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In TDK Rises Batman shoots the bomb truck with The Bat, killing the driver.

It's not alright to fire a handgun, but it's alright to fire machine guns strapped on a flying vehicle.

So when are the Nolan lovers going to say there ARE situations when lethal force (intentional or not) is required?

If the deaths of Ra's and Two Face aren't going to make them do it, I can't imagine anything being good enough.

Indeed. And destroying the monastery in BB.

I don't even know where to begin with this movie. There are so many plot holes and curiosities in it.

I hate it when Batman kills intentionally, or doesn't save life when he can. But I am OK with colateral damage. Case in point I've always hated how Batman left Ra's to die in Begins. But on the other hand I have no problem with Two-Face's demise in TDK, since I see that as Batman making the only choice he could in saving Gordon's son. Nor do I really have a problem with the monastery, since I saw it as a necessary action again. As far as TDKR...well I guess he had to do it to save the city, but with all my problems with that film I kinda choose to forget it and not really consider that film. 

But Batman's attitude to killing has always been one of my problems with Burton's take on the character. It doesn't bother me that much in B'89 (since narratively that film only can end with either Batman or the Joker meeting their end), but I do have issues with hoe he cavalierly dispatches those Penguin goons without much consideration. Still a valid take on the character, but my view of Batman is the more "I hate Killing, No guns" Batman of the 90's comics I grew up with.

We're obviously going through a trend in cinema now where fantasy is rejected by realism and therefore function. Can't set a movie on Mars (Total Recall) let's bring it down to the tired and boring future Earth instead. Can't have a knight in silver armour Robocop, let's have a black tactical looking one because it makes sense having a police armour inspired look. But my favourite is always a Batmobile that doesn't much look like a....BATmobile.

See, this new Robocop design looks far less realistic to me than the original. Like I said before, the original was designed to look like a man with artificial limbs, this one just looks like it was designed with aesthetics instead of function in mind. I mean, why would a cyborg need shoulder-pads? Sculpted abs?

As for the realism vs. fantasy thing, I think it's all relative. I personally think the Nolan and Burton films are not that far apart in terms of realism (when you look at technology, gadgets, etc), they just differ quite a bit in terms of tone and atmosphere. Sure BR is quite more "fantastical" than B'89, but it's no where near the level of something like Sin City. As for current trends, I do think it's somewhat evened out, with having the Nolan Batman's on one hand, but then the release of The Hobbit on the other.

This looks poor. I'm sure it will be better on screen, but it just seems like a missed opportunity.

Ain't that the truth. My biggest problem with that suit is not just color or other aesthetics, but the overall design is flawed, if you want me to believe this is a man with artificial limbs. The original suit's proportions are deliberately exaggerated in order to make him look like he is actually robotic. The old armor is not based on looking like a metal version of human anatomy, but like how artificial arms and legs would look and function. This does not look like a cyborg at all, this looks like what it is, a man with a costume on. Nothing here suggests robotic, it just looks like a suit over a normal guy.

I mean granted, I know some things had to be changed and updated. Realistic he should be able to move fast, not super slow like before. He would have to look agile. But he still would need to look like a robot. Ultimately this is just a dude in a suit. Major missed opportunity.

It's funny that people are comparing and contrasting the Nolan and Burton vehicles since the "real world" aspect of them is what I enjoy the most. Sure Burton's vehicles looked more like "traditional" Batman vehicles but they still looked like they could work. The Burton Batmobile, the Batwing, and even that Batboat he used in Returns look like real vehicles that could work, as opposed to the "all aesthetics, no function" approach of the of the Schumacher films. Personally I loved the vehicles in the Nolan films, and even thought the Burton Mobile is probably number 1, the tumbler is a pretty close second for me, I love the nod to the DKR batmobile. As for the Bat, I really liked it. I thought it carried the design language of the tumbler forward and like Silver Nemesis said, it looks like it was actually occupying space.

