Batman: Unburied is an Audio Play styled podcast featuring Batman from David S. Goyer, released on Spotify.
In another life, Bruce Wayne (Winston Duke) is a forensic pathologist, working in the bowels of Gotham Hospital, and his parents are very much alive. And recently he's been tasked with examining the victims of The Harvester (Sam Witwer), a gruesome Serial Killer that has been preying on Gotham’s citizens.
After a terrifying encounter with the madman, Bruce is sent to Dr. Hunter (John Rhys-Davies), a psychologist, for evaluation but he has bigger problems. After their encounter, The Harvester has developed a dangerous interest in the doctor and begins a dangerous game that he intends for Bruce to play. If Bruce is stop the killer, he'll have to face his inner demons as tumbles down a strange rabbit hole...
Other vocal co-stars include Hasan Minhaj as the Riddler/Edward Nygma, Gina Rodriguez as Barbara Gordon, Jason Isaacs as Alfred Pennyworth, and Lance Reddick as Thomas Wayne.
A sequel, The Riddler: Secrets In The Dark was released in 2023, featuring The Riddler teaming up with Batman to find a Serial Killer of villains.
Welcome, to another page, of tropes and examples in Gotham City:
- Adaptational Job Change: Bruce is a doctor here, though unlike his father he is a forensic pathologist which apparently has caused strain on their relationship. Subverted as it's revealed that it's part of a hallucinate dream caused by Hugo Strange and Poison Ivy, and Bruce is still CEO of Wayne Industries. Played Straight with Barbara Gordon, who is a detective for the GCPD despite it being a common staple of her character that her father forbids her becoming a police officer. Further, her father has been forced out by this point in time and he never made it to the rank of Commissioner.
- Ambiguous Situation: Episode 3 reveals Barbara Gordon is investigating the mysterious death of Wayne Enterprises CEO Bruce Wayne instead of the Harvester case. This completely clashes with the events of the first episodes and implies something is off.
- Big Bad: A Canon Foreigner, the Harvester. Except it’s actually Hugo Strange. Except it's actually Poison Ivy.
- Bloodier and Gorier: Though you can't see any of it due to the nature of the medium, the sound design offers some gruesome sounds. This is especially prevalent during Bruce’s autopsy in Episode 1 and Flass’s cronies beating Eddie half to death.
- The Cameo: Barbara’s visit to Arkham sees cameos from the Mad Hatter, the Calendar Man, and King Tut.
- Canon Character All Along: Dr. Hunter is Hugo Strange, the Harvester is Cornelius Stirk, and Kell is Poison Ivy.
- Canon Foreigner: The Harvester, Kell, and Dr. Hunter are completely new characters made specifically for this podcast. Except not really. See Canon Character All Along above.
- Consulting a Convicted Killer: The blurb specifies that in the absence of Batman, Detective Barbara Gordon will consult Gothams’s second best detective, The Riddler.
- Criminal Mind Games: The Harvester becomes fixated on Bruce after stealing his dictaphone and learns the doctor would empathize with victims to the point of acting as if he is them. He seems to see him as a kindred spirit and breaks into Bruce's home to leave half of the organs he's taken from his victims with this thinking in mind.
- Darker and Edgier: Even for Batman, this is a dark story.
- Death by Adaptation: Hugo Strange is killed by Cornelius Stirk at the behest of his partner Poison Ivy. Ivy herself suffers this at the hands of Stirk after she has second thoughts on going through with her plan (she gets better) and Stirk in-turn is slain by Barbara.
- Dirty Cop: Flass takes a bizarre pride in being one and loathes Barbara for trying to stop his conduct to the point where he threatens her life.
- Doesn't Like Guns: Even when not Batman, Bruce still doesn't like guns to the point he's uncomfortable to hearing the phrase "shoot from the hip".
- Due to the Dead: Bruce, for some reason he can't explain, feels compelled to speak for the dead even though he's lived a life of leisure and never experienced tragedy. It what makes him such a dedicated worker though a little too dedicated that it worries his parents. After the Harvester sends Bruce half of the organs he’s stolen from the victims, Bruce puts them back into their bodies, noting that they deserve to be buried as whole as possible.
- Elseworld: Bruce Wayne is a forensic pathologist, both of his parents are alive and well, and Barbara Gordon is a police detective rather then Batgirl. The former is later subverted as it was all an illusion in Bruce's head created by Hugo Strange and Poison Ivy. That being said, the latter is true and this version of Gotham differs from the one in the comics in quite a few ways.
- Enemy Mine: Barbara teams up with the Riddler to find Bruce.
