Spencer Pratt wants to be mayor. His fans want him to be Batman.

When former reality TV star Spencer Pratt recently reposted a video about X, it went viral so quickly that it seemed few people stopped to really think about what exactly they were watching. Jeb Bush called it “perhaps the best political ad of the year.” Former Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz called it “basically a maximalist expression of what a political ad can do.”

It's understandable that they thought it was a campaign ad. Spencer Pratt, a registered Republican, is running for mayor of Los Angeles, and the video echoes the themes of his dark horse campaign: Los Angeles has fallen apart thanks to his incompetent and venal leadership, and he is the man to fix it. But by any normal definition, it wasn't an advertisement at all. It was something utterly strange: an AI-generated fan video by a Los Angeles-based filmmaker named Charlie Curran, whose other recent works include a video of the Pope dancing to rapper Chief Keef and one of the Rizzlers performing a walkout over Iran.

The video Pratt posted described Los Angeles as Batman's Gotham. Karen Bass, the Democratic incumbent mayor and one of Pratt's opponents in the upcoming nonpartisan primary, is the villainous Joker. As things unfold, a man who looks a lot like Joe Rogan, if Joe Rogan dresses like Commissioner Gordon, turns on a spotlight that hits the overcast sky with an insignia reading "SP." At that signal, Pratt dons black armor, cape and gloves – much like Batman's – and descends to save a post-apocalyptic Los Angeles from its Democratic captors.

In the past, making such a video would have required actors resembling the politicians in question, sets, sound stages, costumes, Joe Rogan, extras, makeup artists, cameras and people to operate them, permits, writers, editors, security and, one would imagine, permission to use the intellectual property in question. This would have cost a lot of money, which would also involve creating a political action committee and issuing all the disclaimers regarding who made this video and why. But there is now generative AI. – and, for better or worse, people can do whatever they want.

Batman offers obviously flattering points of comparison for Pratt – who, by positioning himself as a populist candidate, has tapped into his fellow Angelenos' anger over the handling of homeless encampments and the wildfires of 2025. Bruce Wayne is famous for being a wealthy, traumatized man who (like Pratt) lives on the outskirts of the city. In Christopher Nolan's films, Wayne Manor is canonically located in "the Palisades," a suburban enclave located within the city limits — much like Pacific Palisades, where Pratt grew up and lived with his wife and children until his house burned down last year. This injury is the cornerstone of Pratt's campaign. He believes Bass and the sclerotic city government completely mismanaged the response to the fire – before, during and after.