8 Things The Batman Sequels Need To Succeed 

In the comics, the implications of Batman having child sidekicks are mostly very positive. He has gathered children who have similar traumatic pasts as him and gives them an outlet where that lingering trauma can do some good. Despite Batman being known as a loner, he is a patriarch of a family that loves and respects him.

In the realistic and nihilistic world of The Batman, having a child as a sidekick looks like indoctrination to vigilantism. It would look like Batman targets children in a time of their lives when they are most vulnerable and in need of a father figure and then raises them in a life full of near-deaths with no chance of a normal life. It wouldn’t be Batman and Robin, it would be Big Daddy and Hit-Girl. Every uncomfortable implication is going to hit this franchise like a brick.

So if the sequel insists on introducing a sidekick, the only stance the movie has for Batman having one is that he shouldn’t. It should be treated as a mistake by a man who thought that he is helping, only to realize he isn't. The story should be like when Jason Todd died or is driven to a path of being a villain. If a movie ends as if to glorify that Batman has a new partner and we should be happy about it, it would be a jarring tonal whiplash.