Okay, so I think I’ve waited long enough to run this, since most of the people I know who were excited about “The Dark Knight Rises” have seen it already, and the ban on spoilers seems to be have been reduced from “spoil the movie and die a slow, painful death” to something akin to “make an honest effort not to spoil it for anyone and we’re cool.”
Even so, I want to make it absolutely, positively clear that this post will be FILLED WITH SPOILERS. Furthermore, these spoilers won’t be the painless “Batman has a really tough time with Bane” sort of spoilers. They’re the “this is what happens at the end of the movie” kind of spoilers.
So, one more time… Do not keep reading this post if you are concerned about “The Dark Knight Rises” spoilers.
Okay, are we clear?
Good.
Now that we have that settled, you probably know I wasn’t a big fan of “The Dark Knight Rises.” Not only was it my least favorite comic book movie of the year — ranked behind “The Avengers,” “Chronicle,” and “The Amazing Spider-Man” — it was also my least favorite of Nolan’s movies.
As you might expect, this has put me at odds with quite a few people who absolutely adored the film.
So, in the interest of figuring out why I had such a problem with a movie that so many people seemed to love, I’ve put together a list of the things that bugged me the most about “The Dark Knight Rises” — but be warned, it’s a long list, so get comfortable.
Let’s begin with…
1. The Gotham City Police Department’s crack team of investigators
So let me get this straight: Batman is a fugitive who the police and public believe is responsible for the murder of one of the city’s most beloved political figures, and is widely regarded as the most-wanted criminal in all of Gotham. Batman disappears just as the city’s most famous businessman, Bruce Wayne, decides to disappear from the public eye. Eight years later, both Bruce Wayne and Batman suddenly appear in public again, returning to the spotlight within just a few hours of each other.
And no one — not even the GCPD detectives looking for the guy who killed Harvey Dent — suspects there’s any connection between Bruce Wayne and Batman.
2. Bruce Wayne gives up being Batman because of his girlfriend’s death
Okay, so maybe this one comes from being overly familiar with the Bruce Wayne character from the comics and not being able to reconcile Nolan’s drastically different take on Batman’s alter ego, but HOLD THE HELL UP, PEOPLE. Bruce Wayne DOES NOT just put away the cape and cowl because his girlfriend dies.
We’re talking about a guy who became the Batman when his parents were killed right in front of him. Becoming Batman was his way of making his parents’ dream for a better city come true, and a way to stop other people from experiencing the pain he felt when his father and mother were taken from him.
And he just gives it all up when his girlfriend is killed by exactly the sort of criminal he vowed to remove from Gotham?
It would be one thing if he gave up being Batman because the city didn’t need him anymore, but when he’s confronted by Alfred early in the movie, he says that the reason he stopped being Batman was because of Rachel Dawes’ death.
Which brings me to my next gripe…
3. The part when Alfred takes off and leaves Bruce on his own
Any Batman fan will tell you that Alfred Pennyworth is Bruce Wayne’s surrogate father. Even before Thomas and Martha Wayne died, Alfred was guiding Bruce, watching over him. After his parents were killed, Alfred helped to mold him into the man he would become. He’s been Bruce’s constant companion, sticking by him through thick and thin, even when Bruce didn’t seem to want him around. Heck, he pulled him from an inferno when the League of Assassins burned down Wayne Manor, nursed him back to health when Bruce was bruised and battered, and watched over Bruce during his darkest moments.
So it seemed a little — no, A LOT — out of character for Alfred to suddenly tell Bruce (and I’m paraphrasing here, of course), “Well, if this is what you want to do, then I’m out.” Keep in mind that their fight was essentially about Alfred hiding the letter Rachel wrote to Bruce before she died, and you’ll start to understand why this scene seemed so unlike everything we’ve seen from Bruce and Alfred’s relationship thus far.
Oh, and Bruce lets Alfred go? Oh, heck no…
4. Gotham to wherever-that-prison-is must be a direct flight.
Maybe I’m just missing something here, but it didn’t seem like a very long time between Bane beating Batman, dragging him to his former prison (which appears to be located somewhere in Africa or the Middle East), and then returning back to Gotham in time to blow up a football stadium and take over the entire city. Yes, one second they’re in Gotham, the next second they’re deep in the heart of an unknown third-world prison, and a short time later they’re back in Gotham.
How did they… what did they… when did they…
*sigh*
Next!
5. Repairing a broken back with a hard punch to the spine is my new favorite medical procedure
Clearly, anyone who pays millions of dollars to repair a broken or dislocated spine is getting hosed, because some half-blind prison inmate can just punch you in the back and hang you from a rope to achieve the same results. Heck, if you add a training montage to the recovery process (complete with floor push-ups!), you’ll be able to beat up one of the world’s deadliest villains in just a few months.
And on that note…
6. Time is weird in Gotham.
How many months were those cops trapped underground in collapsed subway tunnels? I get a little woozy spending 20 minutes on a subway platform, but apparently the GCPD is made of sterner stuff, because they can spend months stuck underground with minimal food and water, then emerge from the tunnel fit, feisty, and ready to rumble with Bane’s crew.
It’s also somewhat amazing that Gotham seems like a pretty quiet, well-run city after it’s cut off from the rest of the world by Bane’s crew. You’d think that the complete elimination of authority figures and the release of thousands of hardened, probably psychopathic criminals into the streets would result in more chaos than just the few brief scenes of riots we’re shown. By the time winter arrives, the city looks downright serene. That’s a pretty quick transition from complete anarchy to pacified urban society, don’t you think?
Which brings me to my next question…
7. What is Bane’s plan, anyways?
Okay, so first he’s a spokesperson for the Occupy Movement, but then he shifts toward full-on anarchy. And then his stance seems to become “KILL EVERYONE! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” I’m pretty sure that my attempts at comprehending Bane’s plans for Gotham actually gave me whiplash.
Sure, all of this makes sense if Bane was presented as an unpredictable, wild-card character like, say… The Joker. However, we’re led to believe that he’s a brilliant strategist and a match for Batman in more than just a physical sense. After all, he outsmarted Batman before he broke him over his knee.
