The Batman offers a bold reimagining of the Riddler, with Paul Dano’s creepy serial killer being wholly different from any previous portrayal of the Prince of Puzzles. For one thing, his look could not be further removed from the villain’s classic green leotard/suit, with Dano decked out in a grotty coat and taped-up mask. But there is actually one part of his ensemble that is lifted from an unlikely source — Jim Carrey’s Riddler from Batman Forever.
As Twitter user @Guslivesagain noted on Twitter, in a tweet that quickly went viral, the distinctive transparent-framed glasses worn by The Batman‘s Riddler are actually a callback to an identical pair worn by Carrey’s Edward Nygma. Carrey wears them prior to his transformation into the costumed criminal in the early part of Joel Schumacher’s 1995 camp classic. Dano, meanwhile, keeps the specs on whether in or out of his Riddler guise.
While The Batman may seem like it’s keen to totally reinvent the wheel, these matching glasses remind us that director Matt Reeves actually tipped his hat to Batman’s past screen history in various subtle ways in his film. For instance, Robert Pattinson’s DC debut pays homage to 1966’s Batman: The Movie, another of the Caped Crusader’s campest outings, via a piece of easily missed set decoration — a Shakespeare bust owned by Adam West’s Bruce Wayne.
In the wake of The Batman‘s release, Batman Forever has actually enjoyed something of a renaissance as fans have been revisiting it and finding much to enjoy about the traditionally much-criticized entry in the Bat-canon. Carrey’s Nygma, in particular, is one of the finest OTT supervillains in comic book cinema, so it’s pleasing to discover there was a homage to his take on the Riddler hidden in The Batman, which is playing in theaters now.
