Did The Riddler Get His Due Here?
At the movies...we've had so many Jokers.
Two of them won Oscars for the role..one Best Actor, one Best Supporting Actor(but he was the better one of the two.)
One superstar originated the role in 1989 and got a $60 million payday.
..and there are a few more.
But what of The Riddler?
I'm going to leave out the animated versions because I don't think they have "the reach" so we are really down to four:
"TV Batman"(1966): Frank Gorshin.
"TV Batman" (1967) John Astin
"Batman Forever" (1995): Jim Carrey
"The Batman" (2022): Paul Dano
I do believe that Gorshin was the only actor to play a villain on Batman to actually win an Emmy for it (Best Guest Performance.) The Riddler -- not the Joker -- was the villain on the opening episode of the series in 1966. Then they brought out the Penguin(Burgess Meredith( the next week, and then finally The Joker(Caesar Romero) three weeks out. ABC seemed to think The Riddler was the most interesting villain to lead with.
In accord with The Riddler from the comic books(first appearance, 1948) Gorshin had to wear
a skintight green leotard as The Riddler. Occasionally, The Riddler wore a jacket and pants ala The Penguin and The Joker, but Gorshin's slim body worked well with the skintight number.
Gorshin couldn't fit The Riddler into his schedule one time(maybe he quit for good?) so they used another actor who looked nothing like Gorshin OR The Riddler in the comic books(who DID look like Frank Gorshin.) John Astin -- the moustacheod Gomez Addams of The Addams Family -- looked NOTHING like Frank Gorshin or the Riddler in the comics -- Astin had black hair, for one thing. And the skintight green leotard looked a bit stretched on him.
Gorshin came back as The Riddler one more time in Batman's final, truncated season. And that was it for The Riddler for a long, long time.
When a big screen Batman finally hit theaters over 20 years later in 1989 -- they went with The Joker, and a prestige superstar to play him.
3 years later, they went with The Penguin and Catwoman.
3 years LATER, they finally gave The Ridder his big screen shot. No respect. Why? The kinky leotard? The difficulty of writing quality riddles?
Robin Williams, having been considered and dropped for the Joker in Batman 1989, moved into position for The Riddler. After all, Gorshin had played the guy with a manic energy and insane super-giggle. That was more Robin Williams than Jack Nichoslon.
But alas for Williams, in the interim, a new, "nuttier" and more youth-friendly superstar arrived and took over the role: Jim Carrey (Williams, now twice burned by the franchise, was never considered again.)
Wherea Williams stocky build might have looked odd in that leotard, the thin, fit Carrey fit it fine(as well as fitting in the coat and hat in other scenes.) And Carrey took Gorshin's nutty giggler way up into that over-acting stratosphere that had gained him so many fans.
Alas: Jim Carrey's pretty perfect Ridder was in the first of two pretty bad Batman movies(the infamous Joel Schumacher ones.) It was an inauspicious big screen debut for The Riddler.
And the franchise seemed hellbent on ignoring The Riddler thereafter.
Instead we got Mr. Freeze,Two-Face, Poison Ivy, Bane, Ras a'Ghoul , The Scarecrow, The Joker (again), Two-Face(again) Bane(again), and Catwoman (again.) Then we got two more Jokers.
The Riddler. No respect. Til now. 27 years after JIm Carrey played him. Ta da...
...Paul Dano? And as a guy called Edward Nashton? Instead of Edward Nygma? ("Enygma.")
And this: Dano NEVER wears that green leotard, or that pink eyemask, Or even a jacket with question marks all over it.
No...in this new edition of Chris Nolan realism with an even darker nihilism, The Riddler pretty much wears a dark mask all the time -- he looks like the Zodiac secial killer in David Fincher's movie. He wears a thick leather jacket. There is no "uniform" to the Riddler at all. And certainly no color...green or otherwise.
And when he IS unmasked and put in a cell...he's just...Paul Dano. Dano's a weird looking guy anyway, but there's not much mystery to him here.
There is also this: for the first time in ANY Batman movie, a Batman villain gives off a very serious "serial killer" vibe. Yes, The Joker is a serial killer, but he's also a gang boss. THIS RIddler is a psycho who kills people "Saw" -like as psychos do -- putting a man's head in a cage full of rats goes towards "Hostel" -- no kids allowed, anymore.
Meanwhile: in the third act, with Dano in a glass cell and Batman growlilng at him in raging, impotent fury, we get a re-do of Batman's similar jailhouse rant against Heath Ledger's Joker and -- poor Paul Dano looks like even LESS of a "super-villain." He's just a crazy looking nerd. An incel, I suppose. But still.
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