So where’s the strategy in cutting off Gotham from the world, dismantling the city’s economy, and then just blowing the whole place up? Why not skip straight to the blowing-stuff-up part? At one point, Bane mentions that he had access to the bomb from the very beginning of his campaign, so why go through all the stuff in the middle that could’ve derailed his master plan?
8. Surprise! All you had to do was punch him in the mask!
You’d think that Bane’s ridiculously conspicuous mask would be the first thing Batman punches when they have their inevitable brawl, but you’d be wrong. Batman’s decision to punch Bane in the mask is a revelation when it finally happens late in the film, and — surprise! — it turns the tide in Batman’s battle against Bane.
Apparently, it took a broken back, a third-world prison, and an intense training montage for Batman to realize that punching Bane in that big thing strapped to his face is something he should try to do at some point.
9. The Batpod: It’s like riding a bike.
How did Selina “No one calls me Catwoman” Kyle know how to ride Batman’s Batpod? I can understand if she showed a basic understanding of the vehicle’s steering and such, but she was flying over bad guys and flipping through the streets of Gotham with ease just two minutes after hopping on the bike.
I’ve driven a lot of different road-based vehicles in my life, and I’m fairly certain I would crash the Batpod into a lamppost 4.3 seconds after the wheels began moving.
10. I’m crippled and at your mercy! Wait, no… it’s just a flesh wound.
So Talia al Ghul jams a five-inch blade into Batman’s stomach up to its hilt, and Gotham’s favorite superhero is down for the count, meek and gasping for air as Bane calmly finishes him off. A minute later, he’s sprinting to his jet and flying all over Gotham, redirecting a truck carrying a nuclear bomb all over town with his precision marksmanship. Oh, and then he flies off into the sunset with the bomb, showing no signs of his recent “knife-sized hole through my important organs” injury.
Riddle me this: Why am I the only person puzzled about the knife wound?! Why?!
11. It was a six-mile radius. Six. Miles.
Not only does Batman barely get the bomb out of Gotham in time to save the city from the explosion’s six-mile radius of fiery, radiation-filled disaster, but he has time to eject from the plane and swim to safety before the bomb goes off. I know, time is weird in Gotham, but COME ON, PEOPLE.
Okay, fine. He’s the goddamn Batman.
Case closed.
[UPDATE: I'm 100% aware of that scene near the end of the film when the technician tells Lucius Fox that the autopilot was fixed. And yes, I realize that this is basically telling the audience that Bruce Wayne is still alive. What I don't buy is the idea that at some point between the time when Batman was flying around in his Batwing and shooting up the streets of Gotham and the moment when the bomb exploded safely out of the six-mile destructive radius, Batman managed to set the autopilot and bail out of the plane without anyone noticing.
Remember, we're talking about a guy who's supposed to be bleeding all over from a massive knife wound, whose every action is being watched by an entire city full of people. And yet he somehow managed to exit the plane and hide without anyone seeing him? It's not like it was even nighttime here, folks. It was the middle of the day, and every single person who could see him and the Batwing was watching. Heck, if a superhero guy was flying around your city in a superhero jet while dragging an atomic bomb, wouldn't you be watching?]
12. “Frobbledee gramderbin wampavern Gotham! Fropp gramderbin ashes!”
So I know I’m in the minority here, but I only understood about 80% of what Bane said in the film. Sure, this is an improvement from the 5% of his dialogue we understood in the early trailers for “The Dark Knight Rises,” but the fact that people are saying Bane was one of the best characters in the franchise is making my brain ache. For all I (and anyone else who couldn’t understand him) know, Bane could’ve been telling us about his favorite episodes of “My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic” during several scenes. I JUST DON’T KNOW.
Of course, this wouldn’t even be so bad if the 80% of the dialogue I did understand didn’t sound like someone doing a Patrick Stewart impression through a toy microphone.
Think about it. You know I’m right.
13. It’s like an ’80s action movie, except more ridiculous.
Reigning champion gets a little full of himself, then tangles with someone who had a more difficult life and gets his butt handed to him in a duel. The hero takes a back-to-basics approach with his training and eventually earns himself a rematch. This time, he beats the bad guy with his newfound, street-smart bad-assery, and we all learn a valuable lesson about not getting too full of ourselves. Sound familiar?
Hey, Christopher Nolan, “Rocky III,” “The Karate Kid, Part II,” and about a hundred other ’80s action films called. They want their basic narratives back.
14. We have how much time left? Oh, crap! Time for some tie-ins!
There were a lot of unintentionally funny moments in “The Dark Knight Rises,” but none were quite as jarring and heavy-handed as the scene near the end of the film when a clerk tells John Blake, “You should use your real name… Robin.” The emphasis on the name was so distinct and so forced that it fell just shy of having the actor who plays the clerk suddenly turn and stare at the camera right as she says the name “Robin.”
Sort of like this…
And finally…
15. So the big twist is that Bane’s just a henchman… again.
Remember how everyone complained about Bane being used as a simple henchman in 1997′s “Batman & Robin”? Well, Christopher Nolan punked us all by making the big twist at the end of “The Dark Knight Rises” knock Bane down to a similar second-in-command role.
Yes, just when we thought Tom Hardy’s version of Bane was the biggest bad-ass of them all, we find out that he’s just Talia al Ghul’s muscle, and has been following her orders from the start.
How’s that for a demotion?
And… breathe!
Okay, I think that’s about it for now, though I reserve the right to add to this list as more problems with the movie occur to me.
okay you do have a few good valid points but i saw the movie last night and loved it. granted i did not do a whole lot of thinking like you did.and granted i do not know alot about batman history.but was totally engrossed in the movie from the second it started.it was my sons second time seeing it and he thinks it is one of the best movies he has seen.thanks for giving me lots of things to tink about.i will take them into consideration.
Good points Rick! This movie was fun to watch but it just doesn’t hold to the smell test when you think about it for even a few minutes.
