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[alludes]

Asking a question like that only alludes to telling somebody you don't have a plan for your actions. In the Joker's case, that's complete and utter crap and it only makes Harvey Dent an even bigger moron for falling for that bullsh*t.

Harvey was already psychologically broken. The Joker just twisted him. Of course that alludes that he doesn't have a plan, but it's also a way of not saying that he doesn't. It's a manipulation tactic.

Except he ended up burning the money to spite the mob. Remember?

He said he was only burning his half. But even if he did burn the whole thing, he still did that so he could get it.

Anyway, I thought you believed that the Joker was a maniac who spouts nonsense and lies just to cause chaos? In that case, that's not somebody I'd describe "a man of his word".

I didn't say lies. I said nonsense. Which to me means that he doesn't really have a true set of beliefs beyond trying to cause chaos. But I didn't say he was a man of his word. I said that he said that.

I'm a Joker fan, but I can't believe how poorly written he is in this movie. Very overrated interpretation of the character.

I don't really see how.

I've seen people desperately reach to justify something before but... wow...

I'm stating what happens in the film.

So my summary of the line I wrote off the top of my head wasn't word-for-word perfect?

It changes the context of the line.

Ah yes, the Indestructible Crazy Enemy. He can do anything and succeed at anything because, whoa, he's crazy, man!!!

It just happens to work. It is a movie.

Nice try but in that same scene he denies having a plan. That's contradicted by his actions in kidnapping Rachel and Harvey and deliberately giving Batman and the police the mixed up addresses. It's also contradicted by the scene where Batman dangles him off a building and he admits to targeting Harvey in all this.

He doesn't say he doesn't have plan. He asks Harvey "Do I really look like a guy with a plan?" He doesn't say he doesn't have a plan.

Really? But that can't be right. I thought the Joker was a guy with simple tastes. Doesn't he enjoy dynamite and gunpowder and gasoline? I mean, the thing they have in common is they're cheap. Why, if the Joker ever came face to face with a huge pile of money, I could see him burning it up or something.

So no. I don't buy a word of what you just said.

It was for the mob. He got the money for them. He said he was a man of his word. He fulfilled his end of the deal. It's all there.

Again, if that's all he wanted to do, there are less risky ways of going about it.

But not a way that would achieve all of his goals. Get Lau, have a conversation with Batman, see what he'd do. It was a kill three birds with one stone situation. Plus I bet any other way wouldn't have been as fun for him.

There are positive aspects of Nolan's films but overall they really only work for me as an Elseworld's story.

It's all elseworlds.

[why]

"I don't want to kill you!"

"You know, I thought you really were Dent."

In the scene preceding those two lines of dialogue, the Joker opened fire on Harvey's convoy and he was clearly shooting to kill. If he really thought Harvey was Batman... well, obviously he wanted to kill him.

That's not the line. He says, "You know... for a minute there... I thought you really were Dent. The way you threw yourself after her!" This showcases that when he attacked the convoy he likely didn't believe that Dent was Batman. But for a minute after the fake reveal he did.

Of course, that all ended up being a ruse anyway. Apparently the Joker intended to get caught. So rather than fake it and allow himself to get caught in a way that might not get him killed, he finds the most intricate, Rube Goldberg way to "infiltrate" the police station.

The Joker doesn't seem to really care if he gets killed.

All this requires the Joker to know Harvey wasn't actually Batman (which invalidates the first part of the interrogation scene with Batman) and for him to somehow predict he'd be kept in the same holding cell as Random Thug #1 into whose chest he'd implanted a bomb. It also requires him to know he'd somehow be able to detonate the bomb in a way that wouldn't take himself out too.

The Joker says that he just does things. He didn't know that he could detonate the bomb in a way that wouldn't take him out too. He just did it. It also doesn't really seem to matter if the thug was in his cell or not. But the mob does have cops on their payroll.

The obvious question to ask is why would he go to all this trouble? You could say he was protecting the mob (his temporary employers) and his real objective was getting to Lao. Fine.

If that's the argument, why even get arrested at all? Why not stitch a phone into Random Thug #1's chest, have him get arrested for something or other and then detonate the bomb remotely? That alone might kill Lao. But if it didn't, the police station would be chaos and smithereens, which would allow a cop on Maroni's payroll (which don't seem to be in short supply) to kill Lao when nobody's looking.

Thank you for this. This forced me to realize something I hadn't thought about.

The Joker doesn't want Lao dead. Because Lao is the only person who knows where the money is. So, blowing him up would be counter-productive. He needs him alive to get the money.

Was the Joker's objective then a face-to-face conversation with Batman? Um, why would he want that? But if I'm supposed to believe the Joker needed some kind of conversation with Batman, there are any number of other ways to get it. Allowing himself to get arrested is probably the stupidest possible way to go about the job considering he can't be sure Gordon will let him be interrogated by Batman.

All around, TDK works great as long as you don't think about it very much.

