The Dark Knight Rises (Spoilers ahead)

[Evvie]

I saw it at the midnight showing with my brother. Did anyone else catch it?

I was actually really pleased with it, I thought it would suck but it was pretty radical.

The only thing though, at the end [SPOILERS BB U GO NOW] when Alfred does the double-take at the camera, I really really wished it cut off instead of showing Bruce again. Like, come on. That would have been hella perfect.

Which also raises the question, how the fuck did he survive a nuclear bomb exploding 50 feet from him? The one that had the power to destroy the whole city?

Think he has some anti-fission spray right next to the anti-shark spray in there?

Also I'm pretty excited about the inevitable Robin movie that will come out in three years.

 

[morment]

Which also raises the question, how the fuck did he survive a nuclear bomb exploding 50 feet from him? The one that had the power to destroy the whole city?

Think he has some anti-fission spray right next to the anti-shark spray in there?

He fixed the autopilot, they showed Lucious asking about it, although that raises the question of how the vehicle itself survived.

I agree that they shouldn't have shown Bruce at the end, all they had to do was have Alfred nod towards the table he was sitting at.

 

[Evvie]

Which also raises the question, how the fuck did he survive a nuclear bomb exploding 50 feet from him? The one that had the power to destroy the whole city?

Think he has some anti-fission spray right next to the anti-shark spray in there?

He fixed the autopilot, they showed Lucious asking about it, although that raises the question of how the vehicle itself survived.

I agree that they shouldn't have shown Bruce at the end, all they had to do was have Alfred nod towards the table he was sitting at.

Yeah, even if the autopilot steered him out, it's still a damn atom bomb. Just seems silly to me.

 

[morment]

Yeah, even if the autopilot steered him out, it's still a damn atom bomb. Just seems silly to me.

I figured that he bailed out well before the bomb went off, but still silly that the batcopter wasn't vaporized or at the very least wrecked beyond recognition.

 

[VeronicaChaos]

I saw this last night and I was actually pretty disappointed in it. The first hour of the movie seemed to drag on forever and didn't make much sense, and then toward the end things were rushed. And then it ends with Batman pretending that he's Superman lol. It didn't really seem like a Batman movie to me. Also, when he starts growling in his Batman voice with Kane near the end I nearly lost it. There were parts of the movie that were, in my opinion, indistinguishable from satires of the films. Mysterion (from South Park) is hardly even a parody at this point. It was a decent flick, but doesn't hold a candle to The Dark Knight.

 

[mynameisbob84]

I just got back from it. I enjoyed it but not without reservations.

HERE BE SPOILERS

On the one hand it was bloated and pretentious but given the epic scale of the thing, I'm willing to overlook that. The scene where Bane set his plan in motion (with the bridges being demolished and the football field being torn asunder) and pretty much the entirety of the third act contained the kind of spectacle that you don't often see in a cinema. That's definitely a good thing.

The first act did drag but there was at least a point to it. I thought the film did a good job of stressing the immensity of the weight being placed on Bruce Wayne's shoulders (mainly by Bruce Wayne). I liked the way Bane and Selina Kyle were introduced and thought both characters meshed well with the universe Nolan had created over the course of the two previous films. I'd feared the worst with Selina Kyle/Catwoman and was pleasantly surprised by how strong a character she was.

Perhaps my biggest criticisms of the film were the leaps in logic it asked the viewer to blindly accept and the contrivances it expected the viewer to simply ignore. Just how many times can Batman swoop in at the last second to save someone from certain death before we start to question how he knew those people were in danger, and where those people were at any given time? How did Wayne get back to Gotham City so quickly and without being seen? Why did he take the time to shave? How did he track down Selina Kyle so effortlessly? Isn't she supposed to be elusive? Why was Lucius Fox left to live when Bane (or even Talia) could have so easily killed him and saved themselves so much potential grief? These things could have been explained away by a tighter script. It's disappointing that they weren't.

There were little things that bugged me here and there like the film's anti-socialist message being presented as a simplistic and axiomatic truth, eliminating any and all shades of grey; the silly flying "Bat" that looked like something out of GI Joe; and that ghastly fucking shot of Bruce Wayne nodding to Alfred at the end (that shot's one saving grace is that I don't believe it was intended to categorically illustrate that Batman survived the nuclear blast; I think it was tempered with ambiguity and represented what Alfred WANTED to see, but not necessarily what was there).

So yeah, it was not without faults, but I definitely enjoyed it. While I wouldn't rate it as highly as The Dark Knight (or Batman Begins for that matter), I think it was a worthy finale to the best comic book trilogy ever made. And given how abso-fucking-lutely spectacular it was in parts, it wouldn't even register as a disappointment necessarily. But to unconditionally praise it (as I'm sure many, many people will do) would be to delude oneself in the glare of rampant fanboy-ism.