Here’s what I would add. The Lazarus Pit, Turkish Prison, whatever you want to call it was supposed to be the bowels of hell and where Bane was born in the dark. Bruce gets taken there and has round the clock healthcare, free cable and a whole prison of supporters cheering for his escape! WTF! I mean seriously and there was more sunshine there than anywhere in Gotham save the football stadium.
For a Batman that is against guns, he sure had a lot of firepower on his vehicles! Would’ve been cool if they were non-lethal like nets, highly stick resin, etc…
John Blake gets constantly referred to as being a “hothead” and for speaking out of turn but they are fairly big points that he is bringing up that seem silly to just dismiss: connections to Daggett and warning the FBI/CIA guys that infiltrated the city. It may be nitpicking but it just didn’t seem earned. I think I would have preferred to see more of rookie cop getting overly excited and interjecting himself but Blake seemed pretty cool headed for the most part.
What was Talia’s motivation? She hated Bruce and wanted to publicly destroy him? Why send him halfway round the world and keep his identity a secret rather than string him up in public display back in Gotham? Was it to continue her father’s wish of taking down Gotham due to its decay? By all accounts, the last 8 years in Gotham have been pretty sweet.
Things I dug in the movie: IMAX scenes, score-Hans knows how to build towards a finale, The Bat and the actual performances (even with the clunky dialogue).
Yes, the knife bothered me too!
Dude, take your meds. This isn’t a documentary. It’s entertainment and great at that.
Holy shit, you really think Bane is a brony?! Call Jim Collins, this one just went from good to great!
Dear Rick you may have some valid points but they do sound like you dont understand the movie.what was Talias motive?hmm mayb bruce let her dad die.blake was robin?knew that when he first talked to bruce.not a add on.what are Banes plans?wow guy watch the movie,it was to torture bruce.hard to torture if you just blow it all up.alfred leaving and bruce retiring?alfred leaving made sense for he thought bruce was done with batman and didnt want to see him die. as for bruces mental state by losing rachel?do you have ever had a girlfriend?that mite explain your confusion.you enjoying the Avengers Spiderman Chronicle?i like both Avengers and Chronicle even tho Chronicle isnt a comic book movie,But Spiderman?please.Talking giant lizards and Norse Gods and Kids flying around are soo much more realistic then getting around the world without a passport or dropping a bomb off in a 6 mile radius.Good Points rick,lets see what the acadamy picks in february.
Two quick responses to two of your points.
Re #11: He didn’t swim to safety, he was never in the bat-copter. He fixed the autopilot. Watch the movie again; it’s stated explicitly.
Re #15: Maybe Bane was Talia’s partner? Afterall, he’s all set to disobey a direct order and kill Batman anyway, and only doesn’t because of Catwoman’s intervention. Are they working together? Yes. Is he some subordinate drone? No.
[...] image of the dramatic rodent idea was taken from Rick Marshall’s post about why he didn’t like The Dark Knight Rises. If you’re not angry enough at my rant, be sure to check his [...]
Definitely agree with you about all of this stuff, but especially the part about punching Bane’s mask being the key to his downfall. Didn’t he tell someone towards the beginning of the movie that they would be in a lot of pain if they tried to remove it? What happened with that? Still enjoyed the movie overall, but a lot of these flaws were distracting.
I am not leaving my opinion of the movie just wanted to clear one point up. At the end of the movie fox states that bruce wayne put an auto pilot on his aircraft 6 months pryor. leaving the impression he set the auto pilot and ejected long before leaving the city.
Hey everyone, going to clarify this in the post with an update, but I was well aware of the whole autopilot (a.k.a. deus ex machina) plot device. I’m just a little confused how an entire city full of people watching Batman fly around in his Batwing while dragging an atomic bomb managed to miss him ejecting from the plane at some point. I mean, come on — if you were in the city, wouldn’t you be watching him very intently while he flies around blasting that truck through the streets? Sure, he could’ve left the plane at some point (and I think that’s what Nolan wants everyone to believe), but I’m declaring shenanigans on the possibility of that happening without anyone seeing it.
wow, the guy who wrote this obviously didn’t listen to the dialogue during the movie or most of his problems he found would have been answered and i think he just loves to hear himself rant and rave….you sir are a person i would love to punch
[...] 15 Things that bugged me about The Dark Knight Rises (via Rick Marshall) [...]
1. The Gotham City Police Department’s crack team of investigators:
The People of Gotham not picking up on obvious clues that Bruce Wayne is Batman has been a plot hole of almost every Batman storyline in history. By this logic, wouldn’t everyone have figured out that Bruce Wayne was Batman in BB when he shows back up in Gotham and days later the Batman character hauls in Falcone?
2. Bruce Wayne gives up being Batman because of his girlfriend’s death: He stopped being Batman because Batman was wanted for the murder of Harvey Dent. Did you even watch TDK?
3. The part when Alfred takes off and leaves Bruce on his own: It’s like you weren’t paying attention to anything Alfred was saying to Bruce at all. Did you even watch the movie? Alfred knew that Bruce would be devastated when he told him about Rachel’s letter AND he knew that Bruce wasn’t prepared to fight Bane. He was trying to save him and it was the only thing that he could think to try. OKAY, I’ll be honest, because I REALLY wanted to love this scene and it might have been the most powerful scene in the film, but what ruined it for me was that it was recycled scene from TDK. Which scene was that? One of the worst, most pointless scenes in the whole movie, when Fox quits because of the cell phone radar. If that scene had never existed (and I assert that if you delete it from TDK, it would cause both movies to make MORE sense) I would have loved this Alfred/Bruce scene.
4. Gotham to wherever-that-prison-is must be a direct flight: Yeah, I thought the timing on this part was a stretch. Of course, this is the first time in the history of cinema that a film has been made that tweaked the limits of time and space to make a story flow better.
5. Repairing a broken back with a hard punch to the spine is my new favorite medical procedure: I had a problem with this as well. But once again, obviously, someone didn’t pay attention to the movie. At no point did they say that his back was broken. That’s the comic book version. The doctor said his vertebrae was out (hernia, slipped disc, etc.), and yeah a back punch is a little hokey, but come on. Did you want to see a chiropractic montage? A die-hard comic book fan I know said this: “Right, but he also had the help of a really good doctor. Who also helped heal Bane. It’s important to remember that the prison is a metaphor for the Lazarus Pits, and in Knightfall Bruce Wayne fixes his back through supernatural means. So, while in the real Nolan universe 5 months may not seem too long, its a lot more realistic than what happened in the comic.”
