"The Dark Knight Rises" Review and Discussion Thread (spoilers)

[Venardhi]

Yet, I'm saddened we never got a Riddler, Penguin, Black Mask or Croc showing in a Nolan film.

Croc? In na NOLAN film? You may as well throw in Mr. Freeze, while you're at it. Played by Arnold.

So what you're telling me is your only exposure and knowledge of Croc are the appearances via the Animated appearances over the last 20yrs. Croc was initially a strong arm who wanted to start a criminal empire in Gotham with himself as one of bosses. His appearance was still human just with skin that had a scaly condition look. So, yeah, a much more true to his roots type Croc could easily have been in a Nolan film.

Indeed. He is no more difficult to explain than the Joker or Bane, certainly, and has just as much potential for use in a grounded dark Batman story.

 

[trekkiebaggio]

Apparently a few people have been citing similarities between TDKR and Rocky sequels. IGN posted an article which lists a few of the common elements.

How TDKR is like a Rocky Sequel

 

[Venardhi]

Kevin Smith brought that up in his latest Fat Man on Batman/Smodcast. That whole pattern is kind of a hero's journey trope.

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

I.... really think surviving any proximity to a nuclear bomb requires much more suspension of disbelief than those other examples. You're not talking about surviving being near literally enough energy being released to destroy a city.

The blast radius was said to be 6 miles IIRC. All it really comes down to is believing that the Bat's top speed is sufficient to put whatever "minimum safe distance" you feel is necessary between him and the blast by the time it reached full bloom. He did exactly what Catwoman assumed he'd do before he pointed out that he couldn't because there was no autopilot. But later we find out the autopilot had been fixed.

 

[Captain Craig]

^^^
The only issue with that is in the closing moments you see three things in this order:
-Batman in the cockpit
-timer on the bomb to :05 seconds
-Blake on the bridge viewing the bomb going off

How much minimum safe distance can you get on 6 mile blast radius in 5 seconds?
He's not Superman, no ejection system is going to get that accomplished. It's suddenly asking for lots of suspension of disbelief in a saga that more or less has enjoyed being steeped in a mostly real world of application toys for Batman. Furthermore with Blake and others watching how would you not see an "escape moment"?

 

[Snaploud]

^^^
The only issue with that is in the closing moments you see three things in this order:
-Batman in the cockpit
-timer on the bomb to :05 seconds
-Blake on the bridge viewing the bomb going off

How much minimum safe distance can you get on 6 mile blast radius in 5 seconds?
He's not Superman, no ejection system is going to get that accomplished. It's suddenly asking for lots of suspension of disbelief in a saga that more or less has enjoyed being steeped in a mostly real world of application toys for Batman. Furthermore with Blake and others watching how would you not see an "escape moment"?

As pointed out earlier (by another poster): the cockpit may have been outside of the vehicle (having been ejected prior to the vehicle leaving the island).

 

[The Mighty Monkey of Mim]

^^^
The only issue with that is in the closing moments you see three things in this order:
-Batman in the cockpit
-timer on the bomb to :05 seconds
-Blake on the bridge viewing the bomb going off

How much minimum safe distance can you get on 6 mile blast radius in 5 seconds?
He's not Superman, no ejection system is going to get that accomplished. It's suddenly asking for lots of suspension of disbelief in a saga that more or less has enjoyed being steeped in a mostly real world of application toys for Batman. Furthermore with Blake and others watching how would you not see an "escape moment"?

As others have pointed out, the scene is deliberately edited such that we are MISLED to think there was insufficient time to escape, so that it will come as a surprise that he did. How much time passed between the last shot of him in the cockpit and the last shot of the timer? Impossible to say. Sufficient time. As for seeing him escape, all they saw was a mushroom cloud way off on the horizon. Too far away for them to observe his escape.

As I tried to point out with other examples from the previous films, the oft-toted "realism" thing was always more of an aesthetic choice than anything else. Stuff that looks realistic but isn't actually. Stuff that may be relatively realistic compared to some of the sillier comics and previous adaptations perhaps, but still well into the realm of action movie fantasy.

 

[Warped9]

Bruce was shown to be alive after all was said and done. Thats all I need to know. The ending reminds me of The Mask Of Zorro where Antonio Banderas accepts the mask from Anthony Hopkins. So now John Blake has accepted the cowl from Bruce Wayne only here Wayne didn't die.

 

[Agent Richard07]

It was definitely a good adaptation of the character... but I still don't know if Bane's really a worthy enough villain to be Batman's big, final opponent.

Beyond the physical thing I just didn't find him all that interesting here.

He hasn't been around as long as other classic villains, but when he did appear in the 90s, he was interesting and was portrayed as the mother of all villains. He's the one who broke the Batman. I think he's worthy of being a big final villain in a movie.

Yet, I'm saddened we never got a Riddler, Penguin, Black Mask or Croc showing in a Nolan film.

Croc? In na NOLAN film? You may as well throw in Mr. Freeze, while you're at it. Played by Arnold.

I would have loved to have seen Mr. Freeze.

Wait a second, people are actually silly enough to think TDKR has some sort of ambiguous ending? I know people want to read into it like Inception or something, but it is a pretty cut and dry ending. Forbes puts it succinctly.