FWIW, I've always like this take on the car, the 90's comics Batmobile. It strikes me as a great combination of what I love about both the Burton Mobile and the Tumbler. 

I'm glad that they got rid of the trunks, although I agree they should have had some sort of red in the midsection to break up the blue. I think this is where a red belt like the one in the DCnU suit would work better (although I hate the colar of the DCnU suit, I think capes with turtlenecks just look off).

Nolan's Batman has all the techno and chemical work done and delivered by Lucius. Not bashing, I love Nolan's Bats but thats how it is

I think something has to change there. Perhps Lucius can meet an untimely end, and Bruce then resolves to take on equipment building himself. And by the end of TDKR, he's the final product.

But still, such engineering skills like that cannot be learned in months. It must be learned in years and years since youth, like in the comics and presumably in Burton's movies. The Nolan's Batman is basically an angry and buff guy with no technical, chemical or detective skills (every case and clue he solves with Lucius' toys). I dont know why but I havent realized it before

I would very much disagree with saying Batman had no technical or detective skills in the Nolan films. While he didn't build most things from scratch, he heavily modified the equipment Fox gave him in Begins to suit his own needs (he made the armor into the Batsuit, molded the memory cloth into the cape, assemble the cowl from different parts, etc). They also show him building his own batarangs. In TDK he re-programed the sonar project to track the Joker. In TDK he also used forensics to get prints from the Joker's lackeys from that shell casing. And in TDKR (not one of my favorite Bat-films admittedly) it's implied that he worked on the reactor project himself. So while they may not show as much detective/technical work as in the comics, it's definitely precent.

As for the tread topic at had, I definitely gotta sit down one of these days and read it. This is what I love about this place, it's like you guys have multiple Phd's on Batman. 

As I mentioned elsewhere, I enjoyed the heck out of this book. I really had no problems with Bruce being, frankly, incompetent at the beginning of his career, as it's much more believable than the uberman he's typically portrayed. I really liked his initial reasoning for becoming Batman, and this new take on Alfred as well. If they ever decide to give us a new full blown film origin for Batman, this would not be a bad place to start at all.

I think you're missing the point. The idea is to have the cameos in each movie so that it's made plain that none exist in a continuity unto themselves. The shared universe angle has to be repeated in every film.

True, but I think there are ways to do that without a full blown character cameo unless it serves the story being told. For example, Howard Stark needed to be in Captain America, but Nick Fury and Black Widow felt superfluous to me in IM2, and it's one of the reasons I feel like that film is vastly inferior to it's predecessor. You can have winks, nudges, and after credits scenes, but I don't have cameos just for cameos sake.

B89 is realistic?

Like zDBZ said, I feel like relatively speaking yes it is. I would argue that it is as "realistic" as BB with it's "microwave" transmitter, and in fact more realistic than TDKR with it's back healed by a punch, major american cities being held hostage for months on end without any decisive government action, and with Bruce transversing the Atlantic with zero money. 

Again, you're missing the point. If the "Avengers ripoff" thing really is a concern for somebody, the WF and Trinity films bypass that by leading more slowly to a Justice League movie. Fact is that WF and Trinity are legitimate DCU concepts and I don't think there's any immediate counterpart for them in the Marvel universe. What you're proposing is basically a derivative of what Marvel has already done. I don't really have a dog in that fight either way but if it really bothers somebody, well, WF and Trinity are a way to make the build up more WB's own.

Ah yes, I did misread your post. Personally I have no problem with DCE going the full Marvel route with solo and then team up films, but it's my suspicion is that WB/DCE do and this is why they're doing the team up film first. The reason I would skip WF and trinity and go straight to JL is that well...if you're gonna do a team up, why not go all out you know? 

Blake was one of the things I liked the best about this film. I think it fit the tone of the film and series well, and gave us a good way to finish the trilogy while continuing the story in our heads.

I really enjoyed that, but I gotta admit the TDK music completely took me out of the film at the beginning. It's clear he's a huge fan, so it's time I gave his punisher a second look.