As far as I'm concerned my point is as simple as the following questions and their obvious answers should suggest:
Did Batman stop the Red Triangle Circus Gang from kidnapping Gotham's first-born sons?
If the answer is yes, move onto to the next question...
Is it likely that some, if not all, of The Red Triangle Circus Gang members stopped by Batman were apprehended by the police?
If the answer is yes, move onto the next question...
Is it likely that the police would have questioned the various members of The Red Triangle Circus Gang regarding The Penguin's various activities (especially since the link between them and The Penguin was now incontrovertible seeing as The Penguin had publically announced his plans to capture and kill the first-born sons at Max Shreck's party)?
If the answer is yes, move onto the next question...
Is It highly possible that Commissioner Gordon, Gotham's highest ranking plice officer and a man who clearly had doubts about Batman's part in The Ice Princess' kidnap and murder (having stated that the batarang was merely 'circumstantial evidence', and having stopped his men from firing at Batman when they were on the roof), would have sought confessions from The Red Triangle Circus Gang exonerating Batman of his alleged crimes?
Furthermore, is it also not highly possible that Commissioner Gordon would question Batman's alleged part in an innocent woman's death bearing in mind this was the first time Batman had ever been linked with such a random crime?
Would Batman's other recent actions, including saving Gotham's first-born sons from drowning and stopping The Penguin from blasting all of Gotham to hell not seem to conflict with his alleged murder of The Ice Princess, and wouldn't the police therefore have a duty to investigate further before pinning the crime on Batman on the basis of circumstantial evidence (and Batman's presence at the scene of the crime
is circumstantial until any more compelling evidence can be uncovered linking Batman to the alleged crime)? Wouldn't the police be duty-bound to consider what Batman's motive was for killing The Ice Princess bearing in mind he had done nothing as crazy or unfathonable before or since her death?
If the answers to all or even most of these questions is yes the overwhelming likilhood is that Batman would have been eventually cleared of murder, regardless of what a few mistaken eyewitnesses claim they saw occurring on a roof 100 feet or so above their vantage point.
As for some of your arguments The Joker...
Yes, there is if the Cops want to find out where the rest of the gang is and who they are working for. Someone put them up to it.
That may have been the case, and could even be considered to be a plothole (even as a fan of the film I won't pretend this film contains more than its fair share of these). However, whether The Red Triangle Circus Gang did or did not buckle under pressure to give up there boss' identity at this stage has little bearing on whether they'd do the same later on once it became clear who their boss was and what he had been up to. Not to mention, their supposed (but IMHO questionable) loyalty to The Penguin would have been a moot point once their boss was dead. By that stage it would make little to no sense for them to remian loyal to The Penguin bearing in mind the stack of evidence against them.
No, they were also up on murder charges.
With all due respect, you have accused me of speculation but a number of the points you make including this one, is pure speculation. Unless we saw the circus gang kill anyone and I maintain that we didn't, although it's clear that a number of the gang who had evaded arrest until the end were going to be indicted with attempted murder for their part in the kidnapping of the first-born sons, I don't see how anyone can state with any certainty that they were going to be indicted with murder charges.
Your belief makes little to no sense bearing in mind that the murder of various Gotham citizens would surely have merited front-page news on the covers of Gotham's various newspapers, and yet headlines like 'ME-OUCH' and 'Batman Blows It' seem to focus entirely on the millions of dollars of structural damage sustained against its various shops and properties. Since when has damage to a few shops taken precedence in the news over mass killings? No doubt you will argue this point as well as you strike me as the type of person who won't back down in an argument but I'd have more respect if you'd concede this point since does not seem particularly arguable to me.
No, they wouldn't since Penguin had not even put that plan down on paper yet. He had not gotten access to the Hall of Records after the first attack.
So what if he hadn't yet gotten access to the Hall of Records? That was his intention in ascending to the surface. He surely would have included his gang members in his masterplan which was always to kill Gotham's first-born children, NOT to become Mayor, which was merely a side-issue cooked up by Max Shreck.
Oh man, come on. You just said yourself you saw a shop keeper being attacked. What was a shop keeper doing in there if the store was closed? How did the poodle just walk into the cafe with the grenade unless it was open?
I've already addressed this point, but if you're going to be pedantic...the shop-keeper I was referring to seemed to be an unfortunate victim of what looked like 'happy-slapping'. Sure, it can very, very occasionally result in someone's death but that's hardly ever the case. In fact, the clowns slapping the shopkeeper on the head was almost comical in how relatively tame it appeared. I think the gang merely wanted to create as much chaos as possible. If they really wanted to kill anyone they would have pushed the shopkeeper to the ground and then proceeded to kick the proverbial out of him, or even simpler, just have shot him with one of the various weapons at their disposal.
