Editor's note: The below article contains spoilers for The Batman.Contrary to other major DC superheroes, Batman is usually involved with street-level crime, punching robbers and drug dealers in the middle of the night. There’s an obvious problem with Batman’s approach to the issue, as criminality more than often comes from social inequality, instead of the innate moral inclination of criminals. However, since the Batman franchise focuses on madmen who want to destroy the city, we tend to forget that social inequality is a problem you cannot punch in the face and just get our thrills by watching Batman beat villains to a pulp.

Instead of evading the subject, Matt ReevesThe Batman puts social inequality in the spotlight, forcing Bruce Wayne (Robert Pattinson) to confront his privileges while also showing that walking outside the law is sometimes a survival strategy. That’s a brave stance for the film to take, as it questions Batman’s methods while also showing how the cycle of violence can never end if society does not offer equal chances to all individuals.

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the batman
Image via Warner Bros.

At the beginning of The Batman, we are presented to a classic Caped Crusader, an angry man who channels the pain of losing his parents into becoming a tool for vengeance. Watching Gotham’s streets night after night, Batman puts the fear inside the hearts of every criminal by breaking the bones of everyone who crosses a line. Batman stands in a moral high ground from where he judges criminals, who he sees as obviously bad people who enjoy causing pain to others. And for Batman, if anyone chooses to break the law, they deserve everything that’s coming to them, including the bloody justice of the vigilante’s fists.

As The Batman’s plot develops, Bruce Wayne is forced to question his worldview. First, Bruce gets to know Selina Kyle (Zoë Kravitz), a thief who works on the Iceberg Lounge, the nightclub controlled by the Penguin (Colin Farrell). Selina is on a mission to protect, and later avenge, a friend who has been targeted by Gotham’s underworld. At first, Bruce’s binary moral code leads him to say that the poor girl’s death is her own fault, a punishment for getting involved with the wrong people. That’s a selfish statement that blames the victim, and what’s worse is that it dismisses the social forces that push people into a life of crime.

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Bruce’s proximity to Selina helps him start to see that the world is not black and white, and that when social institutions fail to protect the people, sometimes they’ll be desperate enough to seek help from crime lords. That is why, after two years fighting in the streets of Gotham, Batman was not capable of reducing crime rates. Fear is not enough to convince people to respect the laws. Sure, violent thugs can be dissuaded with fear, but if people commit crimes as a last resort for their own survival, it is sometimes hard to find other options.

Reeves’ Gotham City is gloomy and dirty, and poor people need to get by in small apartments while facing debt, while the wealthy elite hides in skyscrapers. And as soon as the Riddler (Paul Dano) puts his plan into action, Bruce can no longer deny his privileges. In The Batman, Riddler is looking for vengeance, the same way as Bruce. But while Riddler’s methods are condemnable, his motivations are even more justifiable than Bruce’s.

the batman
Image via Warner Bros.

Bruce lost his parents and became an orphan, created in luxury and protected from poverty. The Riddler, on the other hand, was an orphan who grew up in a damp and crowded room, trying to prevent rats from chewing his fingers in the middle of the night. From an early age, the Riddler had to watch babies dying from the cold of winter, while the orphanage didn’t have the funds to offer poor children the basics they needed to survive. So, the Riddler's hate for society and order was fed by a public power that abandoned him and hundreds of other people to their own luck, while the powerful kept filling their pockets with money.

Of course, there’s always a choice to make, and people who commit crimes should be prosecuted and forced to pay for their actions. However, if we don’t understand what leads people to commit crimes, we cannot solve the issue. That’s the change of perspective that The Batman forces on Bruce, as he goes from blaming the individual to recognizing Gotham’s endemic social inequality. By the end of the movie, Bruce decides to become a symbol of hope, instead of a tool for vengeance. This shift comes from his realization that it doesn’t really matter to put people behind bars if social inequality keeps making crime the best way to survive. You cannot punch poverty in the face, and in the future, Bruce’s philanthropy work could become more important than Batman’s expensive gear to save Gotham from destruction.