Seven things that could have made ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ better

It shouldn’t have all been set during the day.

Self explanatory.  This is Batman we’re talking about.  He is the night.

Someone needed to die

I’m fine with a happy ending for Batman.  In the context of these films, Bruce learning that it’s okay to be selfish and go off to live happily ever after is a cool idea.  But at the end of The Dark Knight Rises, everything is just… too perfect.  The city has been through some shit, sure, but nothing happened in the film that left real mark on anyone.  Lucius?  He’s fine.  Gordon?  Fine, gonna keep being the comish.  Blake?  New Batman, or whatever. If Bane and Talia were such badasses, and the situation in the film so dire… shouldn’t we have lost someone?

Imagine if Alfred have died.  In addition to everyone in the audience being heartbroken because ‘oh my god they killed Michael Caine,’ think about what it would have done to Bruce.  It would have been fascinating to watch.  Or if it had been Gordon.  We love Gordon!  Hell, I would have been happy if they had killed Lucius Fox, just to show us that Bane wasn’t fucking around.

I think it would have been pretty amazing if, after Bruce was put in the Prison Pit, Blake had found the Batman suit, put it on and attempted to be Batman, only to be unmasked and executed on television by Bane.  Can you imagine what a fire that would have lit under Bruce’s ass?  At that point, the symbol of the city has been broken, and he needs to bring it back and show them that it’s okay to hope.

If Robin’s gonna be in the movie, then just have Robin be in the movie

No, I’m not saying he needed to be wearing the red and yellow tights, or even going by the name Robin.  But if you’re going to have a Robin character in the film, then just name him Dick Grayson! Or Tim Drake.  Or Jason Todd.  I don’t care.  But name the character John Blake, have him kind-of sort-of serve like a sidekick to Batman, and then at the end go ‘What’s that you say, your middle name is Robin? Nudge nudge wink wink aren’t I so clever BWOOOOOOWMP.’  (I like to imagine that Chris Nolan just makes the Inception noise whenever he thinks he’s blown somebody’s mind.)

My point is that it was a cheap trick, and like so many other things in the movie, ultimately didn’t end up meaning anything.  It’s great that he is going to take over as a Batman-type vigilante, and I love the idea that Batman is sort of going to live on even without Bruce, but the character got lost in whatever it was that Nolan was trying to do with him.  Although, to be honest, there wasn’t much of a character there besides Good Cop to begin with.

If you’re going to do a Robin type thing, then let us see Bruce take him under his wing.  They have maybe one scene together, and I’m left wondering why I’m supposed to care about this John Blake fellow.

The Talia reveal should have happened thirty minutes earlier

The movie spends a lot of time telling us (rather than showing us) what a big threat Bane is.  He destroys Batman in their first fight, and does a lot of other stuff, I guess.  I felt as though his brutality could have been highlighted more, but that’s neither here nor there.  My point is that we spend a lot of time being told his backstory, and having him built up as this Ultimate Threat.

Then, right before the end of the film, not only is all of the backstory we’ve been told revealed to be false, but he is essentially reduced to nothing but a glorified bodyguard.  He’s just a thug there to protect Talia and her master plan, and he gets shot by Catwoman and goes out like a bitch.  This would be fine, if Talia was now our Big Threat, but the problem is that she’s not.  She reveals herself, stabs Batman, and dies three minutes later.  Ultimately, the reveal of Talia didn’t mean anything, for Bruce or the audience.

There are two ways they could have fixed this.  One, they could have established Bruce’s relationship with her much more, making the reveal a huge betrayal.  And two, they could have revealed it much earlier in the film.  When we’ve been told the entire movie that Bane is the bad guy, it’s not a twist to pull the rug out like that, it’s just annoying.  If Talia is the real villain, then let her be the real villain for a decent chunk of the film.

Less time should have been spent on supporting characters

The Dark Knight is a great film, but let’s face it, it’s not quite a Batman movie.  It’s more of a Joker and Harvey Dent movie, with Batman as a catalyst for many events.  It has plenty of things to say about Batman and about Gotham, but it says them through those two other characters.  The issue with the Dark Knight Rises is that it attempts something similar, but with way more characters, none of whom are as compelling as those two.