The shopkeeper probably lived above the shop, although it may also have been a 24-hour convenience store. However, it appeared quite clear to me thata the attack occurred late at night. We even see a clock a couple of scenes later indicating that the gang's rampage took place during the late hours of the night/early hours of the morning.
As for how the poodle got into the store, admittedly that may be a plothole but since we don't see any customers in the restaurant, nor even any lights on, I refuse to believe it was open. The more likely possibility is that one of the circus thugs had already broken into the restaurant and absconded before the poodle could caus maximum damage with the grenade. Anyway, it was just a funny, cool looking shot. I don't think we're meant to take the whys and wherefores too seriously in this instance.
There was people present in all of these buildings that they blew up. Just because Schreck's was closed doesn't mean every where was. There's no universal hour for a close of business. Plus even if they had blown up Schreck's they would have killed the two security guards whom Catwoman had frightened off.
I've answered this point above, but I will reiterate the most compelling point. If the gang
had killed anyone in this attack it would be reasonable to assume that their deaths would have made front-page news and have been the focal-point of The Penguin's post-riot speech to the public. Instead, no mention was made of any casualties, although millions of dollars in property damage was cited.
Another thing, why would the circus gang blow up Shreck's Department Store? The point is The Penguin was working alongside Shreck so as far as his gang went that was a no-go zone. Therefore, there was no chance of them killing Shreck's security guards.
One final point here. Catwoman later demonstrates that she's not interested in killing innocent people; in fact it goes against her nature. Why would she then team up with The Penguin if she believed and understood him and his gang to be murderers? Your argument makes no sense. Bear in mind that when Catwoman teamed up with The Penguin she had no idea he was going to kill Gotham's first-born sons and simply believed his list to be an 'enemies list' ala Nixon.
Make no mistake, they killed people. Many people.
If you believe that after what I would argue is incontrovertible evidence to the contrary that's your prerogative.
I like it when people are able to raise their hands up and say 'maybe I was wrong', or at least 'you have a point'. I do this whenever I believe someone has a strong argument. However, I suspect (although hope I am wrong) that you will maintain your stance and seek to argue these points however tenuous your arguments might be.
They would all be charged with murder because the it was a mass gang attack. The Cops can't be sure which specific ones blew up one store. They just know the circus gang was involved. They'd all be charged as one criminal conspiracy.
They would not
all be charged with murder. They'd be charged with criminal conspiracy sure, but this is not the same as a collective murder charge, unless it can be established that each member of the gang had a part in anyone person's killing.
Assuming anyone did commit murder in the first two attacks on Gotham, the nature of the rioting was so haphazard I can't see how anyone would come to the conclusion that there was an orchestrated plan to kill anyone. It would go completely against the interests of justice and a fair trial if the gang were to be indicted as one for any individual killing undertaken by one or more members of the gang.
And how do you know Gotham carries a death sentence for murder? In fact all evidence suggests it doesn't since none of them ratted Penguin out.
I don't know. Neither do you. I never stated that I did. It was a minor point to underscore how useful a confession might be, but the stakes don't have to be quite as high as a death sentence. There are other bargaining 'chips' even for a crime as cut-and-dry as murder, or conspiracy to murder. Even if life-imprisonment was on the cards a deal for a particular prison might be made. It's also likely that some of the members of the gang involved in the kidnapping of the children could negotiate a lesser sentence as 'accessories' to kidnap etc.
Of course all this is pure speculation, but as my questions at the above of this post should illustrate, the overwhelming likelihood is that Gordon and his officers would have found some way of getting the truth out of one of the gang during routine questioning. It's very difficult in such circumstances involving multiple arrestees for everything to remain under wraps. That's just common-sense.
Whether Gordon believed Batman was guilty or not was irrelevant. Without a shred of proof to clear him he's got nothing.
What he has got is evidence against Batman, including:
- A blood stained batarang found in the Ice Princess' dressing room
- Hundreds of eye witness accounts of Batman pushing the Ice Princess
- More eye witness accounts of Batman getting into his Batmobile and trashing the city with it
The first and second 'pieces of evidence' are purely circumstantial. A blood-stained batarang and Batman getting into his car to evade a mob of blood-thirsty members of the public mean nothing without any other overwhelming evidence.
Before anyone starts jumping to conclusions regarding the batarang who is to say that it even belongs to Batman in the first place?
I trust you've seen 12 Angry Men. I'm guessing you'd have been one of the ones on the jury voting 'guilty' on the basis of the knife and the fact that there couldn't be more than one such weapon.
