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Fridge / Batman: Arkham Asylum

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As a Moments subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.

Fridge examples in Batman: Arkham Asylum.


Fridge Brilliance
  • Detective Mode could easily have been named Knight Vision. In-universe though, Batman probably named this function, so the pun would've been out of character for him.
  • After talking to the people you meet during the Scenic-Tour Level, you learn that Killer Croc is pumped full of tranquilizers before he's moved. That means Croc was sedated when you go into his lair, explaining his performance as a boss.
  • During the intro, every time the Blackgate inmates or Joker start talking too much, Boles quickly shuts them up. Because he's taking a big enough risk throwing his lot in with Joker to begin with without their blabbing ruining it all.
  • Riddler's last interview tape reveals he knew about Joker's plan. That means that Riddler had partnered with Joker. What was Riddler's role in this venture? Why to slow Batman down with the Fetch Quest!
    • A follow-up to the above one is that Riddler gloated about his involvement to Dr. Young. In fact the last two Joker tapes reveal she figured out Joker funded her research, and Joker warned her that he was coming back. She never reported this to the police, Warden Sharp, or even Batman in the Medical building because she knew she'd either be arrested for working with a psycho (and experimenting on Bane has to break a few laws) or even committed to Arkham herself.
      • Plus, after the player defeats Harley Quinn, her last (easily escapable) trap is baited with a Riddler trophy.
  • Another Riddler one: At one point he'll accuse you of cheating and using the Internet. So if you used an internet guide to solve the Fetch Quest, the Riddler has beaten you, and he's actually gloating to the player about it.
    • Counter-Fridge Brilliance: Is it not in Batman's style to use every resource he has when he needs it to defeat his enemies, pragmatist that he is?
      • As he put it when he used not-so-straightforward methods to beat Prometheus in hand-to-hand combat: "Not cheating. Winning."
  • A truly wonderful piece of this is realized when if you go back to the transfer areas of Intensive Treatment, you will see posters bearing Quincy Sharp's image with the text "Quincy Sharp's Arkham." This is supposed to show possession, but that can also be taken to mean "Quincy Sharp IS Arkham." Which he turns out to be, in spirit anyway.
    • The posters that describe Sharp as the Voice Of Arkham fit with this as well.
  • After fighting skeletons in Scarecrow's nightmare world, you might realise that thanks to detective mode, you've seen just everybody you've fought so far as a skeleton.
    • The skeletons are also noticeably more aggressive than the regular enemies, but also go down much more quickly. Joker's thugs wouldn't be so frightened to engage a drugged, hallucinating Batman. And the reason they get KO'd so quickly? Batman is less concerned about avoiding lethal force when fighting skeletons, so he's not holding back.
      • However, this also means, since they fall apart and shatter, Batman may have accidentally killed them.
      • Not necessarily; the ones you can check after the toxin wears off are still breathing.
      • True. But still, the fact that Batman could so easily have killed them without even knowing what he was doing is Fridge Horror in and of itself. The near-lethal force he uses when under Scarecrow's influence proves just how much he does hold back against your average criminal... and just how utterly terrifying he would be if he didn't. ...Well. More terrifying than usual, anyway.
  • Why did Joker let Batman win so easily? This whole game was a charade to make Batman as insane as Joker!
    • Joker hints at this when he tries to poison Gordon and before the final fight.
    • It explains how the Batmobile got through the doors to take out Bane. He was probably expecting Bats to use it to get Gordon out, then Bane popped up and messed things up.
  • If you're bothered by the fact that sometimes Batman KOs enemies with a shot to the groin, think about this: there is a self-defense technique that involves striking the pelvis. The pelvis is a ring that, at the front, is held together by a cartilaginous joint. A strong blow to the pubic symphsis (the bony spot just above the male junk) can break that cartilage. This makes it painful simply to stand and almost impossible to walk. The Batman isn't just going for the obvious target we all know about; he's a master of combat and is, in fact, truly disabling the bad guys.
    • ...well, it's actually a pretty funny bug, completely unintentional on the creators' part.
