Commissioner Gordon: Who Plays Jim Gordon in Every Batman Film

Commissioner Gordon is James Gordon, the Gotham City Police Department officer who is willing to work with Batman while much of the force looks the other way. Credits list him as Commissioner Gordon, Gordon, Jim Gordon and, in 2022, Lt. James Gordon, because his rank changes from film to film. Think of him as the one colleague at a very crooked office who actually answers the phone.

Six performers play or voice the role across the films below, and each era treats him a little differently. Here is who has him and where.

The Lego Batman Movie (2017), directed by Chris McKay, also features a Commissioner Gordon, who is retiring at the start of the story and hands the job to Barbara Gordon.

How tall is Gordon, and how old is he? No studio has published an official height or age for the character, and the films never state either.

Gordon's arc runs from background ally to the moral anchor of Gotham, and it is clearest in the three Christopher Nolan films. In the Burton and Schumacher era, which starts with Batman (1989), directed by Tim Burton, he is mostly a public face. At the end of that film Commissioner Gordon announces the arrests of the Joker's men and unveils a new Bat-Signal, so the film closes on the symbol of the partnership. Pat Hingle then plays him through batman returns, batman forever and batman and robin, where he stays in the supporting cast.

In batman begins, directed by Christopher Nolan, Gary Oldman's Jim Gordon is a lieutenant, and the film gives him a real job to do. He destroys the monorail track with the Tumbler so the train carrying the microwave emitter crashes, which stops Ra's al Ghul's plan to spread a fear toxin through Gotham's water. At the close, Gordon shows Batman the Bat-Signal and mentions a new criminal who leaves a Joker playing card at his crimes.

In the dark knight, Gordon is promoted to commissioner after he and Batman capture the Joker. The same film puts his family in danger: Harvey Dent takes them hostage and falls to his death while Batman saves Gordon's son. Batman then persuades Gordon to hide the truth, takes the blame for Dent's crimes so the city can keep believing in him, and Gordon goes along with it. the dark knight rises opens eight years later with Gordon privately carrying the secret as Gotham celebrates Dent's memory.

The Batman (2022), directed by Matt Reeves, resets him as Lt. James Gordon, played by Jeffrey Wright. Batman has been fighting crime for two years and helps Gordon investigate the Riddler's murder of the mayor. In the batman 2022 Gordon arrests Carmine Falcone before the Riddler shoots Falcone and the flooding begins, and the film closes with Batman choosing hope over vengeance. Fans following the sequel can track it on the batman part 2.

Gordon's defining relationship is with Batman, and almost every other tie in the films is measured against it. The Bat-Signal is the physical link between them: it appears in Batman (1989), closes Batman Returns, and is the object Gordon shows Batman at the end of Batman Begins. His connection to Bruce Wayne is indirect, since the films keep the two identities apart, and that gap is the point of his role as the cop who works with the mask without needing the name. See bruce wayne for the other half of that partnership.

His professional circle changes by era. In Batman: Mask of the Phantasm he works in the same police world as Detective Bullock, voiced by Robert Costanzo, while the police and press blame Batman for the Phantasm killings. In The Dark Knight he is the third corner of the alliance with Batman and Harvey Dent, and the plan to break the crime families depends on all three. two face is where that alliance turns tragic. In The Batman (2022) he works with a Batman who has been fighting crime for two years, against a city where officials are paid by the crime boss Carmine Falcone.

His family is the other thread. In The Dark Knight, Dent holds it hostage. In The Lego Batman Movie, Barbara Gordon takes over as commissioner and wants Gotham to work with Batman as a partner, then becomes Batgirl. In Batman & Robin, the Barbara who becomes Batgirl is Alfred's niece. The plots of these films do not name a wife for Gordon.

Villains such as the joker and the riddler shape his workload more than his home life, and the wider Gotham cast is on batman characters.

In the theatrical films, Gordon is never shown dying, and he never becomes Batman. He announces the Joker's men arrested in Batman (1989), survives the hostage crisis in The Dark Knight, and arrests Falcone in The Batman (2022). The idea that Gordon takes up the cowl comes from other Batman stories, not these films.

Why is Gordon no longer commissioner? The answer depends on the film. In The Lego Batman Movie he retires at a gala, and Barbara Gordon takes over. In The Batman (2022) he is a lieutenant from the start, and the Riddler kills the police commissioner later in the film. In The Dark Knight he is promoted to commissioner after the Joker is captured, and he keeps the job while helping hide the truth about Dent. The Dark Knight Rises still credits him as Commissioner Gordon, and eight years on he privately carries the secret of Dent's crimes as Gotham celebrates Dent's memory.

So, the films never close his story. Each new actor starts him again from a different point.

My pick for the best Commissioner Gordon moment is the end of The Dark Knight, because it is the one time the film asks Gordon to carry a lie that costs him something. He knows Batman did not do what the city thinks, and he goes along with the cover story anyway. In my opinion, that is where the character stops being a helper and becomes a partner.

Second, I would choose the Tumbler beat in Batman Begins. It is a practical set piece, and it gives Oldman's Gordon a job only he can do instead of a speech. Third is the Bat-Signal reveal in Batman (1989), a brief public scene where Pat Hingle's Commissioner Gordon makes the partnership official in front of Gotham, a good fit for a film that wants Batman to feel like a myth.

The weakest use, perhaps, is the Schumacher films, where Hingle is billed but sits at the edge of the story. That reads to me as a script problem, not an acting one, and Hingle's four films are still the longest run any actor has had with the role. If you want to see how Wright's version compares, start with the batman 2022 and then read batman actors in order. For the full list of films, use batman movies in order.