B. Lorenzo Buckinchere
May 25, 2025
It’s the end of the month and time once again for our monthly review series. Our muse for the month of May is Edward Nygma, alias, The Riddler. Particularly in his first appearance on Batman The Animated Series, during an episode titled, “If you’re so smart, why aren’t you rich?” But first, here’s a disclaimer: The following review contains spoilers so I recommend watching the episode first before reading this or any other reviews on the topic. Now without further ado, let’s begin.
Overview:
Batman The Animated Series is an American television series that premiered on Fox in 1992. The series was created by Bruce Timm and Paul Dini as a 90’s revival of Bob Kane’s 1938 creation for Detective Comics, and originally consisted of 85 episodes across two seasons, the largest episode count for a single season of any children’s show at the time.
“If you’re so smart, why aren’t you rich,” was the forty-first episode of the series. It originally aired during the show’s first season on November 18, 1992. Written by David Wise, Directed by Eric Radomski, and starred Kevin Conroy, John Glover and Gary Frank. It was also The Riddler’s debut episode.
The Premise:
Edward Nygma (John Glover) is an employee of “Competitron,” a toy manufacturer. The episode opens with Nygma arriving at work one cloudy morning just in time as the janitor was tossing his name tag in the trash. Nygma asked the janitor what he was doing and that was when his employer Daniel Mockridge (Gary Frank) who was standing there all along informed him that he was fired.
Nygma protested that Mockridge cannot do without him because he is the smartest game designer in the company. Mockridge replied that he can indeed fire Ngyma because the latter is suing him for royalty. As an employee of Competitron, Nygma previously designed a video game titled, “Riddle of the Minotaur,” and is now suing the company for royalty. Furthermore, Mockridge lives up to his name by mocking Nygma in the form of a rhetorical question, the titular question of the episode.
After some time had passed, Mockridge tried pitching Nygma’s work to Bruce Wayne (Kevin Conroy) and Luscious Fox (Brock Peters) who were initially hesitant. At some point during the meeting, Mockridge looked outside the window of the conference room and noticed an ominous riddle in neon light. The riddle read, “Why do multimillion dollar deals break down in the wasteland?”
Later that evening inside the Batcave, Bruce dons his Batman alter ego, and ponders on the meaning of the riddle as Robin (Loren Lester) ironically plays “Riddle of the Minotaur” on the bat computer.
“Holy irony Batman, it’s a good thing I’m already familiar with this game. I have a hunch we might be needing it soon.”
“Good thinking old chum, to the batmobile.”
Though they didn’t actually say any of that, I think it’s worth mentioning that their voices actually sounded a bit more cartoonish this time around, almost like they sounded in the classic “Superfriends,” cartoons from the 70’s, hinting at the fact that this episode is nowhere near as dark and brooding as other episodes.
Meanwhile over at Competitron, Mockridge walked into his office and found Nygma sitting in his swivel chair in the dark, donning his Riddler alter ego for the first time. No doubt the end result of trauma, and a need to get even. Mockridge humored Nygma, perhaps feeling a bit cocky that he might be able to get Nygma to create more games for Competitron, but Nygma had other plans.
He redesigned the Chinese finger puzzle in the form of some gold rings that look eerily similar to the symbol on the Olympic flag. He tossed the gold rings at Mockridge who was none the wiser and who tried solving it, only to unwittingly cuff himself with it, just as two of Nygma’s henchmen pounced on him.
Batman and Robin crashed the party just in time, and got into a fight with Nygma’s goons who managed to escape with Mockridge as their hostage. Sometime later that night as Batman and Robin were driving across the Gotham bridge, they noticed that the lights were flashing all across the city.
Batman, quickly realizing it to be morse code, translated the message, and it turned out to be another of Nygma’s riddles that read, “When is the Minataur’s owner as high as an elephant’s maize?” They quickly realized that maize is a wordplay for maze, and took off for the amusement park where they had to navigate a life-sized replica of Nygma’s video game in order to find Mockridge.
