With the release of “The Batman” starring Robert Pattinson as the titular character, moviegoers have now seen four Batmen over the past 30 years. “Spiderman: No Way Home” sees the three live action actors for Spiderman from the past 20 years come together. With so many actors sharing claims to the same character, people have begun to question how these reboots may affect the integrity of the character.

With each new actor and director comes a different idea as to how the character should be.

“There are a lot of different takes on it. If you watch Christian Bale’s Batman, that’s very different from Michael Keaton’s Batman and that’s very different from Ben Affleck’s and Robert Pattinson’s Batman,” said Jacob Carlson, English teacher. “All of these versions are a little different while still being true to the character.”

These different interpretations make it so everyone can find a character that they connect to the most.

“People that consider the first trilogy as their favorite Spider Man see him as a different person than the people who like the second two movies, versus the third trilogy,” said John Otto, senior. 

“I think the variety in a character like [Batman] just allows people to find something that reaches them or touches them in the story,” said Carlson

With so many reboots over such a short period of time, some feel that there will come a point where everything will be too much.

“With the comics there’ve been thousands of different Spider Man stories. But that is always taken through the lens of ‘well this is cool,’” said Otto. “But if we’re talking about actors and actual movies, yeah, that would just get so confusing. And it already is confusing.” 

There have been enough interpretations to warrant directors purposely leaving famous story lines, due to them not providing anything new.

“When Marvel introduced Tom Holland as Spider Man in “Captain America: Civil War”, they purposely avoided Uncle Ben and with great power comes great responsibility. And I think that decision was driven by them knowing that Spider Man is really popular and that people have probably seen at least one movie before,” said Carlson. “Matt Reeves has said the same thing about his Batman. He said, ‘We don’t need to see Martha and Thomas die in the alley. We don’t need to see the pearls again, as shown in every film.’”

A lot can be said for the popularity of these different iterations. The fact that every version of these characters are popular in some way drives more versions to be created.

“It depends on how popular those iterations become,” said Otto. “If they continue to be popular then I see no reason why they can’t be shown.”

When Pattinson’s role as Bruce Wayne was announced, many people were skeptical about how the writers would keep the movie fresh after 30 years of the same story. With positive reviews coming in from both critics and audiences, it can be said that the writers were able to write an effective script.

“Part of me wonders, how many of those decisions are being made by hearing discourse online, on Twitter, or YouTube?” said Carlson.

When it comes down to it, as time goes on, it is nearly certain that more iterations will be created as more people find love in these popular characters.