Review: Robert Pattinson embodies a broody, brawny Dark Knight for a new era in 'The Batman'

There have been so many Batman films – and quite a few Batmen – since Christopher Nolan’s 2005 reboot “Batman Begins” that the new one is bound to drive some moviegoers, well, batty.

Director Matt Reeves’ ambitious and excellently crafted “The Batman” (★★★? out of four; rated PG-13; in theaters and streaming on HBO Max) more than justifies its existence as a world-building wonder that slathers a realistic grime across its Gotham City, a metropolis filled with familiar yet refreshing takes on its iconic coterie of heroes and villains. And at the center of it all is Robert Pattinson, the latest actor to don the famous cape and cowl, who brings a grungy, broody brawn to an emotionally conflicted Caped Crusader.

The character has long been known as the “world’s greatest detective” in comic books, and in that vein is where “The Batman” thrives – with a noir-style voiceover narration introduction by Pattinson – as the "Chinatown" of the Bat-movie canon.

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This new Bruce Wayne is more two-fisted gumshoe than masked vigilante (though he certainly can whale on street criminals' heads if need be), but honestly, the job’s not going well at all: Batman is in his second year punching punks and solving crimes, though the crime has actually grown worse since he started.

A corrupt police department on the whole doesn’t love that he’s around, and piling on to the problems is a masked serial killer named the Riddler (Paul Dano) who is murdering Gotham power players and leaving cryptic cyphers and puzzles for Batman by name.

Bruce, a dark sort even when not in his Batsuit, goes down an investigative rabbit hole to uncover a city poisoned by good intentions turned bad and learns about his late parents’ involvement. What he mainly needs to figure out, though, is will Batman just be a symbol of vengeance or should he be something more?

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Reeves tries to do a lot over three expansive hours, and he mostly succeeds, filling out an expansive Gotham mythology that Batman and his colorful co-stars exist in naturally rather than overshadow. (As much as he packs in, Reeves also seeds intriguing aspects for sequels down the line.)

Bruce has allies in good cop/frequent partner Jim Gordon (Jeffrey Wright), loyal butler Alfred (Andy Serkis) and the shadowy Selina Kyle (Zoe Kravitz), a club waitress and cat burglar who grows close to Batman as they work together and find commonalities in their past traumas. Dano’s Riddler is a Zodiac Killer type with a penchant for punctuation who grows creepier as his story is revealed, while Colin Farrell fabulously embraces his inner Robert De Niro (and is delightfully unrecognizable under a ton of prosthetics) as the gangster Penguin.

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There’s an interconnectedness among the characters that really works, plus “The Batman” is undoubtedly just really cool. Pattinson plays Batman as an enigma slowly unlocked along with the film's central mystery – as Kravitz’s pre-Catwoman persona discovers, you dig him the more you get to know him. Also, the hero’s muscle-car Batmobile is the niftiest since Michael Keaton’s 1989 road monster, and Reeves’ movie is the best-scored comic book film since 2008’s “The Dark Knight.” A composer with the creativity to be this generation’s John Williams, Michael Giacchino constructs individual character themes and a genre-mashing piano-and-orchestra soundscape that are essential elements in making “The Batman” a triumph.

Reeves’ “The Batman” is doing its thing far outside the DC movie universe where Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman and Jason Momoa’s Aquaman hang out. That’s a good thing: Pattinson’s main man holds down a revamped Gotham that feels distinctively gritty with its blueprint of madness and mayhem, a place you would never want to live in but still would love to revisit as soon as possible.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'The Batman' review: Robert Pattinson excels as new Dark Knight