6. Time is weird in Gotham: Have I asked this yet? DID YOU EVEN WATCH THE MOVIE?!? They sent supplies down to the cops. It showed them getting supplies. Then, you go on to whine about how peaceful it was in Gotham during Bane’s reign. Did he not see Scarecrow’s court, or penthouses getting trashed, or people living like refugees in Wayne Tower?
7. What is Bane’s plan, anyways?: DID YOU NOT FREAKING WATCH THE MOVIE?!? Bane tells Wayne that it’s not enough to blow up Gotham. He wants them to have false hope and then experience utter despair. He’s not just a killer, he gets off on terrorism.
8. Surprise! All you had to do was punch him in the mask!: Batman couldn’t get to the mask in the first fight, because he was fighting with reckless abandon. The mask hit isn’t what won him the fight the second time around. It was just the blow that helped get him off guard. The fact that Batman didn’t get in a mask punch the first time around just speaks to Alfred’s point (Number 3) that Batman wasn’t ready to fight Bane (due to Number 2). This is what Bane meant in the first fight when he said “Peace has cost you your strength. Victory has defeated you!” and then “You fight like a younger man; nothing held back. Admirable… but mistaken.” If you had even tried to pay attention, you would understand that Batman went into the first fight unprepared and wanting to die. He went into the second fight prepared and ready to see it through to protect Gotham. That’s what prison will do to you.
9. The Batpod: It’s like riding a bike: Dumbass just wants to get to 15. Really, this is nitpicking it to death. You probably bitched about Gordon driving the Tumbler in BB too. Can’t Catwoman be kick-ass too? It’s unrealistic for anyone to do ANY of the things they do with ANY of those vehicles in ANY of those movies. So because Catwoman can do it, that’s where we’re going to draw the line? Sounds kinda sexist to me.
10. I’m crippled and at your mercy! Wait, no… it’s just a flesh wound: Yeah, I thought that didn’t make sense. But I didn’t think it was a huge deal. Again, they could have spent another five minutes of the film explaining how it was a strategic blow that wouldn’t kill him so he’d be alive to feel the fire of the explosion, or we could just let it go.
11. It was a six-mile radius. Six. Miles: Yeah, last shot of Batman in the cockpit was with 5 seconds left on the bomb. Chalk it up to Nolan crossing the line to get you to really buy that he died. Again, no other film in cinema history has ever done that.
12. “Frobbledee gramderbin wampavern Gotham! Fropp gramderbin ashes!”: There is no doubt you went into this movie wanting it to suck and wanting to find 15 things to bitch about. There was one line that I didn’t pick up the first time (“Peace has cost you your strength”). I guarantee you, if you watched it at a different theater and actually tried to pay attention, you would understand most all of the dialogue and by extension would lose at least half of this list. That would be an awkward editor’s note.
13. It’s like an ’80s action movie, except more ridiculous: Still trying to get to 15.
14. We have how much time left? Oh, crap! Time for some tie-ins!: Yeah the “Robin” delivery line was poorly done. Let’s trash the whole movie because of 2 seconds of an actress who probably got paid $200 for that one scene delivering her line badly. Or let’s trash Goyer and Nolan for that one poorly scripted line whenever they tied so many other themes and lines so beautifully into the script from the first two films.
15. So the big twist is that Bane’s just a henchman… again: Half-ass interpretation. You’re assuming because she told him not to kill Batman that she’s the one giving the orders. Remember, as soon as she leaves, he says “F—- that, I’m killing you.” So the one order she gives him, he ignores. Remember, in the first fight he said, “I am the League of Shadows.” But you probably thought he was talking about My Little Ponies because you forgot to clean your ears out before going out in public. It’s pretty clear that Talia and Bane shared authority over the league.
Also, why don’t you try to be original?
http://www.slashfilm.com/15-bothered-the-dark-knight-rises/
Zack, you’re telling me that the guy that BECAME BATMAN BECAUSE HIS PARENTS WERE KILLED would give up because his girlfriend died? Someone with so much will power and a thirst for vengeance would do something completely opposite of what lead him to become the Batman? It’s completely unbelievable!
And it’s spelled, “might” not mite.
@Erudy: I don’t read SlashFilm. I guess that’s just more evidence of how flawed the film was. So many people are coming up with lists of glaring problems with it! *shrug* Thanks for reading!
Exactly, I was worried I’d be copying when I wrote my own list, but then I realized… I’m not going to be the only one on the internet that’s going to notice these flaws. When more than one person writes about the same thing it doesn’t have to be plagerisim, there’s seriously things to consider.
It’s like when people come up with the same joke. One didn’t have to steal it from the other person, there’s a thing called parallel thinking.
[...] you want to see a list of legitimate concerns for TDKR, check out this list put together by Rick Marshall. Like this:LikeBe the first to like this. from → Thursday [...]
Batman didn’t give up the cowl because Rachel died. He gave it up because Rachel’s death showed him that Batman couldn’t be the hero Bruce wanted him to be. Instead he was better off as a symbol – a defunct symbol – for what “I’d have to become to stop men like him”. Didn’t you watch the end of The Dark Knight? Rachel’s death is the motivation – but not the reason – for his giving up his crusade. I think Nolan’s version of the character squares well with the comic book version, depending on what writer you are referencing. Nolan’s Batman is very similar to Alan Grant’s take on the character, for instance.
I agree with some of the points here. However, we must take in considoration that this is a MOVIE. Not reality. Nonetheless, you are right about a few things. I’m a hopeless Batman fan and I couldn’t wait for this movie. But still I was a little dissappointed by a few things:
- Batman is the Dark Knight right? So why the f*ck is he fighting bad guys in broad daylight? Batman belongs in the night. He should be coming from the shadows in stead of out the sunlight.