First of all, let me clear one thing up right away — yes, Bruce Wayne really is still alive at the end. For some reason that escapes me, a segment of fans are insisting it’s “open to interpretation” whether Bruce actually is sitting in that cafe, or if it’s just Alfred’s imagination. But there should be no confusion, the shot of Bruce at the cafe comes amid a montage of scenes showing each person close to Bruce finding out a bit of information revealing Bruce survived the nuclear blast. Lucius finds out Bruce secretly did repair the autopilot on “the Bat,” Gordon finds a repaired bat-signal on the roof of the MCU (contrary to some reviewer’s misunderstanding, Gordon didn’t repair it himself, he walks up and looks shocked to find the new bat-signal, runs a hand over it, grins, and looks around, all in the montage about Bruce’s actions), John Blake gets a big bag full of equipment and a GPS locator, and Alfred gets Bruce’s money and then sees Bruce at the cafe. Bruce’s arc ends with him finally being able to move on with his life, and without that fulfillment Bruce would actually have no true character arc (getting his back fixed and climbing out of the hole to fight Bane again is not a full arc, for those inclined to say the climb out of the pit is the major point in his arc).

Sure, the ending is chock full of rather outlandish implausible elements, but the entire trilogy has problems of that nature. It does not equate to Nolan pulling some tricky ambiguous ending that runs counter to anything seen in the films previously.

Thanks for that. I assumed that only Alfred and Fox knew that Bruce was still alive. I didn't think that Gordon or Blake knew. A new batsignal and a bag didn't seem like evidence that Bruce was still out there.

 

[Gojira]

I think Mr Freeze could have worked in a Nolan film. You had the device from Batman begins that could evaporate water or something like that...I cannot remember. Anyway I could see some genius scientist type who is mentally unstable and getting a hold of that device and manipulating it so that it freezes everything in sight.

You could handle it like Nolan handled Catwoman. First giving him a different name and not calling him Mr. Freeze would be a good start.

 

[Agent Richard07]

^ I'd see no problem with him being called "Mr. Freeze". Notorious criminals sometimes get nicknames in real life, so why not in a comic book movie?

 

[DigificWriter]

There seems to be a lot of ambiguity out there as to John Blake's fate as indicated by the film's final scene, but, if you're actually paying attention to the clues Nolan leaves us throughout the film, there really ought not to be, because he's hinting pretty specifically at Blake taking up the mantle of Batman. There are even some moments in the film where he's not-so-subtle about pointing in that direction, such as the two conversations between Blake and Gordon about the need to know who their savior (Batman) is. The reprise of this conversation is particularly important in terms of foreshadowing Blake finding the Batcave and rising up with the bats surrounding him, especially since said reprise comes only moments before said scene (Blake in the Batcave).

There's also more than a bit of foreshadowing/hinting going on in terms of the chalk bat symbol that we see Blake and some of the kids in TDKR drawing and that was used in promotional material for the film.

 

[Captaindemotion]

I saw it last night and at this stage can just say WOW! It was just brilliant. I was actually prepared to disappointed - the long running time did not bode well (while I loved TDK, I thought it could have done with shortening) and some of my friends (including big Batman fans) were so-so about it. I was certain that I'd come out thinking that while it was good, it didn't match The Avengers.

But, nope I wasn't at all disappointed and I didn't feel the time running in. For all the talkiness, the multiple characters, the sub-plots about Wayne Enterprises etc, it still felt like a taut tense movie to me. The cast never felt cluttered or the movie too busy.

Tom Hardy was just incredible as Bane and I may even have preferred him to heath Ledger's Joker. Loved Anne Hathaway's Selina - the way she was able to convincingly play the nervous or hysterical woman one minute (in Wayne manor and in the shootout) then become a total hardass was brilliant. I think the naysayers have a lot of backtracking to do.

I totally saw the Miranda/ Talia twist coming (even my friend with me knew that she was the traitor who was leaking info to Bane, and he knew nothing about Ra's having a daughter). The constant references to 'the child' as oppose to 'the boy' gave me the nod, while the way that the young man at the pit fought was so reminiscent of Bane.

Nolan found a great way of concluding his story of Batman, without doing the unthinkable and killing him off; he's left it so that they could do a straight sequel to this, focussing on Robin Blake, though I rather suspect that WB will just do a new take on Bruce Wayne as Batman (without going as far as Sony's Spider-man reboot). The ending was not unlike that of Inception but less ambiguous, as far as I could see. I think Bruce was definitely supposed to be alive.

Incidentally, was anyone else surprised to hear Matthew Modine's character called 'Foley'? Remember when he was announced to be playing someone called 'Nixon' and we all assumed he'd be corrupt?

Nice also to see Nolan continuing his run of excellent tv actors in support roles. Aiden Gillen from The Wire, Wade Williams from Prison Break (and as a prison officer no less!), Robert Wisdom (from, er The Wire and Prison Break!), William Devane (playing the POTUS for the nth time in his career) and his fellow Stargate actor Chris Judge.

 

[Set Harth]

Incidentally, was anyone else surprised to hear Matthew Modine's character called 'Foley'? Remember when he was announced to be playing someone called 'Nixon' and we all assumed he'd be corrupt?

He's not a crook.

 

[Gojira]

^ I'd see no problem with him being called "Mr. Freeze". Notorious criminals sometimes get nicknames in real life, so why not in a comic book movie?

That's a good point.

 

[Set Harth]

Just make his last name actually Freeze. Or Frieze.

 

[Warped9]

I quite liked how Freeze was done in Batman TAS and Batman: Sub Zero. In that he wasn't a totally black villain and was a somewhat sympathetic character. But that kind of story probably wouldn't be considered big or epic enough for a feature film.

 

[sojourner]

Isn't his actual name in the comics Victor Frieze? I forget.

 

[Warped9]

Isn't his actual name in the comics Victor Frieze? I forget.

I don't know about the comics, but is in TAS.

 

[CaptainCanada]

Victor Fries is the name the animated series gave him, which was incorporated into the comics; the name "Mr. Freeze" actually comes from the Adam West show (he'd previously gone by a different name in the comics), but there he had a different, non-pun-related real name.