WARNING: The following contains spoilers for The Batman, now in theaters.
From the onset, the trailer for Matt Reeves' The Batman made it clear Paul Dano's Riddler would be the main villain terrorizing Gotham. Penguin (Colin Farrell) worked on the ground with the mob that belonged to Carmine Falcone (John Turturro), helping escalate crime and corruption, but Riddler was the one running rampant to purge them. However, while Robert Pattinson's Dark Knight did spend most of The Batman dealing with both and trying to save the city from getting caught in the crossfire, the real tyrant of the film was actually the dark web in a harrowing meta-statement on society.
How Did the Dark Web Hurt The Batman?
In The Batman's climax, after The Riddler got arrested for shooting Falcone, the Bat realized the cryptic game was still going. He went back to Riddler's apartment, and there, he unlocked clues on the laptop confirming Riddler wasn't working alone. He had amassed a cult on the dark web, using a mysterious social media platform to sow anarchy.
He had 507 followers and did livestreams for months on end, with these folks ready to end oppression by helping him build bombs, detonators and offering up other bits and pieces of advice on his war on corruption. In other words, Riddler secretly created an army, and they were the final piece of the puzzle. It came to a head when the bombs they helped him design blew up, flooding the city and making it a No Man's Land.
What Else Did Riddler's Online Army Do in The Batman?
With Riddler in jail, basking in Gotham's watery destruction, his message and symbol lived on as gunmen dressed like him stormed the mayor's inauguration. They started firing from the rafters, hitting her, trying to kill off Jim Gordon's cops, and making it clear the system had to be rebooted from scratch.
Luckily, the Bat arrived on the scene, and with Catwoman and Gordon's help, they took the thugs out and rescued civilians from the deluge and rubble. However, there was one horrific moment when a gunman said he was "vengeance," which was the Bat's nickname in Gotham that he used to scare criminals. This made Bruce realize he had become the very thing he fought against -- a dark monster -- so he needed to recalibrate to become a beacon of hope, something the online movement and Riddler couldn't misappropriate again.
Why Was the Dark Web the True Villain in The Batman?
Riddler, in his real identity as Edward Nashton, made it clear to the Bat in the scary Arkham Asylum that he was always a loner. He never had family or friends and was always bullied, even at the Wayne Manor-turned-orphanage. There, it was even worse because he was always surrounded by the shadow of wealth he'd never had. It led to him becoming a forensic accountant, finding financial documents about Thomas Wayne's Gotham Renewal Fund and how it was used by the elite to drain the city.
Edward then became The Riddler, wielding power with like-minded folks online who wanted to raze society to the ground. There, he had a family, which Reeves used to echo the horrific reality of today, where many violent movements begin with small groups online. Ultimately, whether it was Riddler or some other villain, hidden right under everyone's noses, they were eager to become domestic terrorists, which not even the Caped Crusader would have seen coming. It harkened back to Todd Phillips' Joker, where civilians rioted and looted against injustice.
But in The Batman, rather than impulsive reactions, vulnerable people planning for a while were weaponized to become an ideal. Thus, this gave way to an invisible legion: something that transcended war in the flesh, which sadly, could return at any time to plague Gotham's rebuild.
See how the Dark Web created immense chaos in The Batman, now in theaters.