- This is a Batman trilogy right. So, in a 2:45 during Batman movie, I want to see some “Batman action!” Like the harbour scene in ‘Batman Begins’ for example. I really missed these kind of dark exciting moments where Batman is snatching frightend bad guys from the shadows like he supposed to be doing.
- Mr. Nolan said that he would do 3 movies and then quit. So why am I still thinking this 3rd Batman movie isn’t Nolan’s last one? The ending leaves so many options open for another one, that it’s hard to believe that this really is the final Nolan Batman movie. That makes me sad really.
Again, I am a huge Batman fan and I loved the movie. Heck, I loved all three of them and will surely see them one by one as soon as the third one is released on Blu-Ray. Anyway, thanks for this article. I liked reading it! :-)
[...] he posted a list of 15 things that bothered him about “The Dark Knight Rises.” These are more logistical than critical problems; [...]
i believe when batman shot up at a building in the bat when blake yells “alright its starting”, thats when he ejected cuz everyone was watching the building explode
I didnt quite have 15 things thaty bugged me, just 2.
#1: the prisioners all want to get to that ledge. And they have a really long rope. So…they best they can think of is “I’ll tie this to my waist and make an impossible leap!” Nobody thinks of using it to make a grappling hook to latch onto the ledge? Including Batman, who uses grappling hooks all the time?
#2: Time issues aside, how did Bruce get back into Gotham? He had no money and the army was keeping everyone out. If he had a secret Bat-tunnel, why didnt he use it to evacuate people?
all in all, the entire prison scene just seemed overly forced for the sake of a metaphor.
Batman was gone for 8 years. Bruce Wayne was only a recluse for the last 3 years.
@Joe, yes, that was actually what I was thinking when viewing it again last night. Why does that building blow up all,of a sudden? Because Batman blew it up as cover for his escape.
@Joe & Pidge – Would Batman really blow up a building in Gotham just to cover his escape? That seems like a bit of a stretch. I mean, it *is* Batman we’re talking about here… blowing up a building to cover your escape seems more like something a villain would do.
While I agree with point 3 the way it’s done in the film, the fact is that it’s taken straight from the comics, but out of context.
When Bruce is recovering from his back injury, there’s a point where the doctors tell him he must lie in the hospital for several weeks. Bruce says he can’t do that because he needs to find Bane, and Alfred says you WILL do that, or I’ll resign right now. Bruce decides to go after Bane, and Alfred says basically what he did in the movie. And Bruce lets him.
So, points for comic accuracy, but neg points for taking it out of context.
This post is directed toward Jett at batman-on-film.com. Thank you for taking the time to address some of the problems that have been raised with The Dark Knight Rises (DKR). I wanted to write to clarify that ongoing critiques of the various inconsistencies and leaps of logic in DKR are based not on a misunderstanding of the film, but rather on the premise that these inconsistencies dramatically weakened DKR and had the overall effect of lessening the enjoyment of the film.
It is true that Nolan attempted to explain away some of the various problems with the story (i.e., the hi-tech leg brace, Bane’s exposition on the role of hope in despair, etc.). It is also true that one can deduce answers to some of the issues that have been raised by chalking it up to Bruce’s resourcefulness (i.e., he’s Batman), as you have done. Yes, I agree that Bruce may have had secret bank accounts he could access from anywhere in the world. I also agree that, yes, Bruce may have previously set up contingency plan ABC in order to deal with scenario XYZ and so forth (i.e., returning to Gotham after escaping from a hole in ground halfway around the world with no money or Bruce regaining access to his Bat gear after being outed as Batman by Bane).
However, filmmakers by definition are storytellers, and the best storytellers have the ability to create a world in which audience members can lose themselves, one in which they can easily believe. In order to successfully achieve this goal, the filmmaker must not allow plot holes and other inconsistencies to appear in the final cut, because these problems ultimately have the potential to take audience members out of the world depicted in that movie, thus lessening the overall enjoyment of the film and diluting its impact. This is exactly what happened to me and others when we were watching DKR.
If Nolan wants us to believe that it is plausible for a man like you and I to dress up as a giant bat and run around the rooftops of a major metropolis beating up criminals, then the plot and the narrative and all of the techniques used to move that story forward must be plausibly constructed. This is the reason why Batman Begins and The Dark Knight are regarded as great films that transcend the comic book genre: Nolan created a world on film in which the existence of Bruce and Batman was plausible.
In DKR the moments of implausibility substantially outweighed the moments of plausibility. For example, we understand that Bane’s plan to blow up Gotham is meant to unfold over the course of 90 days or five months, as you say. The problem with using this approach, though, is that it effectively slows down the story while simultaneously opening up gaping plot holes. There is no plausible reason for Bane to wait three to five months to blow up Gotham other than the fact that this grants Bruce sufficient time in the screenplay to recuperate from his back injury.
We understand that it is the tradition in these larger than life good vs. evil stories for the bad guys to give the hero a chance to win the day by wasting precious time explaining their plans to the hero (i.e., monologuing) or making some bumbling mistake at the end, rather than simply carrying out their plans to destroy the world in a ruthless and efficient manner. The difference between a good movie and a mediocre movie of this type is how much plausibility the filmmaker can bring to this moment, the pregnant pause before the enactment of the master plan.
In James Bond movies, the villain usually captures Bond, tells him what his plan is, leaves him to die, and then goes off to execute his plan. After the villain leaves, James Bond escapes and finds a way to foil the plan. I would argue in the majority of movies of this sort there are very few villains who would wait three to five months to execute their master plan after the big reveal. There is a good reason for this. It’s because allowing for the passage of that amount of time immediately saps the film of its energy and believability. By choosing to allow Bane to exercise such (in your own words) “strange logic and motivation,” Nolan serves to muddle the line of his story unnecessarily.
