It's been a slow two months for me in terms of movie watching. It's not because movies these days are bad (some are pretty decent) and not because I couldn't watch any (more on that later) - it's because I've been preoccupied with a couple of very time occupying activities.
First of all, I've recently played and finished Elden Ring. For a dude who has previously played three Soulsborne or Souls-like games but stopped after a few hours, this is a big freaking deal. Since everyone and their cat has played this game, I won't bore you too much with expansive paragraphs describing what the game is about, so I'll just say this: in this game, you roam around a HUGE open world, kill some bosses and become Elden Lord. Maybe. Or Maybe Not. It depends on you.
"The game in its first few hours is difficult" is an understatement, at least to me. A lot of it is just trying to survive and earning enough to get better weapons and levels. But after a certain point, I got enough stuff to start making a little headway. As someone who was trained in the JRPG style of grinding and steamrolling everything by exploring every possible nook and cranny before advancing the story, the difficulty curve began to flatten over time. It didn't totally plateau, since endgame bosses ramp up in difficulty after a certain point, but it was at least manageable. Now I will be the first to admit: in a PvE situation where I'm only fighting against the computer, I am not a wholly honorable man. If there is a way to defeat an enemy using cheap or underhanded tactics, I will do it, sometimes even if it's more cumbersome than fighting something the "intended way," whatever that means. I buy, sell and eat cheese wholesale; discovering strategies like that brings me the most joy.
Ultimately, the game is only as easy or as hard as you want to make it. Choice is the most important thing in this game. You absolutely have the power to fight this guy, or go off on an adventure for a few hours somewhere else and come back, or fight someone else. Sometimes you don't even have to come back at all.
The thing I liked the most out of Elden Ring, after 200 hours of playing it, is that emphasis on player choice. Gameplay and story (as equally simple and esoteric as From's stories can be) are both closely intertwined, unlike other games whose gameplay and story choices don't exactly line up. I'm looking at you, The Last of Us 2, but that's a story for another day. Is Elden Ring a perfect game? No, no it is not. But the way it approaches its open world and how it masters the gameplay loop it has been trying to perfect for more than a decade easily makes it one of the year's best games.
Speaking of maidenless behavior, it was around 2013 when I began to drift towards media and videos of a certain ideological inclination. I had joined the movement our of righteous indignation at a tangentially related matter, but the group I involved myself in had other things in mind. Little did I know that movement I was getting into was part of one of the opening salvos of a culture war that would consume the world in the 2010s, culminating in the 2016 US presidential elections. My S.O. (then fiancee, now wife) noticed the videos I was watching and asked me, concerned, "isn't that alt-right stuff?" back when the term was in its infancy. I answered with "this is what the media isn't telling us" or something to that effect. I said that unironically back in 2013-2014. Obviously I don't feel the same way now - it came to a point where I took a step back, looked at everything critically - including the 'other side' - and saw the movement for what it is. It boggles my mind that I drifted towards that kind of thinking.
But on the other hand, it's not entirely far-fetched; I remember the days when I was deep into this emerging movement, there was a sense of community. It was us versus them, yes, but the "us" was definitely an "us" - formed by solidarity over sometimes completely arbitrary or tangential reasons, but we were together. It felt good being with these people for a while. It was a true manifestation of humankind as a social species, even if this bonding was over things that, looking back, repulse me to my core. There is nothing more dangerous than a misplaced sense of self-righteousness, but it happens often, and in media, people who are entrenched in this mindset make the best villains - the people who think they are the heroes of their own stories.
Matt Reeves' take on Batman approaches the caped crusader and the villains who oppose him through this lens. The central villain of this movie, The Riddler (Paul Dano), is a man who believes in his own hype, a fan of the Batman who is exposed to dangerous ideas, is introduced to a cult not unlike what we see today in America and in some parts of the world, and acts upon these ideas with his intellect. Reeves' Riddler does not believe he is a villain, he believes he is doing the things he does for the better good. He found a community with conspiracy theorists and these dangerous ideas made him even more dangerous.
As for the titular Batman, I recall a well known picture from Greg Rucka's Wonder Woman Annual no. 1, where Wonder Woman, in an attempt to suss out imposters, uses the Lasso of Truth on herself, Superman and Batman to state their true identities. Wonder Woman and Superman respond as one would normally expect, but Batman states that he is the Batman.
Reeves' The Batman may take place during the caped crusader's first few years on the job, but it too is an origin story: not for Batman, but for Bruce Wayne. When in the climax of the film, Batman realizes that his vigilantism and the Riddler's self righteous crusade aren't all that different, he decides to become something more. The Batman's existence and the existence of most, if not all his enemies stem from a system of justice that is deeply dysfunctional, inequitable and corrupt, if not outright non-functional. Perhaps what Batman decides at the end is not to supplant that system entirely with his vigilantism, but to become a beacon of hope, to hopefully fix and restore trust in the system - effectively removing the need for a Batman at all. I don't know if that's really what the film meant to say, or even if it did so properly, but I'd like to believe it's something like that.
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