SPOILER ALERT: the following article contains massive spoilers, including the ending. If you have not yet seen the movie, proceed at your own risk, or better, come back to this article later!
Batman ventures into Gotham City’s underworld when a sadistic killer leaves behind a trail of cryptic clues. As the evidence begins to lead closer to home and the scale of the perpetrator’s plans become clear, he must forge new relationships, unmask the culprit and bring justice to the abuse of power and corruption that has long plagued the metropolis.
SPOILERS AHEAD
The Batman Plot Summary and Synopsis
Reclusive billionaire Bruce Wayne has operated for two years as the vengeance-seeking vigilante Batman in Gotham City.
Mayor Don Mitchell Jr., who is campaigning for reelection and previously oversaw a historic bust that ended mobster Salvatore Maroni’s drug operation, is murdered by a serial killer calling himself the Riddler.
The Riddler leaves behind a clue in the form of a riddle addressed to Batman.
The riddle leads Batman and Lieutenant James Gordon of the Gotham City Police Department (GCPD) to a thumb drive containing images of Mitchell with a woman, Annika Koslov, at the Iceberg Lounge, a nightclub operated by mobster Carmine Falcone’s lieutenant, Penguin.
Batman questions the Penguin, who pleads ignorance, and meets Selina Kyle, Annika’s roommate and girlfriend, who works there as a waitress.
When Annika disappears, Selina works with Batman, infiltrating the club to search for answers. They discover that the Riddler’s victims are all officials on Falcone’s payroll. Selina is unnerved upon encountering Falcone and abandons the mission.
The Riddler abducts corrupt DA Gil Colson, straps a timed collar bomb to his neck, and sends him to interrupt Mitchell’s funeral. When Batman arrives, the Riddler calls him via Colson’s phone. He will detonate the bomb if Colson cannot answer three riddles.
Colson answers the first two, but refuses to answer the third—the name of the GCPD informant who assisted in the Maroni drug bust—and dies. Thinking the Penguin is the informant, Batman and Gordon track him down at a drug deal. There they discover that Maroni’s operation was actually taken over by Falcone, with many GCPD officers operating under him. A shootout ensues when Selina arrives to steal Falcone’s drug money. Selina discovers Annika’s strangled corpse in a car trunk.
Batman captures the Penguin, but learns that he is not the informant. Upon being questioned, Selina reveals to Batman that she is Falcone’s illegitimate daughter; when her mother was strangled to death, Falcone never claimed her as his own.
Batman and Gordon follow the Riddler’s trail to an abandoned orphanage established by Bruce’s parents Thomas and Martha.
They learn that the Riddler was a resident at the orphanage and holds a grudge against the Waynes, who established a $1 billion philanthropic urban renewal fund during Thomas’s mayoral campaign that never reached the orphanage or the public following Thomas’s murder.
Bruce’s butler and caretaker, Alfred Pennyworth, is hospitalized after opening a letter bomb addressed to Bruce.
The Riddler then leaks evidence that Thomas hired Falcone during his campaign to kill a journalist for threatening to reveal embarrassing details about Martha’s history of mental illness.
Disillusioned by these revelations about his father, Bruce confronts Alfred, who explains that Thomas only asked Falcone to intimidate the journalist; he intended to go to the police upon learning of the murder.
Alfred believes Falcone had Thomas and Martha killed to prevent this.
Selina finds an accidental voicemail recording of Annika’s murder on her phone. It reveals that Falcone is the informant, and that he killed Annika because she learned this from Mitchell.
Selina goes to kill Falcone in revenge. Batman and Gordon arrive at the Iceberg Lounge in time to stop her. Falcone reveals he murdered Selina’s mother. Gordon arrests Falcone, but the Riddler kills Falcone.
Unmasked as forensic accountant Edward Nashton, the Riddler is incarcerated in Arkham State Hospital. During his work, Nashton discovered a ledger proving that after Thomas’s murder, the renewal fund was shared among Gotham’s corrupt officials and mobsters, leaving Gotham’s needy to languish in poverty.
His anger extends to the Waynes for their failed promises, and to Bruce for the public sympathy he received after his parents’ murder, while Nashton and the other orphans suffered.
Unaware of his identity, Nashton idolizes Batman — who inspired him to ruthlessly target the corrupt — and believes him to be sympathetic to his cause, but Batman angrily rejects him.
Batman discovers that Nashton has stationed car bombs around Gotham and cultivated an online following that plans to assassinate new mayor-elect Bella Reál and her supporters as a demonstration of their disillusionment with Gotham.
The bombs destroy the breakwaters around Gotham and flood the city, trapping Reál and her supporters in an indoor arena during her victory rally. Nashton’s followers injure Reál, but are stopped by Batman and Selina.
The Batman Ending Explained [SPOILER!]
In the aftermath, Nashton befriends another inmate, and Batman aids Reál’s recovery efforts.
Selina deems Gotham beyond saving and leaves, while Batman vows to inspire hope in Gotham instead, disquieted that Nashton and his followers were inspired by his pursuit of vengeance.
Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 3.0).