Last week, Telltale Games released the finale of The Enemy Within. You can read my review of the sophomore season here.
In two seasons and ten episodes, Telltale told an incredible, yet familiar story with fresh twists. Things weren’t always as they seemed, and they allowed you to craft your very own tale of Batman, forge your own alliances and create your own enemies. They really let you feel like if you were the one wearing the cape and cowl, what would you do?
We met many classic Batman characters along the way. Alfred, Commissioner Gordon, Catwoman, Harvey Dent, Carmine Falcone, Harley Quinn and more! We had to make some incredibly hard decisions and make sacrifices to get where we’re at now.
With the critical success that Telltale’s sequel season with Batman has had, there’s little doubt that they’ll be coming back for a third. If and when that happens, here are five things I’d like to see in a third season of Telltale’s Batman.
Warning: if you haven’t played through Batman: The Telltale Series and/or Batman: The Enemy Within, spoilers lie ahead. So do yourself a favor and craft your own Batman tale and come back when you’re ready.
Still with me? On with the show.
5) Suicide Squad
The Enemy Within introduced players to the Telltale version of Amanda Waller. She’s in charge of an organization called the Agency, and they come to Gotham when the Riddler first makes his attack at the beginning of Episode One.
Much like her comic book counterpart, she’s extremely intelligent and resourceful, using leverage to manipulate people into doing what she wants. She manipulates you as Batman when you discover she knows you are Bruce Wayne. Although you might not like or trust her, you can’t risk your identity leaking and she could be useful in saving Gotham.
Waller and the Agency leave Gotham at the end of the season, but it would be great to see them come back. Bane, Harley and Freeze are in their custody. We find out in The Enemy Within that Harley’s father had mental health issues, which caused her to become a psychiatrist. When he committed suicide because of his struggles, she had a mental breakdown and became Harley Quinn.
The plot of the season revolves around her trying to find a cure and willing to kill everyone in the city to do so. Waller could use this as leverage and promise a cure to make Harley cooperate. If fans choose the vigilante Joker route, you already saw a glimpse of Harley working with Waller. But I’d love to see this expand with other villains.
Waller using known criminals as tools in her agenda could catch Batman’s attention, causing you to go after them. Depending on what villains are in the Squad, it could also be used as a backdoor introduction to other DC Universe heroes. More on those later.
4) Scarecrow and/or Mad Hatter
Some of the best sequences in the Arkham games are the Scarecrow and Mad Hatter portions. Both villains love to use psychological and mental warfare against Batman, which is why I think one or both would be great additions to a third season.
Whether it’s a mind control device from Hatter, so you don’t know who you can trust and who’s under his control. Or a fear toxin trip where the player has to make choices while under the influence and when you come to realize what you have done. Either one of these would make for great storytelling and make the choices you make that much more crucial.
Telltale likes to add fresh twists and interpretations of established characters, so Jonathan Crane and Jervis Tetch could even be partners who either had a falling out and are at war or decided to work together.
We already know from Arkham Knight that the Scarecrow can be a great primary villain for a story, but with The Enemy Within’s climactic ending revolving around a chemical attack on the city, I’m not sure that would be the route to go with him, it would feel redundant. But there are other ways he can be effective. They could even borrow from the New Batman Adventures “Never Fear” where his toxin takes away a person’s fear.
Similar to the carnival/fun house setting at the end of The Enemy Within, Mad Hatter could draw you into Wonderland and you could fight through that to get to him.
There are lots of different ways they could go about it, but I’d love to see one or both of these psychological terrors show up in a third season.
3) Superman and/or Justice League
Ever since Batman’s first Telltale series, fans have said that Superman should be the next hero to get this treatment. A well written story can give fans the incredible power of the Man of Steel, but force him to make incredibly difficult decisions.
A train’s breaks broke down during rush hour, is on the verge of going off the tracks and into traffic, and hundreds of people will be hurt if you don’t do something. But, an armed robbery is in progress, people might die but there won’t be many casualties. Even with your great power, there’s only time for one. What do you do?
