I'll start off by explaining who is my favourite, and least favourite character of the series.
Most favourite:
"Robin" John Blake. Why?
- He was the only character who had a brain (i.e. figuring out that Bruce Wayne was Batman, not believing that Batman murdered Harvey Dent in cold blood, and was surprisingly calm for a "hot head").
- He was a rather good detective, and called out on someone else's nonsense when it was called for (condemning Gordon for his involvement in the Dent cover-up).
- He was the only character who did things within reason, especially under circumstances that were beyond his control.
Least favourite:
Bruce Wayne/Batman. Why?
- He needed everyone to explain everything to him and influence him to become Batman; when witnessing his parents' murders should've been enough to motivate him to fight crime in the first place.
- He contradicts himself at every step of the way (e.g. his moral code and his stance on guns). His has different reasons for becoming a symbol - especially how he declared that he wanted to become incorruptible and inspirational, but then he throws it all away by taking the fall for Dent; becoming everything he stood against. How the hell is that less damaging to the city than telling the truth about Harvey?! ???
- His refusal to end the Joker (twice) puts Gotham in harm's way for no good reason, despite the fact that he's rather quick to use lethal force against other villains.
- He gets constantly outsmarted by the villains, and never learns from his mistakes.
- He claims people are inherently good and they wouldn't kill each other while they were stranded on boats rigged with explosives...but later, he covers up Dent's crimes because he's afraid that people will give up on the legal system if the truth comes out. I guess deep down, Batman doesn't believe people can be trusted and actually agrees with the Joker's bleak perspective on human nature after alll?! ???
- He fakes his death for no good reason; putting his close few friends under such unnecessary grief so he can run off with another woman, whose criminal record includes theft and murder. Holy morality, Batman! (excuse the lame pun) ::)
In terms of what I deem to be the best Batman interpretations:
Michael Keaton: A detached loner who lives by himself and doesn't crave human interaction save for his elderly butler. When he does fall in love it ends in such an emotionally devastating way. This is a man of extremes.
Keaton's Bruce likely creates and maintains his own equipment because he's a control freak. His role with the Wayne Foundation isn't explored but one has to assume it is a limited role if that. He focuses all of his mind into the war on crime. He's the darkest of all the cinematic Dark Knights. He works alone without a Robin.
Kevin Conroy: A balanced interpretation with elements of darkness and camp successfully merged together. He has a part-time Robin under his wing. He serves on the Wayne Foundation. He's the middle ground.
Adam West: The other end of the spectrum - the bright knight. This Bruce Wayne is the most believable as having genius level intellect. He's not internalised ala Keaton, or indeed, elements of Conroy. West's Bruce is extremely well read with interest in astronomy and other fields. His general knowledge is first-rate.
This Batman exists in a campy world and he traverses this setting with utter normality. He has a large role on the Wayne Foundation and has a full time Robin.
I don't see Christian Bale's Batman as being all that smart like the above three. He doesn't create or maintain his own equipment for one. He doesn't see Batman as a long term crusade. Bale's performance was adequate (if I can try and ignore his constant open mouth and often mocked voice), but the writing just doesn't make him one of my favourite Batmen.
I might have accepted Bale's Batman not being that technically smart if he had common sense and actually had character development. Contrary to what most people believe, he doesn't have any. He does a lot of things out of character and never really changes as a person naturally. If he does change, it's always because of plot contrivance e.g. encountering Ra's al Ghul in prison, taking the fall for Dent that only undermines his own purpose of becoming a symbol in the first place and stop living his life for 8 years because of Rachel; which apparently had a greater impact on him than his parents' deaths. None of the contradictions he has ever gets addressed in any of the scripts, and because of this, it completely undermines any moral tension that the character faces. Why should I take his stance against the Joker seriously when I know he is always prepared to kill another villain before and after the fact? It's pointless, lazy, and just bad writing.