Once having made this narrative decision, Nolan is now forced to find ways to keep the audience interested in the events taking place in Gotham while Bruce is offstage. He does this by following Commissioner Gordon and John Blake around and by depicting the various kangaroo courts in action until such time that Bruce can heal himself and find his way back to Gotham. Again, the problem with this approach is in both the execution and the plausibility. We already know that the bomb will blow, and we also understand that the actions of Blake and Gordon during this stretch of the film are meant to create a sense of hope in the minds of Gotham’s citizens and in the members of the audience.
However, we also know that there is nothing that Gordon and John Blake will ultimately be able to do to stop the bomb. We know this, because Batman has been established as the single character who can successfully foil Bane’s plot. As the protagonist, Batman is the one character whom the audience as well as the characters in the film have invested their hope in. Unfortunately, Batman is not on screen for most of the second act. Instead, he is stuck in a hole in the ground, and when he does escape, Nolan does the audience a grave disservice by failing to show or even tell how Bruce returns to Gotham as Batman. This further raises the implausibility factor. I must, therefore, conclude that the three-to-five month nuclear setup and Bruce’s time in the hole create a dead spot right in the middle of the film when the audience is primed for the climax to begin.
In closing, I would caution against people dismissing the inconsistencies that I and others have raised as nitpicking or that “It’s only a movie” or “It’s a movie based on a comic book–what do you expect?” I think that we as sophisticated film goers and believers in the Batman mythos have a right to expect movies produced by filmmakers who seek to ground the adventures of Bruce Wayne/Batman in reality, and who purport to represent our hero in a gritty, realistic, and plausible fashion to play by those same rules throughout the course of those films. If the film fails to do that or lapses into such illogic or implausibility that it sufficiently jars viewers out of the world and out of the story that is being shown on screen, then that film must necessarily be defined as a lesser film. I suspect that there are many people who would agree with me when I say that similar plot holes, leaps of logic, and inconsistencies in Joel Schumacher’s Batman and Robin film also lessened their enjoyment of that movie. The best course of action for Nolan would have been to tighten his narrative and eschew those plot points that muddied the clear line of his story, which fundamentally seems to have been one of revenge (Talia & Bane taking revenge on Bruce for defying Ras al Ghul and the League of Shadows). That approach, in my view, would have been superior than to leave all these story problems and other inconsistencies hanging about for moviegoers like us to dissect.
I’m glad I’m not the only person alive who thinks this movie makes no sense what so ever. I am more entertained by well thought out stories than action cliches and deus ex machina plot elements.
The Cop army scene was really funny and I did enjoy Anne Hathaway’s goggles/kitty ears, very cute.
Just saw the movie and I need to get some things off my chest. I am not a huge batman fanboy, but I respect that culture and I am certainly a fanboy of many similar things. I am also not a huge movie buff, but I appreciate the art and I enjoy seeing a movie every once and a while. After waiting some time I finally got a chance to see that movie and I will admit that unlike the Olympics people were very serious about not ruining the movie for everyone else. Everyone that I know was sure to cover the room before breaking out into any Batman related discussion out of respect for those who have not seen the movie, this is truly a super heroesq move. I also admit that I am a very critical movie viewer, but at the same time I am fair and I do understand that at times a movie is just entertainment and does not always need to be subjected to nit picking and deep analysis. Now before I saw TDK I already new that it was very hyped and I could end up not happy. Here is my list of complaints (and yes some may be due to my lack of Batman/Nolan related knowledge). The plot was very hard to follow, there were some really lazy plot holes, the conveyed message to the audience was not even close to being understandable, and the passage of time in the movie was crazy bad. On the other side I thought that the last 5 minutes of the movie were what saved it( cheesy or not), Hathaway was a good catwoman and made me regret thinking at one time or another that she was not sexy as hell, some of the scenes were pretty cool and intense (however it seemed like no scene lasted more than 45 seconds), and Bale is a pretty deep Batman/Bruce Wayne. From a critical standpoint the movie was not the masterpeice that some say it is, but for a movie going experience it was okay, however for the price of movies in this day and age I feel that it is okay to hold blockbusters to a higher standard.
Hi Rick, Bane sounds like someone doing a Patrick Stewart impression through a toy microphone, love it. Anyway you forgot to mention that the whole awful situation was all Bruce Waynes fault anyway. He built what was to become the bomb then when he discovered it could be used as a weapon what did he do with it, did he destroy it? No he left it unguarded underneath a huge metropolis and not only that he showed it’s whereabouts to the head of a terrorist organisation intent on destroying the city. He cost thousands of people their lives and nearly destoyed the entire city.The rest of the film was just about him sorting out the mess he caused.
Nice list Rick. After watching this movie last weekend, I wrote my own list today of what I didn’t like and emailed it to a friend. Here it is:
1. Every scene with Alfred. Man, he just sucked the life out of the movie by recapping stuff that happened in the first two movies.
2. The whole plot twist at the end. Talia al Ghul was the child born in the prison. Yet, Bane clearly confirmed the rumor that he was born in darkness. Actually, Bane, no you weren’t, and I didn’t take you for a liar. Oh, and after spending 90 days in prison, not one of his prison friends mentioned that it was the girl who escaped?
3. After hacking into the stock exchange they leave on motorcycles and it is pitch black out? Timewise, this scene should have happened in early Autumn, where there would be plenty of daylight.
4. No one thought to alert the National Guard about how the bomb works? I though cell phones worked. If not, surely someone had a radio in the city somewhere. If not, how about a message written on a tennis ball and lobbed over the bridge to them?
5. The entire police department walks up one street for a war-movie like rush battle? No one is flanking? They don’t just stand their ground and fire their weapons, ’cause fist-fighting is more effective. They should have added some Ka-Pows into that fight.
6. Didn’t love that CatWoman finished Bane off. It should have been the Bat.
7. Batman’s armor can protect him against bullets, yet yields like butter to a knife?
8. No matter how intense the fighting was, many people always knew to the exact minute when the bomb was gonna blow.
I have others, but those were the ones that bothered me the most.
The article would have been a lot shorter if you just stated “I hate super hero movies,” since being consistent with your ridiculous nitpicking would mean that the entire trilogy’s suckiness was only matched by every other movie in the world.
