Clayface-Joker standing before Real!Joker in the chair hooked up to the equipment, is the one the troper mentioned above where the real Joker moved. So I take it we're just meant to understand Joker faked death or rigged the machine somehow to fool Batman - how isn't important I suppose}}.

*** Er, no. The fact that Batman doesn't react at ''all'' to hearing the name Azrael makes it clear this is the first time in this 'verse he's met anyone with that name. He doesn't mention Bane or Valley or say "I know someone else called that." That's where the confusion comes from-

*** Arkham Asylum is also often described as a facility for 'special needs' prisoners -- iprisoners—i.e. people who might not strictly be sane but can only be housed by facilities in Arkham that more routine prisons don't necessarily have. Hence why Mr. Freeze, despite technically not being insane, tends to end up there a lot. This could apply to Penguin and (at a stretch) Catwoman as well.

** Only [[Batman Begins]] has it pronounced as {{spoiler|"Rass"}}, The animated series and {{spoiler|[[Batman Beyond (Animation)|Batman Beyond]]}} have it pronounced as {{spoiler|"Raysh"}}

** [https://web.archive.org/web/20140612144803/http://www.comicscommunity.com/boards/dennyoneil/?frames=n;read=1079&expand=1 According to Dennis O'Neil(One of the creators of said character)'s wife], the pronunciation is {{spoiler|"Raysh"}}.

** Their fates are never elaborated upon, but given that Batman already beat down every enemy in the area and that TYGER withdraws after Strange is gone, they likely escaped to relative safety.

** To strengthen the above, the game locks you into completing the main story pretty much after you re-enter the Steel Mill / Wonder City, so you're not likely to return to these areas a third time until the game's completed -- bycompleted—by which point the GCPD appear to be entering Arkham City ''en force'' and claiming the TYGER facilities. It's possible that the police located them. Furthermore, IIRC Batman makes a comment to both of them that they seem to be really good at hiding; it's possible they've tucked themselves away into somewhere he can't find them until things really quieten down.

** It could be a [[Shout-Out]] to William Blake's poem ''The Tyger'' -- [[Batman: The Animated Series (Animation)|not the first time a Batman story affiliated with Paul Dini has done so]].

** Related to above, Arkham City is essentially an entire region of Gotham which has been sealed off; chances are ''all'' of the villains had weapons stashed away in various hidden locations around the city, and some of those locations would have fallen within Arkham City's borders.

**** I always thought the 'audio' was just the game's way of representing Batman's translation of the engravings on the rocks and the resulting deductions he makes based on it; as in, there wasn't any ''actual'' audio (since, let's face it, Sharp's crazy but he's probably not ''that'' stupid to leave around tape recordings of all his insane plotting) but it's just representing what is being translated. Even if there was, though, since there's only one bit which is recognizably Warden Sharp speaking, he could easily cry fake. Furthermore, Sharp is the Warden of an insane asylum full of criminally insane psychotics, many of whom have genius-level intellects and among other things make a specialty of weird labyrinthine mind-gamey plots; it wouldn't be incredibly hard for him to pass off any evidence found by the cops (who, let's be fair, probably wouldn't do as well at finding or interpreting it as Batman) or Batman as fakes designed and planted by one of the inmates as a way of trying to discredit him. I mean hell, the ''Riddler'' left a whole load of trophies and riddles and scrawlings on the walls tucked away in all sorts of places in the asylum; who's to say (and more importantly, who ''wouldn't believe'') that ''he'' didn't do it?

*** Batman is absolutely the type of person to share that kind of information; since when has he ever let psychotic lunatics off the hook just because they are a [[Villain Withwith Good Publicity]] ? He'd expose him the first chance he got. Its simply lack of evidence that stops him, though one wonders why he couldn't leak the little he has. The main problem with this premise is that there are multiple witnesses to the fact that ''Batman'' was the one who saved the day- including the Police Commisioner and several Arkham guards-; and, the fact that the breakout happened on Sharpe's watch should kind of affect the idea that he is supposed to have put an end to it, since one would think people would wonder if his negligience was part of the problem in the first place (though, to be fair, Gotham might have realised by then that no amount of security is good enough for [[The Joker]]).