 

[Freq]

the ending threw me for a loop as well.
::SPOILERS::

The bomb definately went off, and they stated that it had a 50 mile blast radius. Forget the fact that batman was still in sight (surely not 50 miles away). Either way, the blast wouldn't have been survivable.
SO yes, I think that Bruce Wayne is surely dead. There is even a reading of Bruce Wayne's will and testament. There is also the nagging tidbit that BOTH Batman and Bruce Wayne are DEAD at the same time? Do the masses of Gotham not see that coincidence? If they are intelligent enough to piece that Pink Elephant together, what does it matter if Bruce Wayne faked his death or not?
I am going out on a limb here but I think......
There will be a ROBIN movie in the forseeable future! BATMAN would completely overshadow Robin if the movie were to be made, so Batman won't play a big part. SO my theory is that the person you saw at the end of DKR was in fact CLAYFACE!, not Bruce Wayne! The word "coincidence" is thrown around quite a bit in DKR; Robin, being a detective that no longer believes in coincidence will find out that his partner isn't the real Bruce Wayne at all quickly into the movie!

 

[Evvie]

the ending threw me for a loop as well.
::SPOILERS::

The bomb definately went off, and they stated that it had a 50 mile blast radius. Forget the fact that batman was still in sight (surely not 50 miles away). Either way, the blast wouldn't have been survivable.
SO yes, I think that Bruce Wayne is surely dead. There is even a reading of Bruce Wayne's will and testament. There is also the nagging tidbit that BOTH Batman and Bruce Wayne are DEAD at the same time? Do the masses of Gotham not see that coincidence? If they are intelligent enough to piece that Pink Elephant together, what does it matter if Bruce Wayne faked his death or not?
I am going out on a limb here but I think......
There will be a ROBIN movie in the forseeable future! BATMAN would completely overshadow Robin if the movie were to be made, so Batman won't play a big part. SO my theory is that the person you saw at the end of DKR was in fact CLAYFACE!, not Bruce Wayne! The word "coincidence" is thrown around quite a bit in DKR; Robin, being a detective that no longer believes in coincidence will find out that his partner isn't the real Bruce Wayne at all quickly into the movie!

I distinctly recall them saying the bomb had a 6 mile blast radius, but perhaps that was the midnight fuzzies?

 

[mross2_]

I distinctly recall them saying the bomb had a 6 mile blast radius, but perhaps that was the midnight fuzzies?

Yupp, they for sure said the blast radius was only 6 miles.

 

[bigsancho]

*Spoilers*

The funny thing is I find people complaining about when did Bruce take the time to shave lol he either could of done it at the airport or on the plane.

I think the John Blake's name being Robin John Blake could of been better if his real name being Dick Grayson

I enjoyed seeing Niam Neeson playing Ra's Al Ghul one last time

 

[mynameisbob84]

I'd be lying if I said it didn't irk me that he took the time to shave
The bigger issue though is how did he get back so quickly? When he left the prison he had no money, no passport, no shaver... Then in the next scene he's back in (a heavily guarded, with all its surrounding bridges demolished) Gotham City, clean-shaven and chatting up Catwoman.

 

[Evvie]

I'd be lying if I said it didn't irk me that he took the time to shave
The bigger issue though is how did he get back so quickly? When he left the prison he had no money, no passport, no shaver... Then in the next scene he's back in (a heavily guarded, with all its surrounding bridges demolished) Gotham City, clean-shaven and chatting up Catwoman.

They used the news coverage to cover how long it actually took him to get back. It was between day 83-100 (cannot exactly remember) when he leaves the pit and he returns right at the end of the event, which is around day 150. So iirc, he would have over a month to get back to the states and in to Gotham.

 

[mynameisbob84]

I'd be lying if I said it didn't irk me that he took the time to shave
The bigger issue though is how did he get back so quickly? When he left the prison he had no money, no passport, no shaver... Then in the next scene he's back in (a heavily guarded, with all its surrounding bridges demolished) Gotham City, clean-shaven and chatting up Catwoman.

They used the news coverage to cover how long it actually took him to get back. It was between day 83-100 (cannot exactly remember) when he leaves the pit and he returns right at the end of the event, which is around day 150. So iirc, he would have over a month to get back to the states and in to Gotham.

Ah, okay. That does make things a little more plausible. I wanna see it again relatively soon to see if the things that didn't quite add up first time around, do on the second viewing. Also, to see if it feels more or less disjointed now that I have a clear view of where the story's headed.

 

[bigsancho]

I plan to rewatch this movie I don't know if I will watch it 4 times like I did with the Dark Knight but I do plan to see Rises in Imax when there are no lines at the Metreon

 

[Shaun__]

Just watched it today.

