The Batman's Co-Writer Fixed A Problem He Had With The Dark Knight For 20 Years

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Superheroes like Batman originate in comic books, where the only limits on their costumes are what the artist can imagine. A comic's pencillers, inkers, and colorists control everything, from the costume's contours to the way the lighting of a panel brings out its colors — and all they need is pens and paper. 

Costume designers in superhero movies have the same task but deal with hurdles artists never do. "Batman" comics always depict the hero with white eyelids on his mask, while the movies leave Batman's eyes exposed so the actor can properly emote in the mask. You've also got to account for comfort, which means making the Batman mask's eyeholes big enough that some skin around the eyeholes is exposed. When Adam West played Batman, there was no attempt to hide that. In 1989's "Batman," though, Michael Keaton wore black eye makeup to create a purer black look. 

Bat-guyliner continued with later Batman actors from Christian Bale to Ben Affleck. But the makeup is meant to be non-diegetic. When Bruce Wayne would take off his cowl, the makeup disappeared... until 2022's "The Batman," in which Robert Pattinson's Batman is literally, in the world of the film, wearing black eye makeup under his cowl.

In a recent tweet, "The Batman" co-writer Mattson Tomlin confirmed this detail was his idea, one that director and co-writer Matt Reeves approved of. Giving Batman eye makeup was an idea Tomlin had been sitting on for years, inspired by his personal nitpick about previous "Batman" movies:

"When I was young I noticed that when Batman takes off his mask the eye makeup is gone and it broke the spell for me. I'd had an image in my head for 20 years of how crazy he would look with the makeup and when I pitched it to Matt he loved it."

Reeves' model for crafting his Bruce Wayne was Kurt Cobain (hence "The Batman" needle-dropping Nirvana's "Something in the Way"), and giving Batman eye makeup definitely makes him look like a grunge rock star. Speaking to Polygon, "The Batman" makeup designer Naomi Donne said the makeup on Pattinson's face was a mix of black pigment, pencil graphite, liquid paint, and eyeliner — a concoction designed to both stay on and look good. "We used this lightly sparkly pigment to give [the makeup] a bit of light, so that it reflected lights in the same way his Batsuit would've," explained Donne. 

Seeing the black makeup under the Bat-cowl is a great detail, especially for this interpretation of Batman.

Just how much of a weirdo is Batman? Yes, "a guy who dresses up like a bat clearly has issues," and Batman is often depicted as walking the line of sanity and insanity. In Frank Miller's "The Dark Knight Returns," Batman is depicted like a specter haunting the retired Bruce Wayne, and the book doesn't hold back in suggesting Batman might be as crazy as the bad guys he fights.

But conversely, Batman also has an unbreakable calm. He rarely loses control of a situation or himself because he's a guy who has a plan or gadget for every possible outcome. Yet his determination and strategizing are so all-consuming they can seem like part of his craziness.

Pattinson's Batman leans much further on the crazy side (he journals like Travis Bickle) and is more of an amateur crimefighter. The visible makeup adds to that. When Bruce takes off his cowl in "The Batman," he looks disheveled; the greasy black paint around his eyes complements the helmet hair. It also lifts the hood up on Batman's theatrics, underlining the practicalities of what he has to do to achieve his appearance as the Dark Knight. It doubles as character-building for Bruce's obsessiveness too; when he's first seen suiting up as Batman, part of that is smearing his face with the makeup. Presumably, he then has to wash it off every morning, too. This routine grounds being Batman in the sort of repetitive tasks life is all about. 

The eyeliner is one small detail, but it reflects Reeves and Tomlin's innovative characterization of Batman as someone who genuinely feels human more than he does a perfect hero. That innovation is the main reason I'm excited to see their work continue in "The Batman Part II," currently scheduled for an October 1, 2027 theatrical release.