  • The whole Killer Croc section. A lot of people complained it was very boring, but when you realize something it becomes a lot more scarier, or at least more interesting. The entire game, in the stealth sections, Batman has picked off mooks one by one by pouncing on them from the shadows, from up above the gargoyles where it's hard to get at him. The mook's only hope is to shoot at Batman until he's down, but that doesn't stop him for long before he pops back up like nothing happened. It's Batman's playing field, because there is a TON of ways to pop out and take those Mooks out. In Killer Croc's lair, there is nothing you can do but walk slowly down a linear, pre-determined path. Killer Croc can pounce on you using a large variety of tricks involving the playing field while you're helpless. Croc retreats back to the water after you hit him with a batarang, but will always come back up again. And you can't see him once he's back in the water, and can do nothing except hit him again when he tries the stunt again. The whole section puts you into the perspective of the average mook.
  • After seeing Scarecrow threaten to dump his fear toxin into the Arkham Reservoir to drug all of Gotham, I realized just why Batman was so nonchalant towards Crane, even walking up to him. He knew that Croc had his scent when they met at the start of the game, would rush up to attack him, and could knock him back with a Batarang to the collar. This does go right to Fridge Horror though, as it suggests Batman planned to let Croc possibly kill and eat Crane to stop him. He didn't bother to rescue or look for Crane.
    • "I won't kill you, but I don't have to save you." Also, in all fairness, Batman does try to save Crane... after it's clearly shown that the bag have been dropped. That might have been what he was going for all along, and if Crane ended up dead, well... Occupational hazard. Batman might not deliberately kill people, but if criminals meet an untimely, grisly death due to attempting to flood the home of a vicious monster with toxic chemicals, he's not going to get choked up about it. Besides, what was Batman going to do, dive into the water after Crane and Croc? If the player does dive/fall into the water at any point, Batman promptly becomes Croc's next meal.
    • Batman doesn't have to look for Crane. By the time the spores are collected and he's made it back to his Unspoken Plan Guarantee, he's wandered through every part of the sewer that Croc would have visited since Crane was dragged into the water. No sign of Crane. At least for now. Which begs the question of whether or not Croc dragged Crane back to his lair to play checkers and have tea until Batman found the first spore, since Croc doesn't try to kill Batman until about then.
      • Crocodiles in Real Life stash carcasses for later consumption. Possibly Crane played dead and Croc dumped him somewhere, then resumed hunting Batman.
    • Fridge Brilliance connected to this: by the logic above, Croc has been drawn to Crane believing he has Batman's scent. As soon as he realizes it's not Batman, he throws him away in disappointment (perhaps not logical, but Croc's been obsessed with getting Batman). Crane promptly scurries away thanking every single deity for his momentary good fortune. In fact, remember the door that connects Croc's lair to the old sewer, the one that's locked until you escape said lair? Scarecrow unlocked the door and ran away while you were looking for spores.
  • Why does Arkham Asylum oblige the Batman by having such big air ducts? Because Bruce Wayne is on the board of directors and is a major financial contributor to the asylum.
    • Though it helps that it's a very old building and their ventilation systems tend to be unnecessarily large by modern standards, sometimes even big enough to actually allow people to crawl through.
  • The Joker in this game combines features from every previous version of the character — which is hilariously appropriate for Joker, who is not a man with a past but more a force of nature with a mercurial past and many names, none of which are truly his.
  • The combat system is set up in such a way that the fights actually get easier when he is up against massive odds, as opposed to a small pack. Which is Fridge Brilliance since this is how things are in most incarnations of Batman. He'll spend just as much time with a horde of mooks as with one or two mooks (a few panels, a few scenes, whatever).
  • If Riddler can hack into Batman's communications system, why hasn't he done this before and figured out where/who Batman is, etc? Simply, Batman and Oracle allowed Riddler to hack in so they could find him after stalling him by finding his trophies and such.
    • Riddler has figured out Batman's identity before in at least one continuation, but he'll never tell anyone because it's Gotham's 'greatest riddle'.