I didn’t go through your other comments after reading your no one seeing him eject “logic.” What!? No one noticed Batman, famous for stealth and graduate of the most powerful ninja clan in the world, eject!? What a terrible movie!
Also, I saw the movie twice and missed the part where he said he gave up Batman because Rachel died… which is weird because he was still Batman after she died in the first movie. I think it’s more logical that he gave it up because he’s wanted for murdering police officers and took the brunt of what was supposed to happen to Harvey Dent’s reputation.
dark knight* (not first movie)
Bane’s plan/Ras-a Ghuls plan was too bomb gotham cause they thought that Gotham was too filled with sin and the people in Gotham were corrupted and had no hope so they had too be destroyed to stop the corruption from spreading.
Vote here Dark knight vs Dark knight Rises
http://www.misterpoll.com/polls/566831
He didn’t quit being batman because his girlfriend died.. In fact, he couldn’t get over being batman BECAUSE she died. He quit because be was wanted by the police.
these are the most stupidest things about batman a critic can write…. i swear…
I think the explanation for the strangely disjointed plot is that originally, Nolan’s plan, pre-Ledger’s death, was to have the Joker take over the city and cause anarchy, with the unpredictability of a bomb being driven around in a truck and potentially destroying the city. The whole “Occupy Gotham” thing was much more in keeping with the Joker’s theme of chaos than anything Bane’s character would have been involved with. If Bane’s intent was to complete Ras Al Ghul’s mission, why not just blow up the city? Nolan shoehorned in the prison scene (which was ridiculous and unnecessary in the context of THIS plotline imho) and couple of other Bane centric scenes, as well as the Talia plot (which was also unnecessary) into his original idea of the Joker unleashing chaos on Gotham. I mean, why is Talia riding around with the bomb, knowing its going to go off? Was her intent to be a martyr ? I have trouble believing that. And I agree with the complaint that in the end, Bane turned out to just be a henchman, though you get the feeling there may have been a relationship between Talia and Bane, which was never really explored, given her late reveal.
To me, it felt like Nolan ended up telling two stories, neither of which really fit together- the parts with Bane would have worked better if it was just Bane coming to Gotham to break the Batman, then imprisoning him in Santa Prisca while he took over organized crime in the city. The scene where Bane lets out the prisoners is straight from the comics, where he basically unleashes the Arkham inmates to wear Batman down before the Bane/Batman fight. Its a shame too, because a Bane centric story, without all the occupy wallstreet crap, would have been interesting, and the return of Batman after being broken would have been more intense if he’s not dealing with the Occupy Gotham side story (which again, made no sense to me). Hardy did an excellent job as Bane, considering the material he had to work with – I especially enjoyed the opening scene. Its a shame Ledger died, for alot of reasons, but one of those reasons most certainly is that Nolan didn’t get to end his trilogy the way he wanted to originally and in a way that would have made the most sense.
8. Surprise! All you had to do was punch him in the mask: Can i point out this one other thing? Go watch the second fight once again and notice that Batman didnt break his mask by punching it. He went into his rematch with Bane knowing his weakness is his mask because he learned that while in prison. So now Batman is socking Banes metallic mask instead of backhands around his eyes. But he didnt break his mask with a punch. Didnt you see in the fight that he punched his mask over 15 times? In the movie Batman has a weapon on his arm that appears to be a hooked knifes. He went for an elbow to Banes face as a sudden impulse and Bingo! he finally broke one of the biggest pipes on the left side of his mask.
you forgot to mention how shitty and unnecessary the cat woman was. shitty ass movie.
You have no good points here. Not only have you not paid close enough attention to the movie, your lack of comprehension of the comics is also apparent. I don’t mean to be harsh, but why is this the first critique of Batman that I come across on google? I fail to see your qualifications when half the things you complain about are clearly explained in this fine cinematic masterpiece. Please review your content here and kindly send a letter of apology to Mr. Nolan before the lesser of the species begins to regurgitate this poorly crafted drivel.
1. Bothered me also.
2. Bullshit.
3. Bullshit.
4. I agree.
5. I agree
6. There’s no fucking reason to pay attention to something so stupid.
7. Bane explained it to Bruce when they were in the prison.
8. I agree
9. I agree
10. He was almost fainting….. What movie where you watching???
11. He’s Batman.
12. BULLSHIT.
13. Bullshit.
14. Bullshit.
15. He’s not Batman.
glad to see not everyone’s singing from the same WB song sheet
the movie managed to suck harder than dark knight quite an achievement
The concepts of Bane in the movie and comic book were both stupid. they couldn’t pick a better villain out of hundreds??? You have Batman trained since his teen years to be first and foremost a detective, then a fighter in all kinds of martial arts. Combined that with all the high tech toys he has, he couldn’t beat up a freakin street thug who’s only fight training was in prison, which is basically street fighting. Wait, let me re-clarify. A freakin FAT street thug. Yeah, he was tired or hasn’t been working out, but come on. Suddenly, your forgot your one of the cleverest person in the world (comic world) or Gotham (movie world)??? You couldn’t simply outwit a simple thug??? Like, hmmm, why is that idiot wearing a mask? Maybe his health/strength is connected to it?
For a trilogy ending, he should have definitely adopted Frank Miller’s TDKR storyline of aging Batman to his retirement years. Oh wait, then that would screw up the possibility of a Justice League movie. Heck, they’re going to screw it up anyways. The Superman trailer’s already got 2 jet vapor trails coming out of his ass. Hilarious. Let’s just ignore simple science.
I think you brought up some valid points there but lets face it the batman trilogy was good but it lacked certain elements of the iconic batman. the fight scene’s i thought where always stiff. Most of the time he looked light his costume was slowing him down even when he had it reduced. 80% of batman’s fighting was upper body.Batman is suppose to be fast and agile and a master at hand to hand combat. Batman has literally No agility in the trilogy, he works in the shadows yes but there is also little that batman cant do.
I don’t think they but enough gadgets in the film for batman to use when hes fighting. They did not include enough misdirection’s and distractions. If you compare the animated batman in the movie hes always (barring one movie i wont name) been spot on in every way. But when directors try to recreate that in a live action movie to but on the big screen they never capture all the aspects that make batman so great and legendary.
