Now, if you have already watched the movie, you are welcome to continue reading this story. For those who have not watched the film yet, however, we suggest you click away from this right now as this contains major spoilers from the movie.
The Batman Easter Egg Riddle: Details
If you watched The Batman in the theaters following its release, I’m sure you’d know about the “el rata alada” reference, which was decoded by Batman’s trusted butler Alfred from a cipher left by the Riddler in the movie. While Batman could not understand the riddle at first, he later discovered, thanks to Oswald “Penguin” Cobblepot, that it was a hint for a URL.
So, for the real-world easter egg, the makers created an actual “rata alada” website to hide a new riddle for Batman fans across the world. It is similar to the real-world PiedPiper website from the fictional web series Silicon Valley.
What is rataalada.com?
Now, rataalada.com is a special website that has been designed to reflect the Riddler’s theme from the movies. It gives you a cipher that you can decode using Riddler’s keys, which are customized alphabets to decode the cipher. You can access rataalada.com by simply typing the website address in your browser’s URL bar or by clicking right here.
Upon visiting the website, you are greeted with the signature green question-mark logo of the Riddler, blinking on your screen. After a few seconds, the website automatically starts generating some random codes and numbers relating to Batman’s comic editions (we will come back to this later).
After the completion of the first process, you see a new screen (screenshot above), with a “Click for Reward” button and a loading sign stuck at a certain percentage. Upon clicking the given button, you see a new image (attached below) open up in another tab of your browser. This is the riddle that you need to decode.
How to Decode the Cipher?
Now, if you are a hardcore Batman fan, I’m sure you are dying to decode the riddle and read the hidden message. However, before you can do anything, you need the keys that the Riddler followed to turn his message into a cipher.
Fortunately for us, Twitter user garbage central has provided an accurate translation of Riddler’s keys to help decode the message. You can check out the image from the Twitterati below. #thebatman #rataalada after the latest (and possibly last) update, i think we’re only missing one letter? which works if he’s operating on the standard of I/J having the same symbol, like in a lot of ciphers, but it’s also gonna bother me forever if we never get a J pic.twitter.com/80anoF12M7— garbage central (@airshipshitty) March 3, 2022
So, using this key, you can easily decode the message in the above image that can be found on the website. And if you are too lazy to do so, read along to know what the message says.
What Does the Riddler’s Easter Egg Message Say?
Upon decoding the cipher using the above keys, there is a message that clearly hints at a sequel of the recently-released film. The decoded message follows the Riddler’s perspective and says: “You think I’m finished. But perhaps, you don’t know the full truth. Every ending is a new beginning. Something is coming.”
If this is not a hint for the next iteration of The Batman, I don’t know what is. Moreover, towards the end of the movie, we saw the Riddler residing in an Arkham Asylum cell that is just beside the prison cell of the…wait for it…Joker! So yeah, we can expect Matt Reeves to come up with a sequel for The Batman, featuring the Riddler-Joker pair as the antagonist.
Furthermore, remember the random Batman codes and numbers that were generated on the rataalada website? Well, if you take a closer look at the numbers beside each of the code lines, you will notice that those are the numbers of some specific Batman comic book issues, featuring the Batman, Joker, the Riddler, Catwoman, the Penguin, and others.
So, what do you think about this comprehensive real-world easter egg from The Batman? Were you able to decode the cipher by yourself? Let us know in the comments below.