  • Harley Quinn is defeated pretty easily. And then, while taunting Batman that he doesn't know the Joker's location, she accidentally lets slip where it is. Or is it accidental? Joker wants Batman to find him.
    • Considering how Joker loves to mess with his henchmen- even Harley, Harley genuinely did it by accident and Joker didn't care.
  • The stinger at the end of the credits shows one of three characters (Scarecrow, Killer Croc and Bane, randomly selected) reaching out of the water to grasp a floating crate of Titan serum. Each of the three characters was last seen falling into water: Crane gets attacked by Croc and dragged into the sewers, Croc is sent through a hole into a watery abyss, and Bane gets taken by the Batmobile into the Bay.
  • It was weird how Joker somehow captured Gordon a second time. However, Warden Sharp is not on the island once you get all the Arkham Chronicles, and Gordon took the only boat on the island. At some point, he called for a ride out(reaching Gordon's boat, which came back), got spotted by henchmen, and fled while Gordon was being captured.
    • There was that one armed guard on the police boat waiting for Gordon, whose helmet obscured their face, who said, 'Time to go, sir'. Armed mook? Harley? You decide...
  • Two things about the puppet Scarface:
    • One: Joker carved a smile on his face, Heath Ledger style. I was wondering why he would do this to the puppet, until I remembered the puppet's name. SCAR-FACE.
    • Two: One wonders where the Ventriloquist was during this whole ordeal, and why he wouldn't have Scarface with him. Then I remembered something in one of the Spirit Of Arkham Messages saying that Quincy Sharp beat a paranoid schizophrenic man to death. That WAS the Ventriloquist. This would explain how Warden Sharp HAD the puppet in his office in the first place.
      • Actually, in the Scenic-Tour Level of the game's start, Sharp says that Two-Face and Ventriloquist were out and supposedly reformed. But since Two-Face is reported to be robbing a bank at the end that might be true for the above about ventriloquist.
      • Of course, this assumes Sharp isn't lying.
  • You know how you can't go into Detective Mode during the Scarecrow sequences? Well when you think about it, Batman DOES. It's just the toxin has him hallucinate so what he's seeing IS UNDER THE MASK. Not that big but it's kinda cool.
  • Clayface's cameo. You never see him in his normal form, but when he's imitating others take a look at him with your Detective Vision. See something missing? Something that every other person in the game has, even the ones whose characters models are being reused right now?
  • A YouTube commenter pointed out that the first Scarecrow level is Batman's worst fear (Commissioner Gordon dying and being cut off from Oracle), the second Scarecrow level is Bruce Wayne's worst fear (the night his parents got murdered), and the final Scarecrow level is the PLAYER's worst nightmare (the screen freezes and you get a game over). Knock your respect for Rocksteady and Paul Dini up a few more notches.
    • Alternately, each Nightmare wave represents a deeper, more repressed fear of Batman. The first one is obvious- failing to save Gordon, his parents' death haunting him. The second one goes deeper, putting him/you back in that feeling of helplessness he had as a child, the very night his parents were murdered (add to that Joe Chill's monster voice). The third and final nightmare deals with Batman's deepest, most repressed fear- that he IS crazy.
      • Not just that he's crazy. But that The Joker was the sane one all along.
    • Also, each one deals with or represents death in some way. The first one has the death of Commissioner Gordon. The second one has the deaths of Bruce's parents. The third one has the death of your game.
      • This goes ever further for those playing the game on an early revision of the Xbox 360. These consoles are notorious for GPU problems after a few years of use, so the glitched screen can give the impression that not just the game has died, but rather the entire console.
  • The health meter we see in the Titan Joker fight isn't for Titan Joker, it's for the area of the floor he lands on. Since Titan Joker is invincible, the only thing related to him that can be given a meter is the floor. The meter only goes down after he falls and yanks himself out, damaging it until it can't take the third impact.
  • A more humorous example: When Batman talks to people, he has a tendency to move his head back and forth, side to side, or nod forward. This is a nod to George Clooney's "smile/head bob" acting.
