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Atekimogus wrote:No, I think it was really weak because it pretty much had the weakest Batman of the three, physically, psychological and technological.

It was part of the plot that Wayne was worn down, but this was something I appreciated. Part of a good superhero movie is to challenge the hero with something equally powerful if not stronger and make him overcome the challenge. In the case of the Batman trilogy, it also fits the development arc of the Bruce Wayne character very nicely. To me his vulnerability makes him more human, and in that way easier to relate to. Batman is really just a man in a suit, after all. A perfect character just isn't realistic and isn't something you can connect with.

That's two of three; as far as technology I don't see the point. Batman had the same arsenal as in precious movies plus "the Bat." In fact, he partially uses this Bat to cover his own diminished strength to a degree.

Jim wrote:

Praeothmin wrote:

Jim wrote:The DC Universe is not real good at the credible disguises. Superman's disguise was a pair of regular glasses. A lot of their hero types just wore small around-the-eyes mask... no better than sunglasses...

I don't think the Marvel Universe is much better in that respect...
Any mask that leaves the jaw visible will help people who know the hero to recognize him...

Most Marvel characters don't have "secret identies". Spiderman being the big exception, and he wears a full body suit. Most Marvel characters don't have "jobs"

What about the Falcon, the first Mrs. Marvel, Captain America and Bucky?
Even the earlier X-Men wore masks because they didn't want everyone to know they were mutants, and yet their masks weren't always full-face affairs like SM's...


DC may be the worst offender in that regard, because frankly Superman's glasses is the absolute stupid costume, but Marvel isn't that much better, IMO...

Praeothmin wrote:What about the Falcon, the first Mrs. Marvel, Captain America and Bucky?
Even the earlier X-Men wore masks because they didn't want everyone to know they were mutants, and yet their masks weren't always full-face affairs like SM's...


DC may be the worst offender in that regard, because frankly Superman's glasses is the absolute stupid costume, but Marvel isn't that much better, IMO...

They all had costumes of some sort, even masks... but it rarely seemed to be so that people didn't know who they were. Everyone knew who Captain America was. The Fantastic Four... etc.

The ones I mentioned are the ones who did have a secret identity at first...

But I have to concede, as I googled DC and Marvel after my last post, and there are indeed a lot more "eyemask" type disguises in DC than in Marvel...
Like, a lot...

Captain Picard's Hair wrote: It was part of the plot that Wayne was worn down, but this was something I appreciated. Part of a good superhero movie is to challenge the hero with something equally powerful if not stronger and make him overcome the challenge.

I can appreciate that, however his big challenge in the movie was climbing out of a hole. Now I am not saying that was easy, it was - considering that this went pretty much the whole second act of the film - just incredibly boring and uninspiring. Also, if we argue that he is just an ordinary man with a suit, I am sorry but than one HAS to adress his miraculous healing. I mean how long was he in the pit? Five months iirc.....now one does not recover from such injuries in five months especially if you are pretty beaten up to begin with. Now I am perfectly willing to ignore such a thing in a superhero-movie of the Iron Man kind for example, but if one makes a point of doing it as realistically as possible it would be nice to adress it better. (Heck, in the beginning of the movie when he sees the doctor my first thought was how the hell is he supposed to recover from THAT? I KNOW people who have next to no cartilage in their knees and they do not make movie-stunts anymore. That he also has "not much of any use in your elbows and shoulders"....is, contrary to his knee, never adressed. Now he has not much use of his elbows and shoulders and this gets better by doing push ups?



Another thing I couldn't understand - and maybe someone can help me out here a bit - is the ending. Now I can understand why the Batman had to die, clean slate, new beginning and all that. But why did Bruce Wayne have to die? I mean not only would this lead to speculation as to who Batman really was but it also was ONE dickish and selfish move from him, considering poor Alfred. And the joke is that those people who figured out that he isn't dead, are those who knew that he was Batman anyhow so WHY faking Bruce Waynes death? It's not like he himself can run away from who he is and if he is done with Gotham relocating to another city would have been just as fine. I didn't get his motivation there at all other than making the audience believe for a second (yeah..right...noone saw the Alfred in the Bistro scene coming) that he was dead.

It's a matter of opinion whether the prison/climbing sequence was boring or not, but I didn't find it so. I do have to admit I found the diagnosis at the hospital over the top and Wayne's recovery quite unrealistic. The producers took some liberties with suspension of disbelief there, though if we're going to discuss unrealism in Hollywood blockbusters we'd better get lots of coffee because it's going to be a long night few months. As far as plot holes go the idea of the stock market being broken into and fraudulent trading in Wayne's name going by without even an investigation is pretty bad (but in hindsight). I guess the question as always is whether these problems get in the way of enjoying the film. For me they didn't.

Jim wrote:The DC Universe is not real good at the credible disguises. Superman's disguise was a pair of regular glasses. A lot of their hero types just wore small around-the-eyes mask... no better than sunglasses...

