The Batman Characters: Commissioner Pete Savage

Last Updated on July 20, 2022 by Lil Ginge

Commissioner Peter or “Pete” Savage, the Commissioner of the Gotham City police, is a character in the new film The Batman. He’s also a corrupt cop, and part of the larger wave of corruption that is rampant among Gotham City’s elite class at the start of the film. 

Who Is Gotham City Police Commissioner Pete Savage?

In The Batman, Commissioner Pete Savage is part of the conspiracy involving many politicians and police officers to arrest gangster Salvatore Maroni and hand Gotham’s lucrative drug trade over to rival gangster Carmine Falcone. In exchange, the corrupt elite class, including people like Mayor Don Mitchell Jr. and Gotham District Attorney Gil Colson would exchange many lucrative favors and kickbacks from the gangster who ran the city. Pete Savage is played by actor Alex Ferns.

The character of Commissioner Savage was specifically created by the writer/director of the film Matt Reeves (Cloverfield, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes) for the movie. Savage has never been a part of the Batman comic book universe. Interestingly, however, the name “Pete Savage” was used in the Batman television show from the mid-1960s for a character kidnapped by the Batman villain Egghead. He was one of the founding millionaires of Gotham City, along with playboy Bruce Wayne, and played on the series by actor Albert Carrier.

In traditional Batman lore, the character Sergeant James Gordon (played in The Batman by Jeffrey Wright) is destined to become Gotham City’s heroic police commissioner and a lifetime Batman ally. He is often portrayed as being preceded by a corrupt police commissioner named Loeb, a character who has featured in Batman comic books such as Year One and films like both Christopher Nolan’s Batman Begins and The Dark Knight.

Who Is Actor Alex Ferns?

Alex Ferns is a Scottish-born actor most well-known for his portrayal of Trevor Morgan in the British soap opera EastEnders for which he won the British Soap Award for Best Newcomer. The character has been described as “Britain’s most hated soap villain.” He played the role between 2000 and 2002.

In 2005, Ferns appeared as a character named Lieutenant Gordon in the film Joyeux Noël – no relation to Lieutenant James Gordon of the Gotham City police force. The film is a war drama based on the World War I Christmas Truce. It was nominated for an Oscar for Best Foreign Language Film at the 78th Academy Awards.

Ferns also played the role of Andrei Glykhov on the HBO miniseries Chernobyl and won a BAFTA Scotland Award for his performance. In the show, he portrayed the role of a leader of a group of coal minors called on to help deal with the tragic nuclear happenings at Chernobyl.

Ferns, born in Lennoxtown, Scotland, lived in South Africa for 17 years. He studied drama at the University of Capetown there, and then returned to the United Kingdom in 1991. He currently lives in London with his wife and their two songs.

Rumors Involving Commissioner Savage

Some had speculated from the mention of a character named Savage in The Batman trailer that Vandal Savage, a classic DC Comics supervillain, was going to be a player in this movie. Of course, such a rumor was ridiculous and probably just clickbait. Reeves had made it very clear that this Batman universe was not going to involve the lore of other superheroes from the wider DC Comics landscape.

Commissioner Pete Savage SPOILERS

Commissioner Savage makes a couple of important appearances in The Batman. When The Batman arrives to help Commissioner Gordon investigate the scene of Mayor Mitchell’s murder by The Riddler, Savage is angered by the presence of The Batman. He yells at Gordon for allowing the masked vigilante on the scene and forces Gordon to get rid of the dark knight.

Unfortunately for Savage, he is not long for this film. He soon becomes The Riddler’s second victim and is killed when the Riddler cages his head in with a bunch of hungry rats. The Riddler kills Savage because he is part of the ring of police and political corruption enveloping the city, especially regarding the Thomas Wayne Renewal Fund.

More on The Batman

The Batman, directed by Matt Reeves and starring Robert Pattinson as Bruce Wayne/Batman, was released on March 4th and has so far earned nearly $600 million in worldwide box office. The film also stars Paul Dano as The Riddler, Colin Farrell as Oz “Penguin” Cobblepot, Zoë as Seline Kyle, and Andy Serkis as Alfred Pennyworth.

The Batman was produced by production companies 6th and Idaho Productions, owned by Matt Reeves, and DC Films, the company behind all of DC Comics’ current slate of superhero movies. The film, which reportedly had a production budget of around $100 million, is an original story by Reeves but inspired by a number of different Batman comic books.

If you enjoyed this article on The Batman character Commissioner Pete Savage, check out my recent article on Gotham District Attorney Gil Colson as well.