  • A somewhat meta example. On this game's Headscratchers page, people wonder about Joker's 'marzipan and kitten' bombs, and others mention that it would be in-character of Joker to have 99 kitten bombs and one real one. And I realized something PROVES that, perhaps deliberately; think of the 'presents' Joker leaves at certain parts. Most of the time, they've got harmless (if annoying) chattering teeth...but some have a knife-wielding psycho.
  • If you think about it, The Joker is right: Batman IS as crazy as the inmates incarcerated in Arkham Asylum. How else could he be so well-prepared to battle the super-criminals of Gotham if he weren't just as crazy as them? And, on a certain level, Batman realizes this. His personal No Kill policy is so strict because he knows he's teetering on the edge. He also fights crime as hard as he does because he doesn't want anyone else to end up on that edge alongside him.
    • Except that, as the Riddler quite rightly explains in Batman: Arkham City, being crazy "would imply either mental illness or derangement". Batman might be obsessive, and obviously has spend quite a lot of time studying these mental illnesses, but his mind still follows logic, so he doesn't suffer from it. If he did, he'd be easy prey for Scarecrow's gas. His No Kill policy exists purely because he refuses to take from others what was taken from him.
  • The Stinger at the end of the game shows one of Batman's Rogues Gallery grabbing a crate of Titan. Bane on Titan? Meh. More of the same. But imagine what might happen if Croc gets the drug. Or Scarecrow.
  • All of the Titan-infected thugs Batman fights during this game have had their minds erased by the drug, so that all they can do is lash out blindly and roar like animals. Not so for the Joker. Why? he's already too damn crazy for anything to affect his mind any further.
    • That or, as noted on the Funny Moments page, acting like a murderous savage is what the Joker is like all the time. Okay, it's not that hard to believe, but it does put some perspective on it when you think about it.
  • This troper was bothered by the fact that even though Bane is meant to be highly intelligent, during his boss battle he blindly charges at you and speaks broken English. Then it hit me. All the other people put on Titan became feral savages whereas the highly intelligent Bane is only reduced to using improper syntax.
    • With the above's consideration it adds fuel to the Fridge Horror element as well since when one thinks back to Arkham Origins on the experimental Venom concoction that Bane discovered called "TN-1" actually induces the aforementioned users into deadly brutes. Bane's slight resilience to TITAN is a bit of an upgrade with less effect on his mind due to his extreme intelligence. A Moment of Awesome for him since he can actually control its power!
  • In the PS3-Exclusive Joker Character Pack, there are brand new game over screens with Aaron Cash and Batman. In them, Batman seems unusually hammy. Then I realized, Joker's off his goddamn rocker. How can we trust anything we experience from his point of view?
  • It was real stupid for the guards to handcuff Joker with his hands in front, right? Then realize who cuffed him: Frank Boles: That was his escape plan.
  • Regarding the New Powers as the Plot Demands / Strong as They Need to Be entries in the main page: the Sonic Batarangs are only useful if they attract one mook, which is only possible if said mook has a suicide collar that can resonate with the Batarang. The Sequencer needed the Warden's codes. As for everything else, unless he really needs it, they're extra weight that would slow him in a fight. In the case of the Explosive Gel, the Batmobile is in the open and trashed, so anyone could've broken the trunk and get it; he absolutely has to take it with him, otherwise some prisoner will start blowing things up for laughs.
  • Assault On Arkham gives a good justification for Batman's paranoia at the beginning of the game. Harley Quinn pulled a similar stunt to Joker's, which at the same time explains her position in the beginning as well.
  • A possibility. But random tips in the loading screen after you die, usually give a hint to pass that area. But if you die during the second Scarecrow sequence, the loading screen sometimes suggests going into Detective Mode... despite that you can't do so. One could easily just say that it is "obviously a random tip that means nothing" or... being a Scarecrow scenario, the game is trying to Mind Screw/mock you by giving you information that is useless, to hammer in that you're helpless to stop Scarecrow. After all, being completely helpless is one of Batman's worst fears.
