HBO archives, and also lifting some of the Caped Crusader’s words to re-pitch themselves as America’s great defenders.
In videos posted over the past two days on the White House and The Batman.
As you can see below, the trippy “The last best hope of man on Earth” video has a pretty close-up of Giamatti in his Emmy winning role as the USA’s second POTUS. If precedent is any guide, it is doubtful that Team Trump sought permission for the footage. To that, the White House would not provide clarification on the matter when contacted by Deadline.
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Proving that there’s nothing MAGA love like overkill, there’s also whole lot of George Washington (including a historically daft 2010 Dodge Challenger ad) in the almost hangover inducing 40-second spot. Along with POTUS #1, you won’t see much of anyone who isn’t white and its mostly men.
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There’s a ton of Trump (in some sci-fi settings) some Teddy Roosevelt, Thomas Edison, a bunch of violent Western Frontier conquest images, some NASA astronauts skipping on the moon, lots of Lincoln (the monument and the man himself), military hardware in action, one angry looking eagle, and at least two, maybe three shots of Homeland Security Secretary (and Kristi Noem. Oh yeah, cause it’s the Trump administration — Bigfoot makes a cameo too.
In the DHS post, Robert Pattinson’s vengeance-soaked dialogue from the Matt Reeves directed blockbuster is thrown over images of masked and packin’ Border Patrol agents storming the streets and arresting men at Home Depots. “Fear is a tool,” a voice that if it isn’t Pattinson, sure sounds a lot like him says in the DHS post, which was also put up on IG by the US Border Patrol and its main frontman Greg Bovino.
“They think I’m hiding in the shadows, but I am the shadows,” the voiceover says, just like in The Batman. The post ends with the camera-ready Commander Bovino, who recently got called out by a federal judge for lying over the CBP’s use of force methods, looking on into the night – with an implication he might be the one in the shadows the V/O is referring to.
Now the Dark Knight has always had some distinctly authoritarian tendencies baked into his tactics and mythology, as a Christopher Nolan movie or three made pretty clear. However, this DHS video truly doubles down on that element of Batman’s crime fighting – they even reappropriate the Bat Signal so they can use the narration from the movie.
In case, you still really aren’t getting The Batman 2022 connection, the video also features use of the Kurt Cobain-penned ‘Something in the Way’ from 1991’s game changing Nevermind album – a song used repeatedly in the Batman flick.
Warner Bros Discovery did not respond about the use of its copyrighted content by the Trump administration, when we reached out to them this weekend. Whether or not this is the David Zaslav run company wanting to avoid a MAGA dust-up during sensitive looks under the hood by potential buyers like Comcast, Netflix or David Ellison’s Paramount, the radio silence is bizarre.
Oddly, with the quiet over their IP being lifted from the for-sale WBD aside, the pitches may not be landing with the base as the White House and DHS hoped.
The “best hope” post has only garnered just over 22,600 likes over the past 48 hours.
That’s way down from the Fox Sports clip of Trump at today’s Washington Commanders vs. Detroit Lions game. Posted about an hour ago and already over 35,000 likes, the clip sees the ex-Apprentice host talking about swearing in some new members of the military during the NFL game’s halftime.
As for the DHS video, that’s got just over 2,400 likes as of Sunday afternoon. Low by any standard.
Trump really has a problem with the whole seeking consent thing, doesn’t he?
The degree to which John Adams would have hated Donald Trump can not be overstated – he literally stands for everything Adams was against.
Adams, who on principal was one of the only founding fathers who didnt own slaves, would have looked upon ICE raids which abject terror and horror about whats happened to the union.
He literally passed the alien and sedition act…
Well you know one thing about John Adams but not much else.
Hear! Hear!