Telltale’s third Batman season could introduce us to the character of Superman in their DC Universe. It could be like The Batman/Superman Movie when the Joker travels to Metropolis with Kryptonite, Batman tracks him down and that’s when they meet for the first time. Or it could be like Batman v Superman where Batman witnesses Superman’s power first hand and finds a need to keep it in check.
With the storytelling and choice making strengths of Telltale, the player can decide how they want to act with Superman and what kind of alliance and/or friendship they want to forge. Are they truly friends or just allies with the same goals?
The same could be said about introducing other Justice League members. Maybe Episode One is Batman investigating something, similar to the New 52’s Justice League: Origin or the film Justice League. Through his investigation he meets the other League members, they learn together that it’s an invasion from Apokolips, they form an alliance and defeat Darkseid. Again, you as Batman can decide how you want to interact with these other superpowered heroes.
This can then spin off into a Superman, or other League member, solo season.
2) Ra’s al Ghul
The first two seasons stayed strictly in Gotham. We met some iconic heroes and villains and made some hard choices, but in the end we saved our city. Now, let’s save the world.
Ra’s al Ghul could easily be introduced as he was in the comics and Batman: The Animated Series, as someone who deducted who Batman is, watched and studied him, and now thinks he is worthy to be his heir to the League of Assassins.
At first he seems like an ally, but when you realize what his intentions are, to cleanse the Earth and start anew thus killing millions of people in the process. Telltale could have a lot of fun crafting dialogue choices and decisions that would lead to what you would do at the end.
Of course, the most fun they could have is with the Daughter of the Demon herself, Talia. Telltale did a great job in the first two seasons with your interactions with Selina Kyle/Catwoman. Depending where you ended up with her and/or how you want to move forward with Ra’s, this could lead to some great conflicts for your Bruce Wayne.
If you ended in a good relationship with Catwoman, maybe you just pretend to be interested in Talia, but Selina find out and leaves you. Maybe you genuinely love Talia back and try to get her to leave her father with you. Maybe your betrayal of her father causes her to hate you and want revenge like in The Dark Knight Rises.
Between the relationships with Ra’s and Talia, as well as traveling to different locations in the DC Universe since Ra’s is usually a more global villain, Telltale could have a lot of fun with it. And of course, bringing Talia into the mix means the door could be open for Damian Wayne down the road. Speaking of which…
1) Robin
Batman: The Telltale Series and Batman: The Enemy Within are both very clearly in the early years of Batman. It’s just you and Alfred with Lucius Fox helping with the gadgets. As your journey goes on, you create enemies along with new allies.
With the death of Lucius Fox in The Enemy Within, and his daughter Tiffany being just as, if not, more skilled than he was, the door was left open for you to bring her on as a sidekick. She even developed a “field suit” and everything. They leave the door open for her to be your “Robin.”
As great as this alliance is and potentially will be going forward, I think we really need to be introduced to Dick Grayson next. There is so much potential for where they can take your dialogue choices and decisions with him. How comforting are you to him after his parents die? Do you show emotion or make him “man up?” When do you, if ever, reveal your secret to him?
The Enemy Within ends with you making a choice. Do you give up Alfred to keep being Batman or do you give up Batman to keep Alfred? If you gave up Batman, the third season could open with Bruce and Alfred going to the circus together only to see the death of the Graysons. This would lead to you adopting Dick and possibly Alfred encourages you to bring Batman back to find the killer once he gets to know the young boy, realizing Batman is necessary to keep the city safe.
Or, if you kept Batman and let Alfred go, you go to the circus with Selina. The same events happen, you adopt the boy, but you don’t know how to be a father. So you call the only one you know who does and beg Alfred to come back and help raise the boy. This, of course, would lead to a lot of tension with you continuing to be Batman and wanting to train him, but Telltale is great at creating difficult decisions for you to make.
And then, of course, if you kept Tiffany has a partner, this would lead to great interactions with her. Maybe she wouldn’t feel welcome or that she’s being replaced. There’s a lot of great ways they could take that relationship, as well.
There you have it. Those are the 5 things I’d like to see Telltale take a third season of Batman. Was there anything you’d like to see that I missed? Let me know!