  • A bit of Brilliance to be had about the final boss: why is Titan!Joker so easy to beat? Joker is used to using weapons or plans to fight his enemies; unlike the inmates or Bane who transform, the Joker is very unused to fighting hand to hand, especially with so much power that and his Ego, he doesn't so much fight as take easily dodgeable swipes and then goes to showboating for the news heli.
  • Joker’s choice of weapon in this universe may seem somewhat odd at first glance, a gigantic .44 magnum that would be a challenge even for someone who wasn’t basically skin and bones. One might reasonably doubt he could use it with any accuracy, but remember, he’s the Joker! For the Clown Prince of Crime, a weapon so hard for him to control that he could empty the cylinder at Batman and miss every shot while causing incredibly tragic collateral damage would likely be a positive, rather than a negative. Batman’s alive to keep the sick game going and he has to live with the fact Joker's stray shots meant for him might have killed innocent bystanders as well.
  • Zsasz goes missing after Batman rescues Dr. Young. At this point, Joker has the Titan formula and plans to ship the finished drug into Gotham, Batman: Arkham City confirming 12 containers. Joker had Zsasz sent away as a guard for the Titan shipment. That and Zsasz was rambling to Joker how Batman would "get him" if he didn't have Dr. Young as a hostage - that was when Joker realized Zsasz was useless on the island. It's only because Zsasz was still entertaining to him that Joker didn't dose him with Titan.
  • As the ending shows, Titan wears off pretty fast, likely lasting an hour. Joker sending containers out means he'd be able to "recharge" his monster army once he reached Gotham.
  • Joker's teeth aren't shown on the Riddler's secrets maps. The other collectibles are things the Riddler could logically have planted himself before Arkham Asylum descended into chaos, but the Joker's teeth are left by the Joker at various times during the current night while the plan is already on (new sets of teeth appear on various places when you progress the storyline). The teeth aren't on the maps because the Riddler completed those maps before the Joker started to put them on Arkham Island. The Spirit of Arkham tablets haven't been put there by the Riddler either, but they appear on the maps because the Riddler could plausibly find them while scouring the island to place his own collectibles.
  • In regards to the Early-Installment Weirdness on the main page, it actually makes sense in context. Batman being snarky and friendly to both Oracle, Gordon, and the Arkham staff? The game takes place between Origins, when he was just starting out and believing he needed to do things himself, and City, when things in Gotham were practically going to hell in a handbasket. By now Batman's had years to ingratiate himself into the city and enjoys a tight relationship with a police force almost completely cleansed of corruption. Sure Arkham and Blackgate are still a Cardboard Prison, but he's been able to beat down his rogue's gallery for years now. Can't blame him for getting a little cocky and comfortable. Expanding on that, Joker's takeover of Arkham and how dangerous the Titan formula proved to be has shaken him, leaving him backsliding by the time of City and especially going into Knight. As for the lack of starting gear compared to the other games? Consider what Batman was doing at the start of this game compared to the others. He was escorting Joker to Arkham personally to minimize issues after having foiled a hostage crisis. This was likely something Batman thought would be routine. That said, he did expect Joker might plan another breakout shortly after, he did note it was way too easy to catch Joker this time, so he made sure his best gear was either close at hand or easy to retrieve, and in the worst-case scenario he did have his secret auxiliary Batcave on the island.

Fridge Horror

  • Joker was trying to drive Batman insane. If he did they would most likely have an Ax-Crazy Batman loose on the island. Batman is already a One-Man Army in this game. Driven mad and hopped up on Titan, he would rip the mooks apart and hunt down Joker like nothing you've ever seen.
  • Maxie Zeus' cell is hidden behind a wall. The Ghost of Arkham's messages tell about his treatment of the insane. HE'S LEAVING ZEUS TO STARVE TO DEATH! Alternatively, consider that Maxie Zeus' cell is conveniently located right next to the electro-shock therapy treatment. Could it be that Warden Sharp or others decided to indulge Zeus' delusions with particularly extreme electro-shock therapy, and have tried to conceal any evidence that he was ever there for some nefarious reason? And the Riddler already knows exactly what they're doing to the unfortunate Maxie Zeus ("Even I was shocked when I saw how Maxie Zeus was treated").