SPOILERS




No way would Batman retire from crime fighting. The key defining feature of Batman is his almost insane obsession with crime fighting. I am also unsure why he dropped a rope down to a hole full of hardened criminals who had wanted to murder or rape a child. The stupid fusion generator bomb also made no sense at all, you can not weaponize something like that. They should have just given Bane a real nuclear weapon from some fake country. The plan to blow up the city with all the terrorist still in it gets a pass because criminals are often stupid.

SO my theory is that the person you saw at the end of DKR was in fact CLAYFACE!, not Bruce Wayne! The word "coincidence" is thrown around quite a bit in DKR; Robin, being a detective that no longer believes in coincidence will find out that his partner isn't the real Bruce Wayne at all quickly into the movie!

I doubt that. They have not let any super powered characters anywhere near this franchise. They even took away Bane's Venom Serum. If it was Clayface it will be a boring plastic surgery one.

 

[TheNightman]

I loved it.

Initially, I was taken back by Bane's voice. Certainly not what I was expecting but it grew on me. The Talia stuff I knew was coming, as I'm sure anyone who has read comics, or even played the Arkham games did also. I did not, however, see the ending coming. I thought he genuinely did fly out in the Bat so at least that was one twist that I didn't spoil for myself.

Regarding Robin, he isn't just Dick Grayson. His character in the movie was clearly a mix of all three comic portrayals of Robin.

 

[Evvie]

I loved it.

Initially, I was taken back by Bane's voice. Certainly not what I was expecting but it grew on me. The Talia stuff I knew was coming, as I'm sure anyone who has read comics, or even played the Arkham games did also. I did not, however, see the ending coming. I thought he genuinely did fly out in the Bat so at least that was one twist that I didn't spoil for myself.

Regarding Robin, he isn't just Dick Grayson. His character in the movie was clearly a mix of all three comic portrayals of Robin.

Bane sounded exactly like Sean Connery to me.

 

[TheNightman]

I loved it.

Initially, I was taken back by Bane's voice. Certainly not what I was expecting but it grew on me. The Talia stuff I knew was coming, as I'm sure anyone who has read comics, or even played the Arkham games did also. I did not, however, see the ending coming. I thought he genuinely did fly out in the Bat so at least that was one twist that I didn't spoil for myself.

Regarding Robin, he isn't just Dick Grayson. His character in the movie was clearly a mix of all three comic portrayals of Robin.

Bane sounded exactly like Sean Connery to me.

Hah, it's certainly not a mile off.

 

[texangirlfiona]

I was laughing so hard at certain parts of the movie. And dropping an atomic bomb in the ocean would cause a HUUUGE TSUNAMI that would wipe out even more of the city most likely. Oh, and how the nuclear physicist turned a core into a bomb complete with countdown timer! But I did like Catwoman, I'll give it that.

 

[Shaun__]

This link is funny and spoiler filled, so click at own risk.

As Gotham plunged into anarchy during “The Dark Knight Rises”, the Gotham Gazette continued its stellar daily news coverage of the increasingly absurd events. Here’s TDKR re-imagined in 12 headlines

 

[nancy_raygun]

Watched the movie last night. There were a total of 6 people in the theater. lol

*OBLIGATORY SPOILER ALERT*

So, Bane's voice was spoiled for me. Someone in reddit had mentioned how they think that he sounded like a mix of Zazu from The Lion King and Sean Connery. The voice was definitely a juxtaposition. I liked it a lot though.

I had a terrible time separating real world logic from the movie. How in the world did the right people not know about Bane? And how in the hell did the right people not know about a fusion reactor under Gotham. I understand Bruce was keeping it a secret or something, but you build something pretty powerful and the government would know about it.



I enjoyed the plot twist. I consider myself to be a very simple person, so I did believe that Bane was who people said he was and was surprised when it wasn't him.

I did like the movie a lot though. I'm a slut for intense action and explosions, so I got my fix.
I nearly cried when Alfred started crying. I hate seeing old people cry.

ALSO- fuckin Lt. Bangle as the doctor. I got way too excited about that. And I couldn't help but ask "Cake or Death?" whenever Cillian Murphy's character asked "Death or Exile?"

 

[lordmagellan]

I just got back from it. I enjoyed it but not without reservations.

HERE BE SPOILERS

On the one hand it was bloated and pretentious but given the epic scale of the thing, I'm willing to overlook that. The scene where Bane set his plan in motion (with the bridges being demolished and the football field being torn asunder) and pretty much the entirety of the third act contained the kind of spectacle that you don't often see in a cinema. That's definitely a good thing.