Think about all of the other people with spend time with besides Batman:  Blake, Bane, Talia, Lucius, Catwoman, Gordon, that other cop guy, most of whom were introduced in this film. If it’s the last film of a Batman trilogy, I want it to be about Batman.  Instead, we kept having are attention pulled by a dozen other characters, none of whom were well drawn enough for us to care about, just because there were two damn many of them.  If it had been a six hour movie, then maybe we could have gotten to know all of these people, but as it was, the movies focus was all over the place.

Also, Catwoman gets more cool stuff to do in this movie than Batman does, which is just not okay.  This is the end of your Batman story, Chris Nolan, so you really don’t need to worry about making me care about anyone but Batman.

Bane should have invaded Wayne Manor

I will say that the one scene in the movie that I greatly enjoyed was the first big fight between Batman and Bane, where the music all cut out, Bane just beats the sh*t out of him, culminating in the moment that made every Batman fan wet himself, when Bane snapped Batman over his knee just like in the comics.  That scene was really good.  But it could have been even better.

Think about Wayne Manor, and more specifically the Batcave, at that point in the film.  Alfred has left, (and another thing: how are you going to get rid of Michael Caine twenty five minutes into the movie?!?! But I digress.) and Bruce is left all alone in his big mansion and dark cave.  He’s not Batman, and his father figure is gone, which means that Wayne Manor is now a place of discomfort and uncertainty.  We’re shown at the beginning of the fight that Bane knows that Batman is Bruce (seriously, everyone knows it in this movie), so why not bring the terror to where Bruce lives?

Just imagine it.  The doorbell rings, and Bruce expects Alfred to get it, before remembering that he’s not there.  He opens the door, and there’s Bane and his goons.  “Hello Mister Wayne.  Or should I say… Batman?”  A chase ensues, ending up in the Batcave.  Maybe Bruce struggles to get his suit on while Bane beats the crap out of him, or maybe there’s some messed up scene where Bane, like, forces him to put the armor on.  And then, in his sanctuary, in his place of solitude and safety, Bane breaks him.  Tell me you don’t want to see that scene. (Liar!)

The return of Batman needed to be a bigger deal

At the start of The Dark Knight Rises, Bruce Wayne has not been Batman for eight years.  The city still believes that he murdered Harvey Dent, and he’s spent the past three years cooped up in Wayne Manor, limping around on a cane for some reason or another.  The Bruce Wayne we’re presented with at the beginning of the film is a broken man.  Without Rachel, the love that he lost to the Joker’s explosives in The Dark Knight, he’s lost his drive.  It doesn’t help that the Dent Act has essentially eliminated organized crime.

I’m just going to say this:  eight years is a long time.  If that much time has passed without Bruce putting on the suit, it needs to be a big decision when he decides to put it back on.  The cards need to be stacked against Gotham so badly that he is ultimately left with no choice but to stop feeling sorry for himself and be The Goddamn Batman.  Instead, the way it’s presented in the film, Joseph Gordon Levit comes to him, says ‘I know your Batman,’ (also, everyone seems to freakin’ know that he’s Batman in this movie) and asks him nicely to come back, and so he does and has a car chase, etc.

The moment where Batman returns ultimately carries no wait in the film.  It doesn’t carry weight in the third act because we already saw him do a car chase as Batman earlier in the film, and it’s not played like a big moment.  The triumphant return of Batman should have occurred at the beginning of the film’s third act, when Gotham is in dire trouble and nothing can save it but the Batman.  You know, when the stakes are high.  The return of Batman after eight years needs to be a ‘HOLY SHIT’ moment, and it just wasn’t.

So there’s a very good chance that you’ve seen The Dark Knight Rises, and there’s even a very good chance that you liked it.  Honestly, I’m jealous.  If you’ve read any of my other comic-related articles for the site, you know that I’m obsessed with Batman, and if you read my Top 100 Movies of the 2000’s you’ll know that I’m obsessed with Chris Nolan.  Between these two things, I went into this movie wanting so so badly to like it… but I just didn’t. And I wasn't alone!  Sure there were things to like, but overall I found it to be lacking in most of the things that I love about Batman and Chris Nolan.  What made it even more frustrating is that there really was a good movie in there somewhere, but the execution felt so sloppy and rushed that I was never able to dig in emotionally.  Which is why I’m here to prevent seven steps that, in my opinion, could have turned DKR into not just the Batman movie that we wanted, but the one that we deserve.

Heavy SPOILERS throughout, by the way.  So if you haven’t seen it, go do that, and then check back in.  I’ll be here.