The problem is that Nolan wanted to make movies about a confused, impulsive character who finds himself in messes that he made for himself, and that character happened to be Batman. These movies were never about a man who wanted to avenge his family by making Gotham as safe as possible as part of his spiritual being. It's all about fake and contrived symbolism and morality. I guess that's why I believe Blake is the best character of the whole series. All he could do is react and use his intelligence to adjust to the situation, but also convince Bruce to get off his ass and do something about Bane. Without him, Batman might've come back too late. And yes, the criticisms about Blake that he takes away from Batman and even Gordon from doing too much might be valid. But honestly, those two idiots do ineffective things to the point of becoming irredeemable by that stage.
Despite my distaste for this role, I do like Bale as an actor. But while it's not his fault that he had to work with shoddy scripts, I think he can definitely be blamed for his awkward acting in this series. Personally, I didn't even think he played the Bruce Wayne part that well till TDKR.
Rachel Dawes was my least favorite. My favorite was probably Gordon.
QuoteHe contradicts himself at every step of the way (e.g. his moral code and his stance on guns). His has different reasons for becoming a symbol - especially how he declared that he wanted to become incorruptible and inspirational, but then he throws it all away by taking the fall for Dent; becoming everything he stood against. How the hell is that less damaging to the city than telling the truth about Harvey?
I was actually on SHH saying this in some random thread, and I got slammed by about 3-4 people, so I just bowed out. It's one thing that is so obviously contradictory to what we're told his reasons for being Batman were. He says he wants to be a symbol, because a symbol is everlasting, and a regular human can be corrupted, so in the end of TDK, he gives up his symbol that he worked 7 years for, to give it to a guy who was corrupted and turned into a psychopath. And in the end, it didn't matter anyway, cause the truth came out about Dent....which is the reaosn why the symbol was more important!! It made sense in BB, but not it TDK.
There's so many damn contradictory character developments in these movies. In BB he says he want's to inspire, then in TDK, he says he doesn't want to inspire and have people running around being vigilantes, to then in TDKR, saying he wanted to inspire, while telling Robin John Blake to run around with a mask and be a vigilante. WTF?! He flip-flopped in every movie about that very issue. And another contradiction was in BB telling us that Bruce needed to abandon his fear to become something greater. I mean, that's what the entire movie kept telling us. Then you fast forward to TDKR, and he's in the goddamn pit, and is told he needs to reintroduce fear into himself, in order to make the jump and get out of there. Apparently, that's what was wrong the entire time. Ummm, cool, but why did you cram it down our throats that he needed to abandon fear for the first movie, to then telling us that's waht was wrong with him all along?!
Exactly. The writing sucks. Especially how we have Batman cruising off on the batpod at the end of TDK. We're told he can take it because he's a silent guardian and a dark knight. Then the next film shows Bruce has been locked up as a hermit for years. The clash of ideas and moods is just too much.
Quote from: The Dark Knight on Sat, 31 Jan 2015, 01:00
Exactly. The writing sucks. Especially how we have Batman cruising off on the batpod at the end of TDK. We're told he can take it because he's a silent guardian and a dark knight. Then the next film shows Bruce has been locked up as a hermit for years. The clash of ideas and moods is just too much.
I understand most fans complain about TDKR a lot, but I admittedly didn't care that much because I thought the series completely lost me with TDK, especially for its ending.
I could repeat myself again about the character inconsistencies, contradictory moral messages and scenes that were rushed and didn't work at all (i.e. Dent becoming Two-Face and the boat scene) but one of the worst things about the film is that no one actually wins in the end. Batman didn't win, Two-Face didn't win, the people of Gotham certainly didn't win, so that only leaves the Joker coming close to victory. But if you actually think about it, he doesn't win either because he allows Batman and Gordon to cover up everything about Dent which paved the way for restoring peace in Gotham for the next eight years.
Seriously, if the Joker is still alive and well by the end of TDK and throughout TDKR, does this mean he goes from this:
QuoteThe Joker looks up at him [Batman]. A twinkle in his eye.
THE JOKER
Till their spirit breaks completely.
Until they find out what I did with
the best of them. Until they get a
good look at the real Harvey Dent,
and all the heroic things he's done.