**** Although to be fair, Commissioner Gordon spent most of the crisis either held hostage or experiencing brief moments of not being held hostage, so it's not like he's really in a position to challenge Sharpe's effectiveness much. As for other witnesses, it's been speculated that Sharpe probably took the "I coordinated the retaking of the asylum and Batman was following my lead" approach -- andapproach—and since most of the surviving witnesses spent most of the crisis holed up in various places in the asylum with only Batman going backwards and forwards between them, there's no one really to challenge that. Alternatively, this is Gotham we're talking about, and he's got Hugo Strange of all people pulling his strings; a hefty dose of bribery, voter fraud and / or mind control isn't entirely off the cards. For what it's worth, though, one of the ''Arkham City'' tie-in comics has Vicki Vale call Sharp on precisely this issue during an interview.

* In the cinematic trailer, why does Hugo Strange feel he has to torture his own henchmen to death to get info out of him? I'm pretty sure he'd be forthcoming about the big-scary-man-in-a-cape who beat the crap out of him if his employer had just asked. It doesn't look like a case of [[You Have Failed Me...]] either, as Strange clearly expected the attack on Batman to fail ("This was just one more twist of the knife... to test him.")

* Why didn't the Mad Hatter remove Batman's mask? He has an obsession with hats alongside his obsession with ''[[Alice in Wonderland (Literature)|Alice in Wonderland]]''. One of his main motivations for going against Batman is to collect his cowl. He had Batman unconscious for enough time to drag him back to his lair - so why wouldn't he take off the mask during that time?

** IIRC this is happening in the Penguin's ''own club'' -- i—i.e. he sets the rules about what happens there (most likely in his favour) and most of the people there who can 'testify the fault' are either the Penguin's goons or people who are affiliated with the Penguin in some way, so they're unlikely to be taking Victor's side here. Hell, the whole point was probably to set him up to fleece him in the first place. Victor protests it, likely result is he gets the crap kicked out of him (which, again IIRC, is exactly what happened anyway). And in any case, the Penguin is a major crime lord and, in Arkham City, a sociopathic borderline [[Complete Monster]] -- who—who in their right mind is going to risk pissing ''him'' off (and in all likelihood getting fed to his ''shark'') in a gambling dispute by taking the side of some nobody (at that point at least) who's just had his cash wiped out over a stupid bet?

* Couple of things about the combat system:

** For starters, I'm fairly certain it is physically impossible for anyone to bench press a thousand pounds. As for why he can't stop the thrusts, it would hurt Batman more to try and block it, since all the force of the blow would be concentrated on his arms and the shield doesn't have a good spot for him to get a grip while it's heading towards him.

##Why do Batman and Catwoman let blade-wielders have multiple swings before taking them down? Batman in particular has armguards that can deflect even the katanas of Talia's guards, so why are these highly-trained martial artists giving their attackers more than one chance to attack?

##How the fudge does wearing improvised armor protect you from punches thrown by a human being who has trained himself to physical perfection? Armor helps against piercing and cutting attacks, but the concussive force of a blunt attack will still carry through -- unlessthrough—unless I failed physics somewhere.

*** The place ''is'' swarming with criminals, both inside and outside; it's sad that their colleague is dead, but he ''is'' dead, and they have to put the men who are still alive first and get them to a position of safety before they can start wringing their hands over their dead colleague. Carrying around a body is both heavy and time-consuming; at the very least, it's at least two guys who are now able to carry less stuff which could be used to defend themselves and are now in a weaker position to defend themselves should they be attacked by anyone, which could lead to ''them'' getting killed.