The Joker says why he did this: He wanted to see what Batman would do. Why would he want a conversation with Batman? What? Because he adores the crap out of him. He completes him. This plan achieved all his goals. It makes sense.

[all]

I don't mind BB actually. But agree Schumacher's two movies are infinitely more watchable.

It is interesting how BB ended up aging the best. Yeah, TDK has that high falutin' "serious cinema" cred (and a swiss cheese story) and TDKRises has an amazing first hour or so (and the rest is mostly "meh").

For most of BB's runtime though, you're into the story, the actors are as invested in the characters as they'll ever be (seriously, it's all downhill from here) and the BB villains were all new to live action.

Really, the only thing that got indisputably better as the trilogy went on if you ask me was the music. Zimmer was less experimental with BB's score. It has melody to it and that's nice. But it doesn't have the same innovative qualities to it as the scores for TDK and TDKRises.

I don't get how there's a swiss cheese story.

Blake's conversation with Gordon after Bruce's fake (or at least very premature) funeral is just cringeworthy. "Structures becoming shackles, something something injustice, I can't take it". Aside from how little sense it makes for the character, it's terrible dialogue and a terrible delivery.

How does it make little sense for his character? There was a whole scene where he gets angry at a cop because he's following orders.

Didn't Ra's have all those prisoners slaughtered and spared Bane? I always thought that the majority of the prisoners in present day were ones whom Bane put there (for whatever reason), well after his time in the League of Shadows.

I believe Talia says that her Father took revenge on the prisoners. And the guy that was taking care of Bruce says that this is Bane's prison now. Which implies that they are at least not real bad guys. So, you're correct.

You're right that Bruce knew Selina for only a week, if that. But I'm not that convinced that their relationship was only a fling. I always thought Bruce asking Selina to go back home and be together with him while trying to talk her out of killing Schreck (especially his "split down the center" line) meant that he had intimate feelings for her. And Selina must have had some feelings for him too if she said "I could live with you in your castle forever, but I can't live with myself". For what it's worth, the scripts intended that there was romantic chemistry between the two.

Interesting point about Vicki Vale though. I guess I always assumed that Bruce must have had some affection for her if he went through the trouble of going to her apartment and tried to explain his behavior, and nearly revealed that he's Batman. At best, I guess you could argue that Bruce thought he could've potentially loved her, but realized later on that he didn't. But that's probably what you meant anyway.

His feelings for Selina, by my understanding, was rooted in the negative connection of their self-destructive tendencies.

Nolan's entire premise for Batman is flimsy. I actually love BB. I think it's a great movie. Sure, it has its flaws, and it's not a perfect Batman movie, but I do like it a lot. But one thing that always bothered me about it, is Bruce deciding to train and do something with his life after Rachel smacks some sense into him. He didn't start dedicating his life at a young age, it was kind of a spur of the moment realization when he was in his early 20s that he should do something about it. And then he goes off for years to train and become Batman. After about a year, he's looking to hand over his mantle to Harvey, so he could retire with Rachel. And then in the end, retires to cover up Harvey's murders. Then, at the beginning of TDKR, he wants to become Batman again, because Selina stole his mothers pearls. After he saves the city, he then retires AGAIN(with Selina, mind you. A woman he barely knows), and hands over everything to Robin John Blake(who he barely knows).

Is it just me, or is this the most "selfish" that Bruce has ever been portrayed?

It didn't happen that way. Bruce had had skilled training before he'd come across Ra's. Rachel's speech didn't change Bruce's goal, it just changed why he was doing it and how it he wanted to do it. He didn't become Batman because Selina stole his Mother's pearls. He became Batman because he found out about Bane. He doesn't retire with Selina. He retires, but Selina just happens to be who he decides to be with after. He does this for Alfred. Him knowing John Blake isn't really an issue.

[Scenario #2: Batman keeps both Joker and Two-Face alive AND reveals the truth about Two-Face's crimes to the entire public.]

Scenario #2: Batman keeps both Joker and Two-Face alive AND reveals the truth about Two-Face's crimes to the entire public.
Remember when Batman preached how people wouldn't kill each other when Joker held everyone hostage during the boat crisis...only to then decide to frame himself to cover up for Two-Face because he suddenly had no confidence that people could cope with the truth about the DA's crimes? Instead, let's have Batman backing up his belief that people are "inherently good" like he told the Joker and let the truth about Harvey be known. If the public proves to have the strength to persevere any crisis in the face of adversity, then Batman should trust them to accept the news about what Dent did.

That isn't what happened in the movie at all. He didn't suddenly lose confidence. His confidence that people were ready to believe in good was because of Harvey's example. He feared that without that people would lose hope. The movie shows that Bruce views Batman as a faulty mechanism. He views it as a treatment for the symptoms, not as a cure. The Joker actually showcases this as something that is brought about because of Batman's existence, which to Bruce means that he's failed. As far as he's concerned, the Joker is because of Batman, Rachel's death is because of Batman and Harvey's broken psyche and death is because of Batman.