Well does really matter anyway because there going to bring out justice league to compete with the avengers but that’s far to late and they will do a batman reboot in the near future.
I no fan boys are going to try and attack me because i criticized the movie but there was too many holes init that have already been pointed out by myself and other comments on here.
This seems compeltly pointless.
1: That’s a problem with the last film, not this one
2: The Batman wasn’t needed anymore, this is explained
3: Alfred explains why he has no choice but to leave Bruce
4: So you expected them to show Bane on a plane for 5 hours? Yes they went to the middle east and back, probably over the course of several days
5: Bruce’s back was never broken
6: People will most likely hide in their homes when they’re worried they’ll set a nuke of
7: Bane explains his plan throughout the movie
8: Batman doesn’t punch Bane’s mask, he tears it with his arm-spikes
9: It’s not hard to ride a bike, she only uses 2 guns on it as well, you don’t need training for that
10: Batman is trained for pain endurance, and even then he is struggling
11: Bane man got the bomb away from the city, why would there be radiation?
12: I understood Bane’s voice fine, it’s better than Batman’s
13/14 make no sense
15: Ban eisn’t a henceman, he was not alone in his plan. HOw does that make someone a hencemen? It’s not like he follows orders fro Talia.
Someone needs to watch the movie again!
I’ve expressed those same opinions from almost the moment I finished watching that terrible movie.
Also, I don’t think as many people were as impressed with the movie as you might believe. I just can’t imagine that anybody who grew up reading the comics or watching Batman: The Animated Series and its derivatives could accept the mistakes in that movie.
Alas… at least TDK was good…
#2
batman didn’t give up being batman solely because of rachel, if u notice in the first 30 or 40 minutes of the movie Gordon, Robin and even Bruce himself mentions that there is no such evil out there that a Batman should be needed. After joker’s capture they won, there was no need for a batman. Robin even said that Gordon might be chasing people who have not returned the library books, as the crime rate was all time low
i think “bruce wayne” not coming out of his mansion and not being very social is related to rachel’s death, not batman.
#3
i recommend you to watch the movie again, alfred mentioned again and again that “bruce” is not trained to do this, he was out of action for 8 years (im not sure about the time duration here), alfred told him that “you just cannot put your cape back on and go out there”, and after knowing about bane alfred was certain that this time “bruce” can actually get killed. So to prevent this, he left him.
#4
it was simple scene switching dude, nobody mentioned anywhere in the movie that how much time has been passed between the incidents you just mentioned. Like seriously, you really wanna see bane going to an airport and taking a 10 hour flight from middle east to gotham city ?
5#
All i can think of is it might be dislocated, not broken. and maybe that is what they tried to show in the movie. and i think a dislocated bone can be fixed like that.
6#
“minimal food and water ?” it wasnt shown like that, nor it was mentioned anywhere. ok for the sake of argument maybe it was quite minimal, but cops are supposed to have some sort of physical training right ? And even though some of them might be in a weak physical condition, but that massive fight scene with the bane’s thugs was more about emotions, ambition, u know like performing ur duty, giving ur life even to save the city.
7#
its clearly mentioned in the movie that bane wanted batman to suffer, dats why he did all that to gotham
8#
It was not about punching him in the mask, in the first fight batman wasnt ready, as i mentioned earlier he was at rest for 8 years, he didnt have any physical training etc. so in the first fight bane easily owns batman. but in the second fight, batman returns with a new spirit, somewhat with a revived mental and physical condition (as he trained in the prison), that is why he is able to kick banes ass, yes the mask thingy was also there but that was just to show that batman somehow overcame bane. i mean they had to show sumthing, if batman wudve defeated bane with simple punches or kicks, it wudve looked stupid i think :/
9#
dude seriously, its a movie. sometimes they have to do things like that, they cant show u selina taking a 2 month course from batman on how to ride the batpod…..
10#
u are right on this one, that thing kinda confused me aswell, but hey he is BATMAN :D i think he can withstand such wounds :P
11#
i think this has already been answered, he was never in there, and about ur concern that why nobody saw him ejecting from the bat and stuff, like seriously dude he is the batman, this is what he is best at, staying invisible.
12#
i would say that u shud get a version with subtitles :P, i dont think everyone had that much trouble understanding bane’s dialogues…..
13#
ummm i dont know what to say about it, it was a storyline, and it wasnt that bad i think :S
14#
oh man cmon, they just wanted to tell the audience that he is robin. ummm ok u tell me, how they cudve done that in any other way ? any suggestions ? (not sarcasmn)
15#
again, it wasn’t mentioned anywhere that all these were talia’s plans. they were working as a team. blowing up gotham might be talia’s plan but the different phases involved in it, trapping the cops and stuff, these might be bane’s plans
that is what i think, i have no intention to offend u or sumthing……..
Agreed, there were a lot of plot holes in the movie (super agree on the 6 mile radius thing), but taken as a trilogy this was still a great series. And some comments on your points:
2. Bruce “gave up” on Batman because in the public eye, Batman was responsible for killing Dent as well as commiting all the crimes that Dent did. He never said he stopped being Batman because of Rachel; he simply didn’t want to move on (as Bruce Wayne) after her death.
3. This movie is self contained and outside the canon of the comics. Alfred wanted Bruce to put down the role of Batman (which he thought was self-destructive), and he felt the only way to do stress the importance of this was to leave “someone whom I have cared for since his cries first echoed through this house”
4. There was never any mention of the time lapsed between the battle in the sewers to the arrival of the prison. For all we know, it took several days to get there. And being in the League of Shadows, I’m sure they have access to their own plane (as shown in the opening sequence).
7. Bane stated his sadistic plan during the prison scene; he wanted to give Gotham a sense of false hope. “So, as I terrorize Gotham, I will feed its people hope to poison their souls. I will let them believe they can survive so that you can watch them clamoring over each other to stay in the sun. You can watch me torture an entire city and when you have truly understood the depth of your failure, we will fulfill Ra’s al Ghul’s destiny… We will destroy Gotham”