And you think Gordon is going to make some sort of case to prove Batman is innocent by getting the circus gang to squeal on Penguin just to clear a vigilante whom he already allows to go around killing criminals anyway?
Without a motive, or any witnesses who clearly saw Batman oush the princess, and I'd argue that noone could clearly see what Batman had or had not done from one-hundred or so feet below, the evidence against Batman is pretty flimsy. I'd agree that the police would want to bring him in for questioning but if, as I suspect, Gordon was able to find evidence exonerating Batman, including possible confessions from The Penguin's gang and corrorobative evidence including the plans to the Batmobile inside The Penguin's lair, and The Penguin's campaign van and the mini-Batmobile, it wouldn't have been too difficult to establish a case against The Penguin which would in time, clear Batman from any intentional wrong-doing.
That was a simple case of they don't have a hope in hell of beating Batman so lets get the hell out of here before he arrives. They already saw he was coming in something very large and fast.
The Penguin felt clearly betrayed by his gang's decision to abandon him. If they were as blindly loyal as you seem to suggest they are they would have stuck around until the end even if it meant having their asses whopped by Batman.
Also, your point applies to their arrests. Asuming the gang abandoned The Penguin because they didn't have a hope in hell of beating Batman, then it only stands to reason that they would try to cut a deal with the police if that was there 'only hope in hell' of a lengthy prison sentence.
Oh yes it does. If a man who's chosen to hide his identity and willingly kill criminals pushed a beauty queen off a roof, why would that be so hard to believe?
He's killed criminals liked you state. NOT innocents. If we assume the same length of time has passed between the events of Batman and Batman Returns as the gap between the two movies' respective releases, and I see no reason to suspect otherwise, Batman has presumably been known to the public for approximately three years. In that time he haas apparently gained the trust of Commissioner Gordon and even the Mayor who we see casually chatting to him after the first Red Triangle Circus Gang attack on the city. Even if Batman was capable of randomly killing a beauty queen, it doesn't fit with everything the public knows about him, no matter how limited that might be. People would naturally be asking questions as to why Batman would do such a thing, and it's only reasonable that the issue of motive would need to be addressed before concluding that Batman did kill The Ice Princess without any shread of doubt.
Dirty Harry is a well known figure with an identity and a past and probably a psychological profile done on him, too. He's not a mysterious figure people have clue who he is and he doesn't operate outside the law.
I haven't sen those films for a long time but I'm pretty sure he
did operate outside the law, which is why he was in constant trouble with his superior officers and why in one instance he threw his badge away.
And why on earth should they come to that conclusion? Penguin wasn't seen anywhere near the scenes of these events. Neither was the Red Triangle gang come to that. Nobody was except Batman.
To begin with I would agree that there was little reason to suspect The Penguin's involvement in The Ice Princess' murder, which is why I maintain that Gordon's dogged determinaton to establish the truth and not automatically assume that Batman was a killer for the flimsiest of reasons, plus the later revelations concerning The Penguin's manipulation of Gotham, hatred of Batman and various other plans to kill people, not to mention Batman's part in foiling those same plans, would surely have led to a thorough investigation.
I don't doubt for a moment that a cloud would always hang over Batman, even if he was exonerated of an innocent's murder, following the events of Batman Returns, and that the public and as a result, the plice, would be very wary of having anything to do with him once any degree of suspicion had fallen on him regarding a beloved figure's kidnap and death. However, I still maintain that as far as the law was concerned it wouldn't have been too difficult for the truth to emerge once Batman had foiled The Penguin and some arrests had been made.
In any case, I'm one of those people who don't consider Batman Forever to be a proper sequel to Batman Returns. I suspect that if the events of Batman Forever really did follow Batman Returns, we would be looking at a much more fractured relationship between Batman and the public/police, more on par with the type of relationship they shared during the first half of Batman where Batman was still regarded as a shadowy, somewhat untrustworthy individual and not one who could simply be summoned to action any time Gotham needed some help.
Really? So lets take into account all the goons Joker had with him at the parade including the ones Batman gunned down, then the ones he conveniently had up in the church tower, then the ones he had come collect him in the helicopter.
You're trying to tell me his gang was small just because he kept a small handful around him?
Once again, this is a rather minor point which does little for either side of the argument, but I still maintain that The Joker's gang is much smaller than The Red Triangle Circus Gang. Apart from the black shade-wearing guy who knocks the crap out of Batman, the other two goons in the church tower were regularly seen with The Joker, including during the gallery scene. The goons in the helicopter were at the parade and were also sen in the gallery scene, and only a handful of other goons were killed at the parade.
t: Priceless!