The first act did drag but there was at least a point to it. I thought the film did a good job of stressing the immensity of the weight being placed on Bruce Wayne's shoulders (mainly by Bruce Wayne). I liked the way Bane and Selina Kyle were introduced and thought both characters meshed well with the universe Nolan had created over the course of the two previous films. I'd feared the worst with Selina Kyle/Catwoman and was pleasantly surprised by how strong a character she was.

Perhaps my biggest criticisms of the film were the leaps in logic it asked the viewer to blindly accept and the contrivances it expected the viewer to simply ignore. Just how many times can Batman swoop in at the last second to save someone from certain death before we start to question how he knew those people were in danger, and where those people were at any given time? How did Wayne get back to Gotham City so quickly and without being seen? Why did he take the time to shave? How did he track down Selina Kyle so effortlessly? Isn't she supposed to be elusive? Why was Lucius Fox left to live when Bane (or even Talia) could have so easily killed him and saved themselves so much potential grief? These things could have been explained away by a tighter script. It's disappointing that they weren't.

There were little things that bugged me here and there like the film's anti-socialist message being presented as a simplistic and axiomatic truth, eliminating any and all shades of grey; the silly flying "Bat" that looked like something out of GI Joe; and that ghastly fucking shot of Bruce Wayne nodding to Alfred at the end (that shot's one saving grace is that I don't believe it was intended to categorically illustrate that Batman survived the nuclear blast; I think it was tempered with ambiguity and represented what Alfred WANTED to see, but not necessarily what was there).

So yeah, it was not without faults, but I definitely enjoyed it. While I wouldn't rate it as highly as The Dark Knight (or Batman Begins for that matter), I think it was a worthy finale to the best comic book trilogy ever made. And given how abso-fucking-lutely spectacular it was in parts, it wouldn't even register as a disappointment necessarily. But to unconditionally praise it (as I'm sure many, many people will do) would be to delude oneself in the glare of rampant fanboy-ism.

I agree with pretty much all of this.

Am I the only one who was expecting Bane to offer tea and crumpets to someone. I don't understand why people think he sounded like Sean Connery as he lack both the sexuality and the Scottish. Nolan is either a fucking genius or a mad man when it comes to voicing his masked characters.

One thing I could help but think of at the end: In the sixties we had Batman running along a pier with a big round bomb trying to get it away from everyone, today we have Batman flying out to sea with a big round bomb trying to get it away from everyone. That made me chuckle.

 

[Diana Blake]

I'm going to go a little off topic here and focus on a single character rather than the entire movie. Specifically: Bane.

While I wasn't totally happy with the character and how he was executed I was thrilled to see an intelligent Bane. The character has always been extremely intelligent in the comic books. A mind to match Batman's. While Bane wasn't the true villain in this movie he was by far my favorite character. When I think about his role and his reactions in the movie, I'm reminded of Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." It's a story full of imagery of savagery and primal forces taking over what man thinks of as civilized and proper. Order against Chaos and how one can't exist without the other.

Bane was trapped in a dark, savage place. Surrounded by killers, thieves, rapists...men that had devolved into monsters and in many cases reveled in it. And amidst that darkness a child was born. Something innocent and pure. In the movie Bane speaks to Bruce and tells him that you can't truly know despair without hope. Just as you can't know darkness without light. He speaks of how men in the pit would fight each other to stay in the light of the sun and as the story of Talia and Bane unfolds you realize something incredible; Bane was never a man that fought to see the sun. He didn't need to. All the light and all the salvation that he ever needed was his the day he chose to save that tiny baby girl. She was his sunlight, his hope. Even as she joined her father and took up the mantel of his dark purpose Bane never once faltered in his faith in her.

Bane loved Talia in a completely pure and unselfish way. He never loved her as a man loves a woman. Not even as a father loves his child. He loved her as a symbol. His religion in a godless world. The psychology of the character and the way the actor portrayed it all with only part of his face visible is just...completely amazing to me. While this was not exactly the Bane of the comic books I feel that this character was one of the most beautifully crafted characters in cinema that I've seen in a very long time and I'm very happy with him on the whole.

 

[Shaun__]

Am I the only one who was expecting Bane to offer tea and crumpets to someone. I don't understand why people think he sounded like Sean Connery as he lack both the sexuality and the Scottish. Nolan is either a fucking genius or a mad man when it comes to voicing his masked characters.

I remember when the trailer first came out everybody was whining they could not understand what Bane was saying, and the studio executives made him change the voice. I do not remember what he used to sound like though.

One thing I could help but think of at the end: In the sixties we had Batman running along a pier with a big round bomb trying to get it away from everyone, today we have Batman flying out to sea with a big round bomb trying to get it away from everyone. That made me chuckle.

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