Robin used his experience from playing the Minotaur game to help navigate the maze, and after solving several puzzles and riding on a cool mechanical flying hand (unique to the DCAU), they eventually got to Mockridge and answered one final riddle in time to save him from being sliced in two by an animatronic, sword-wielding minotaur. It turned out that Nygma lured them to the maze intentionally to buy himself enough time to flee the city.
Wayne enterprise eventually bought Riddle of the Minotaur from Competitron, and Dick lamented during the aftermath that it’s such a pity they had to sell to a creep like Mockridge. But that was when Bruce interjected that “Mockridge may have his money, but he won’t be sleeping well.”
We then cut to a scene where we see Mockridge carefully bolting his door at night and looking under his bed, trembling with a shotgun before reluctantly climbing into bed and cowering under the covers. Bruce ended the episode by asking the question, “How much is a good night’s sleep worth? Now there’s a riddle for ya.”
Personal Takeaway:
This cautionary tale serves as a reminder of a clause that could be included in your employment contract depending on the nature of your job. A clause stating that your employer owns the patent to anything you invent for the company while employed to that particular company. Most companies have ensured to include this clause within their employment contracts. The same is true with music, animation and especially writing.
When I first got back to writing, and shortly before I created my blog site on WordPress, I tried freelancing for another blog site. Though I am avidly against using AI to write because I think it takes the soul out of writing, I nonetheless used Chat GPT to offer suggestions on what topics to cover. I did so for no other reason than to save my best ideas for my own upcoming blog.
So I gave them mediocre ideas while saving the topics near and dear to my heart for myself, because I knew that if I wasn’t smart about it, I would never own my ideas outright, I’d only get paid for them. Sure enough I paid the price for my betrayal in the short term because they never accepted any of my submissions, but to me it was worth it because I was rewarded for remaining disciplined in the long run.
The point that I am making by sharing that example is that if you have a bright idea that could potentially make you millions in the future, don’t share it with an employer, create it for your own profit and ownership. You’d be well within your rights to do so. It is your intellectual property after all, and make sure you patent it before pitching it to anyone.
Another thing to add is to always rent the rights to your intellectual property versus selling it off. Never sell to any individual or corporation because if you no longer own the rights to your work you are forfeiting your rights to future royalties.
Although The Riddler was the monster of the week in this story, he is really more of a tragic anti-hero who sold out his ideas for a quick buck. Edward Nygma was born but The Riddler was made, and the person who made him is the real villain of the picture.
Nygma wasn’t Mockridge’s only victim, he was just the one who took action, albeit misguided. Think of how many more families were plunged into undue poverty all due to Mockridge’s greed and betrayal. At least we know Nygma’s name. Think of all the other Gothamites whose names we will never know.
In the end, Edward Nygma got the poetic justice he so richly deserves, and I don’t think he stuck around long enough to witness the full extent of the damage that Mockridge was dealt at his hands.
Bruce Wayne’s question at the end pertaining to the value of a good night’s sleep was essential in weighing the pros and cons of guilt versus reward. The final scene that saw Mockridge bolting his door at night was the most brooding part of the episode. It came straight from out of a horror film right down to the music score.
Trivia:
It was mentioned in the episode that Nygma’s first initial along with his surname (E. Nygma), are a wordplay for enigma, meaning a man of mystery and intrigue.
This was a carefully devised strategy that Nygma used to trap Mockridge who otherwise wouldn’t have trusted him. Mockridge made the mistake of thinking he knew Nygma well enough and just assumed he was some harmless schmuck he could easily get over on.
Conclusion:
“If you’re so smart, why aren’t you rich” was generally well received by fans of the show and went down in history as one of the most memorable episodes of the entire series. I give this cautionary tale of greed, guilt and doubt in one’s own potential a five out of five good night’s sleep, and I’ll see you on the next one.
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