* Just to check, in the [[Arkham Verse]], is the Lazarus Pit under Gotham the only pit, or is it like the regular DC with multiple ones around the globe? I ask because Ra's was making a pretty big deal about that one pit (building Wonder City around it, coming back decades later and ordering his men to dig down to it). You'd think that if there was more than one he'd have easier access to another (I may well have missed mention of other Lazarus Pits...).

*** There's subway tunnels under Arkham City, and presumably other kinds of underground networks as well; could be that some of them haven't yet been flooded in those areas and so can still be used to get from place to place by the inmates. Batman doesn't find or use them because he doesn't need to, having his glider cape and grapple guns and such.

** You can see Joker's [[Mooks]] all over the Subway tunnels, which lead directly into Penguin's territory.

* Way back before Arkham City got all controversial, Hugo Strange was by all accounts a [[Villain Withwith Good Publicity]]. And chances are he wanted to ''keep'' it that way in order to get the whole thing off the ground. Why then, when he was making a deal with Mad Hatter, a [[Mad Scientist|deranged]], [[Ax Crazy|schizophrenic]] and ''[[Alternate Character Interpretation|possibly]]'' [[Squick|pedophelic]] madman with [[Mind Control Device|mind-control technology]], in which he hires him to kidnap and brainwash the mayor in order to get everything he needs, even going so far as to bribe him with some unseen kidnapped woman [[Alternate Character Interpretation|(or girl)]], did he decide to '''''TAPE THE WHOLE CONVERSATION??''''' Mad Hatter would have been easy enough to throw in Arkham City, but imagine if somebody besides Batman found those tapes? What if they had been found before he had gotten all the power he did?? You'd think a [[Magnificent Bastard]] such as Hugo would be a little smarter than that!

** Batman's initial plan was simply to figure out what Protocol 10 was. Calling in all his buddies to beat the crap out of every inmate in Arkham City would not be the best way to conduct that investigation -- ifinvestigation—if anything, it could have made Strange play his hand sooner. Before Batman was poisoned, he had no reason to think there was anything really dangerous going on in Arkham City other than his own suspicions. After he was poisoned, the solution still looked relatively simple: go to Freeze, kick Freeze's ass until he makes a cure, and fix everything. Things got worse after that, and his buddies were needed in Gotham to keep things under control. Besides, he managed to save the day again anyway without them.

** For some of the riddles, we can perhaps assume that he's only referring to the subject of the riddle, not necessarily the specific surroundings or circumstances in which Batman deduces it (the map, in this case, works as a tool for the ''player'', not necessarily a tool for Batman). While naturally he can't predict precisely if or where {{spoiler|the Abrovomic brothers would reconcile}}, he does know that the subject of the spoiler is something that's in the prison and that Batman could conceivably come across at some point. In this case, Batman happens to come across it at that specific location, makes the link there, and solves the riddle; in-universe he could conceivably solve it somewhere else, but that's just where he happens to make the mental link required to solve it.

** 'cause he's so old his blood is dust? Like [[The Simpsons (animation)|Mr Burns]]?

*** Also, the most [[Elite Mooks]] in the game are a bunch of utterly badass women, the women Batman saves from Joker's people (one doctor, one nurse, and one TV reporter) are all tough and cool-headed (Vickie Vale comes off much better than Jack Ryder did under similar circumstances, and the kidnapped doctor is smart enough to arm herself and attack anyone who comes after her, for example), and thugs taunt their male enemies just as much as they do Catwoman. So, yeah, no excuse for the "sexist" thing.

** Incidentally, Bruce Wayne also gets called "bitch" in the game, and the convicts talk about a lot more disturbing stuff than just calling a female character by this expletive, for example how fun they've had torturing people to death in horrible detail. For some reason people find the latter funny but "bitch" offensive. The game does have an unfortunate sexist side in its depiction of female characters (could we have one who doesn't dress like a fetish model?), but the way the convicts talk is not a part of the issue.