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What's your favourite Batmobile? If you answered the Tumbler, the thick, bulky and brutally functional supercar/tank hybrid from Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy, then I'm afraid you're just plain wrong. The Tumbler had a place within Nolan's universe, with its thudding logic dictated by the inevitable and rather joyless collision of immovable objects, but looking back through the history of Batman's garage it's an unsightly addition - a tool fit for a soldier rather than a vigilante, a guardian, a silent predator. Can it ever really compare to the impossible sleekness of the Batmobile that starred in Tim Burton's Batman films, its swooping art deco lines a vision of lethal beauty, while its central turbine recalled the pioneering years of aviation? Or even the 60s futurism of the vehicle Adam West drove, those iconic sculpted panels managing to look somehow less fantastical than the Lincoln Futura concept car the design was built upon.
So poor Rocksteady's already off on the wrong foot with the foundation of Arkham Knight's Batmobile, a thundering mass of military might that takes its inspiration from the weaponised wedge-like design of the Tumbler, before blunting the nose somewhat so that the whole thing looks like a giant Flymo. It's strange, really, given how the studio's Arkham series has always struck an enviable balance, revelling in the excess of Batman while keeping the solemn, straight face at the character's core -and crafting a more satisfying spin on Bob Kane and Bill Finger's creation than Nolan's film universe in the process.
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