(indicates ferry)
Then those criminals will be straight
back onto the streets and Gotham
will understand the true nature of
heroism.
(off look)
You didn't think I'd risk losing the
battle for the soul of Gotham in a
fist fight with you? You've got to
have an ace in the hole. Mine's
Harvey.
to this (after the Dent Act is introduced):
QuoteTHE JOKER
Damn it, it looks like my plan didn't
work out after all. Oh well, I guess
I'll sit here in silence for the rest of
my life and won't tell anyone what
really happened. Better luck next
time.
Joker keeping quiet would go against everything that he stood for.
As much as I can't stand Bruce Wayne/Batman in these movies, does anybody else think that Two-Face is the worst character in TDK? Here's why I think so:
- He's touted as "The White Knight", "the best thing that's ever happened in Gotham in decades", "an inspiration" blah blah blah...despite the fact that we don't see him do anything to earn this reputation. Nor do we actually see what the public really thinks of him either. We're just supposed to believe he's a symbol of hope because the movie says so. ::)
- Despite Batman believing that Dent could take over his place as a symbol, Dent is quite useless and vulnerable if he needs help to advance a case (e.g. Lau) and needs to be rescued all the time.
- That moronic transformation as a villain: when Dent didn't murder Joker when he was given the chance. Despite the fact that Joker killed Rachel AND made an attempt on her life before, Dent allows Joker to manipulate him into taking his anger out on all the accomplices involved in Rachel's murder, or those who let him down. Furthermore, the character's duality is replaced with this misguided sense for vengeance; making Two-Face even less sense.
TDK's arc looks even more pathetic if you compare it to the BTAS Two-Face. When Harvey got disfigured in that cartoon, he didn't take his anger out on Batman, the police, or even the corrupt legal system. He simply took his anger out on Rupert Thorne, because it was the crime boss's blackmail threats that lead to Harvey getting disfigured and ruin his life in the process. - He gets in the way of Batman's character development in the movie, and in TDKR. He only exists so Batman could take the blame for him in the end, and gets taken out of the action in the third film. Which further goes against everything that Batman stood for.
I'm seriously beginning to think that I might have been a lot kinder to TDK if Two-Face was completely removed from the film. Seriously, not is he one of the worst things about this series, I think he's THE worst villain in Batman movies altogether. He makes TLJ's goofy Two-Face look better by comparison.
I like TDK Two-Face, he was a pretty good mix of vengeance (and it believably emphasized, more than TAS, the role of police corruption) and the idea that so much is about sheer chance. I do agree that DA Dent was pretty overhyped but I think that's a flaw of the writing in general (others' observations) more than the character himself.
Best, I think Ra's Al Ghul (really good as a mentor and mirror and early villain and pretty compelling in his disdain for society) with Two-Face in second place (might have won if not for the overhyping).
Worst, Catwoman, we're told too often, too unconvincingly, that she's sympathetic and likeable, I found her pretty much neither, Hathaway didn't have enough charisma to make it work. Why Batman comes to like and trust her so much is underwhelming.
The best was Gary Oldman's Gordon. He is the only character with a true arc in the trilogy and his portrayal was outstanding
Katie Holmes as Rachel Dawes was the worst acted character but if we are to encompass all three films then I would easily say Batman was the worst character. The best scenes in all three films didn't include Batman. His dialogue is awful, his delivery is cringe worthy.
After seeing Oppenheimer, I believe that Cillian Murphy is now an appropriate actor to play Johnathan Crane. When he was depicting a college-age Oppenheimer with frazzled hair and sleep-deprived face, he looked strikingly like the classic comic depiction of Johnathan Crane. He even has the lanky build in this movie, even if he doesn't have the height.
(https://www.tapasmagazine.es/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/cillian-murphy.-oppenheimer.jpg)
(https://64.media.tumblr.com/3cbb20f9668bf916dbec526a704ebd62/1c8050fff895a525-3d/s1280x1920/be00afd60c37bd4e22a6c25bbb09e066eba93488.jpg)
His acting was great as the Scarecrow, but it seemed off that he was too young and handsome to be Crane.