I always wanted that scene in Smallville where Clark was messing around and put on a pair of somebody's glasses, just to try them out for fun, and then Chloe came in and went "Who are you?" And then when he took them off she went "Oh, Clark! I didn't recognise you with those on..."

That would have been funny as hell.

Anyway. I just rewatched Dark Knight for the first time since it came out, and I actually enjoyed it a lot more than I thought I would. After I first watched it I found that the flaws just nagged at me more and more as I thought about the film - basically I thought they squandered the level of realism they had built up in the second movie. Bane's plot to hold a whole city to ransom as some sort of Marxist overlord for months on end with a fusion reactor whose characteristics are entirely plot driven... it's all so cartoony and silly compared to the Joker's "Shoot people and blow stuff up" approach to mayhem. It really bugged me, first time around. But this time, I dunno... I still think that's an issue, but it just didn't bug me nearly as much as I remembered it doing before.

And I still do really appreciate what they have done with Batman/Bruce in these films. Previously the Batman movies have tended to just give us, well, Batman, doing Batman stuff. But there are three pretty distinct Batmans in these films; the first showing Bruce gradually feel his way into what he wanted Batman to be, and what Batman needed to be to be able to operate at all. "Young Batman", if you will. The second a middle aged Batman, one willing to compromise on some of the youthful integrity and honor and really get dirty in the process of saving the city. But I think I actually like the Rises Batman most of all. The old man Batman, struggling to deal with the physical and emotional legacy of all the things he's done and sacrificed. You can see the sheer cost of the last two films weighing down on him physically and mentally. I found that both very interesting to watch in and of itself, but also thought it was a very nice tip of the hat to the previous films. So often sequels are just more of the same - as Neil Gaiman put it "the public know what sequels are about 'we liked that thing you did, and we'd like another one of those, please.'" But these films really aren't just "three stories about Batman", they really do feel like three chapters of one story. And most especially Bruce and Batman both feel like one guy seen in three very different phases of his life. And I liked that, a lot.

I still don't think Rises is as good as Dark Knight, but it's gone up quite significantly in my estimation.

Well don't misunderstand me, I still think it's a good movie, just not nearly as good as Batman Begins or The Dark Knight. It's with those two movies - although they might have also some plotholes and plenty of unrealistic stuff there wasn't anything which was bugging me at the back of my mind.

With The Dark Knight Rises there are plenty small things which annoy me. Weak dialoge (not a single intense or rememberable dialoge. If one would have asked me immediatly after watching the movie which dialoge I remember it would have been: "So that's how it feels" after catwoman disappears. And that only because it was a weak joke.) uninteresting Catwoman (no chemistry with Batman), boring second act and I still cannot figure out what the charade with faking Bruce Waynes death was all about other than squeezing a few tears out of the "unsuspecting" audience.

I just watched a review from confused Matthew and I think he has a point here.

http://blip.tv/confused-matthew/general ... um-6277467

Watch 2/3rds of it on the flight over again. Bane annoys me. I cant see how people think he even approaches the Joker. Also we know the joker is alive, Why wasnt he one of the ones we saw get out of prison... well we know. But IU?

I still think it is the weakest of the three.

I do agree with Confused Matthew about the symbol thing. I'd have had the bridge burning Bat thing actually... have that be something the people of Gotham do, have it be what Bruce sees on the TV that is his big "I have to go back" moment.

Jim wrote:I just can't get past Batman's voice. Ruins the character for me. Makes him a joke. The only reason that I will watch it once it comes out on Netflix is because it was filmed here in Pittsburgh.

Hmm...I took the opportunity to watch all three in a row and what I noticed was that his voice didn't bother me at all in Batman Begins (where he still is able to complete whole sentences without choking or having to grasp for air) went to noticable in The Dark Knight and became completely ridicolous in The Dark Knight Rises where he sounds like a bad William Shatner impersonater who had a 40 year chain-smoking habit.

Watching them in a row is also fun because I completely forgot what cool Batmany stuff he does in BB and also TDK, maybe I don't like TDKR because he doesn't really do anything as batman other than 2 fistfights (lame)?

Well one good thing however was, that they did get mostly rid of the shaky-cam which did saw heavy use in batman begins, so that's a positive. Small trivia question, anybody know how much time is supposed to be inbetween batman begins and TDK?

Finally saw this the other night. I almost didn't want to see it because I didn't want to ruin the happy memories of The Dark Knight ... all I can say is Damn

(Edit: Apologies for the necro if this counts)

Damn good or damn bad because it could go either way.

Damn good overall. I don't think it was quite up to the bar TDK set but in terms of what the film did and how it did it, it did it well. Somethings surprised me, others didn't but in a good way (in the "I expect this to happen so it better happen") kind of way. I enjoyed it and think it wrapped things up well.

Atekimogus wrote: Small trivia question, anybody know how much time is supposed to be inbetween batman begins and TDK?

Somewhere around 10 years.