  • A mix of horror and brilliance: Poison Ivy said the plants were in pain, only to later realize they were "evolving", actually mutating, due to the Titan. There's no indication Joker caused that plant to grow before using Titan on Ivy, he even says he was expecting a 40 foot killer plant to appear. This means that: Joker knew that plant was there somehow and used Titan on Ivy to activate it, even giving her a second dose to speed things up, and that the plant was already growing from Dr. Young's experiments, suggesting that even if Joker didn't do anything, at some point, the plant would've gone nuts.
  • How, you might ask, did Joker take over the Asylum if Frank Boles was the only free man he had inside? According to Bonus Content exclusive from www.arkhamcare.com, the Riddler helped him, that's how. By duping a person with arkhamcare login information (namely you), Riddler managed to take control of Arkham's entire computer network, thereby enabling Joker to turn the electronic security against the Asylum staff. Joker goes on with his mad scheme, Riddler walks out free and taunts Batman from an apartment back in Gotham proper, and Batman gets to suffer for your stupidity.
  • Going through some of the ducts in the asylum, you'll sometimes come across human skulls and filthy bones. They're clearly too old and decomposed to have been done by Joker's men, so how did they get there? Then you remember what Amadeus Arkham did to inmates.
  • When I realized this bit of Fridge Brilliance, I immediately thought, that someone had already covered it. But I haven't seen it mentioned in this section, maybe because it's too obvious. Anyway, lets break things down:
  • Dr. Young says that she created the Titan formula to make patients robust enough to endure more suitable therapies to cure them. What sort of "therapies" would require a patient to be that robust in order to endure them? Electroshock? Something worse?
    • Considering how one of the Arkham chronicles mentions that she shared Sharp's vision and we know Sharp's thoughts on what should be done with Arkham's inmates, it's probably safe to say we don't want to know.
  • Some of the mooks took the jackets of slain Arkham Security, to trap Batman and perhaps others. Even more than those suffering from Titan withdrawal, I would not want to be those mooks when the asylum was retaken. Staff tends to remember, and once Batman and Gordon leave...
  • The Asylum is falling apart. Yeah, Joker's people did a number on it, but there is a LOT of weak walls, broken tile, crumbling supports, blood, probably illegal operations outside of Titan stuff, a graveyard with open caskets, and so on. There is no way that building was up to code. Who knows how many of the doctors were certified. An environment like that does not endear itself to helping non supervillains improve. So WHY DID NO ONE DO ANYTHING? We KNOW the Wayne Foundation contributed money, it's a Riddler answer. And yeah Wayne Foundation money can't fix all of it. But no one from OHSA came in and ordered it shut down? It was never brought up to code? No one talks about demolishing it and building a new place with modern mental health standards and a building that is actually clean? Maybe the supervillains can't stay there, but the people of Gotham who need help don't have options. And, quite frankly, the supervillains didn't really either. If no one cared about the building, they cared about the patients even less.
  • The last two Titan goons you fight, just before the Titan Joker battle, are wearing (such as it is) security guard uniforms. Were those just normal goons who took trophies, or did Joker capture a pair of guards and turn them into monsters?
  • Given how the Titan transformation tears the user's flesh open at certain places, it's possible that if Zsasz was dosed, most if not all his scars would be ripped open and his flesh would've torn off.
  • The sheer amount of jabbering, violently insane lunatics in the Penitentiary actually makes a depressing amount of sense when you think about it. Chances are the majority didn't suffer from violent mental illnesses, but instead are survivors of Joker Venom or Scarecrow's Fear Toxin, victims of Mad Hatter or Hugo Strange's experiments, or even long time Arkham inmates who were tortured by the Warden. They're among the saddest victims of Gotham's various villains, their minds well and truly permanently broken by what they've been through.

Fridge Logic

  • In the psychopath cell room, you enter one cell. Written on the wall it says "Welcome to my humble abode" if you think about it, that has to be Mr. Zsasz's cell as he's the only complete psychopath in the game who tries to sound refined and eloquent (At least in his interviews)

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