- For Want Of A Nail: Bruce's parents are alive and thus he never became Batman, pursuing medicine though he becomes a forensic pathologist meaning he's still a crime-fighter of sorts.
- A Glitch in the Matrix: Several times Bruce will have moments where he experiences this such as hearing the sounds of bats in Dr. Hunter's office or experiencing flashes of his parents' death when his mother's necklace breaks.
- Hell Is That Noise: When in Dr. Hunter's office for his first session, Bruce suddenly hears the sounds of bats...
- He's Back!: Bruce finally wakes up from his dream in episode 5 and dispatches the two goons left to kill him.Bruce: (after knocking the goons out) I'M BATMAN!!
- Hypno Pendulum: Not a pendulum but rather lights, Dr. Hunter uses flashes of light as part of his hypno therapy in his sessions with Bruce. The first time it's used on him, Bruce can hear for the briefest of moments the sound of bats.
- Lotus-Eater Machine: The world where Bruce is a pathologist is an artificially induced fantasy courtesy of Hugo Strange.
- Married to the Job: Bruce has done enough cases (over 300 according to his father) that it warrants a psych eval after being attacked by The Harvester.
- Morality Pet: Alex may be the only person whom Poison Ivy actually likes and Batman uses this as leverage to stay her hand when he informs her she'll be among the first of Gotham's residents to die.
- Mythology Gag:
- Thomas and Martha don't approve of Bruce's career choice due to it being emotionally exhausting, his father believing there are better (healthier) ways to help Gotham and his mother is worried he has no life outside of work.
- According to Bruce, when The Harvester broke into the morgue he was wearing a gas mask like one that could be brought from an army surplus store.
- Part of The Harvester's MO is to remove the amygdala from the previous victim and place into the head of the next; Amygdala is the name of a lesser known Batman villain.
- When asked if he sleeps well, Bruce says he's "kind of a night person."
- His new medical assistant is a woman named Kell which may be a referenced to Carrie Kelly one of the Robins.
- Barbara Gordon has joined the GCPD.
- No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Flass and his cronies beat Eddie within an inch of his life to intimidate Barbara.
- Poison Is Corrosive: Ivy's body chemistry is so virulent that a casual touch is deadly. She kills both her father and professor Jason Woodrue via toxic saliva, spitting in the face of the first and burning the other from the inside-out with her signature kiss. Her blood immediately corrodes Batman's armored glove on contact.
- Psychological Thriller: A very cerebral story.
- Race Lift:
- The Waynes are all portrayed by Black actors in this adaptation. Likewise, the typically Caucasian Barbara Gordon and Riddler are played by Gina Rodriguez and Hasan Minhaj, who are of Puerta Rican and Indian descent respectively.
- Riddler’s spin-off explicitly states that, like his voice actor Minhaj, this Riddler is in-universe a brown-skinned Muslim man.
- R-Rated Opening: The podcast's first episode begins with Bruce having to perform an autopsy and while the medium means there's no visuals, the audience is treated to the wonderful sounds of him handling the organs.
- Serial Killer: Gotham is under siege by one called The Harvester, due to his ritual of removing one of his victims' organs.
- Spared by the Adaptation: Thomas and Martha Wayne appear alive and well, though Bruce has apparently repressed memories of their death. Those recollections turn out to be true.
- There Are No Therapists: Averted, Thomas mandates Bruce get a psych eval before returning to work.
- The Watson: Kell, Bruce's new medical assistant.
- Wham Episode: The fifth episode reveals Bruce’s time as a pathologist is an illusion created by Hugo Strange.
- Wham Line: After being attacked, Bruce is in the hospital when two people enter the room who introduce themselves as his parents and he's not at all surprised to see them.
- Two in quick succession in the second episode: After he passes out from being overwhelmed by the sounds of bats, Bruce can hear his mother speaking to him saying he needs to "wake up." Immediately after the episode ends with a news report announcing that Bruce has died in a plane crash...what's more he's described as the CEO of Wayne Enterprises (not a forensic pathologist) and how the city must take up mourning him since both of his parents are dead.
- The Riddler fires off two at the end of episode 3: he knows Bruce’s death was faked and that Bruce is Batman.
- We get a real doozy at the end of episode 7. Batman is listening to a recording of Hugo Strange interviewing a mysterious female patient with Kell's voice. Then he asks her about a nickname the other kids gave her in school: "They called me Poison Ivy."
- Workaholic: Bruce having already worked over 300 cases or so in the past year when state law limits him to 250. Worse, Forensic Pathology is well-known for being emotionally exhausting and cause social issues.
