The Dark Knight Rises

[Captain Picard's Hair]

I just saw it, and loved it. My long anticipation seems to have been richly rewarded. It wasn't so much a great action movie as a powerful film with a lot of action. The ending was fantastic.

Christopher Nolan has to get a lot of credit for creating a trilogy in which each film is great in its own right and each builds on the previous; the Dark Knight trilogy never ran out of steam. Also, in closing the series the producers avoided the probability of losing creative momentum and letting an uncapped series run aground. This trilogy sets the bar high for other 'superhero' movies to match, though the Spider-man remake was a great improvement on the films earlier this decade.

[IanKennedy]

Well, it was OK, once it got going. I thought it was overly long and concerned it's self with stuff that didn't really matter or move the plot along. Once it got going it was pretty good. No where near as good as The Dark Knight.

Spoiler:

I thought the ending was pretty obvious from the moment they talked about the fact that the autopilot didn't work. That and Alfred's wish, really gave the end away. I didn't see much point is bringing Robin in without Batman either. Either Wayne has what Alfred wanted or he doesn't and will come back. If he comes back then Alfred's wish is lost and there's a point to Robin. If he doesn't there's no point in introducing Robin, can you imagine a film with just Robin!

[Tsukiyumi]

Saw it in IMAX today; I think it's downright epic, though there were a few points that dragged for me early on in the film. Not many, though; maybe a few minutes.

Well worth the price, and the wait.

[Atekimogus]

Well, finally got to see it and I most say I am rather disappointed. Now the movie was not "bad" and certainly had it's good points but imho it is by far the weakest of the triology. It certainly left a somewhat bad aftertaste in my mouth and I am not sure why. Is it because it's slow moving and partly overly long? Maybe, but generally I appreciate it when - especially an action movie - takes it's time to develop characters and story. Was I expecting to much of the villain after the Joker? Well no, I think Bane was brillant. Some might critique the odd voice but imho, here is character wearing a mask covering almost every part of it's face capable of conveing emotion, so of course they impart character via his voice. Well done imho. No, I think it was really weak because it pretty much had the weakest Batman of the three, physically, psychological and technological.

Spoiler:

First, I didn't like the conflict with Alfred. I guess the only reason that was done to bring Batman down even further but imho the movie is very lacking just because I thought Alfred - when not bitching about the Batman business - and Batman had very good interaction and the movie is that much poorer for getting rid of Alfred so early on.

So technologically....in the first he gets all the cool standard batman stuff. In the second he gets some more and his cool mobil phone sonar thingy, makes a cool extraction stunt etc. etc. In this one...he gets a batwing which is really really ugly. (On that note, imho it is extremely noticable in this movie that his bike and the thumblers are only cheap plastics. The way those guns are wiggling around....you wouldn't hit a thing with those. Maybe you don't see it in the previous ones because it's always dark but boy..they appeared cheap.)

Batman...oh what happened to you. Starts as a cripple. (Which was way overdone. Fixing the limp is one thing. Magically fixing nonfunctioning ellbows and shoulders, like the Doctor says is a bit of a stretch...) Get's slightly better. Promptly gets his shit kicked out of him with hardly one cool scene inbetween. But that is ok, the hero first has to hit the rock bottom of the pit (literally). Has a Rockyesque moment in the pit. Surley now it's finally time for him to you know RISE as the title suggest.....or just use cop-cannonfodder while he himself gets in a poorly choreographed bar-fist-fight with Bane. Oh he seems to win this one...finally a moment to cheer our hero..oh wait he get's stabbed...well at this point you know the movie is pretty much over for him. The rest from there on was pretty much standard, without suspense, without surprises, pretty much standard going through the motions stuff. Bombs about to blow. Hero flies it in the sunset. Bomb goes off. Everybody sad. Oh look, Hero survived somehow.
My point is that the movie takes its sweet time to get the Dark Knight to Rise again, which imho is a good thing. As soon as he escapes the pit one is ready to cheer him on and I fully expected him to do some really cool Batman Begins, The Dark Knight stuff......only to see one fistfight. (Heck..Bud Spencer and Terence Hill had far more amusing ones at that... )

And what about Catwomen? Again...she is not "bad". Just utterly....boring and forgettable. So they hardly use her as eye-candy altough they could have, she sure is pretty. That's a good thing imho. (Altough for christs sake Hollywood...feed thy womenfolk. Another movie where a 90 pound heroine kicks the shit out of guys three times her weight. Now I know, martial arts magically makes us all equal ...but even so I'd prefer a trim and fit look to a starved one). But they don't do much else with here either. There is zero chemistry between her and batman and altough she kills Bane and does important stuff for the plot....I almost have already forgotten about her, just an uninteresting, bland character imho.

That being said, I recently also watched a bunch of DCAU Batman movies (Batman:Mask of the Phantasm, Batman SubZero etc. and a bunch of TAS) and honestly, I think the Batman of the DCAU is still by far the best and most balanced one and superior to the movies.

[Teaos]

I personally though Batman Begins was worse... infact the Dark Knight is the only one worth rewatching.

[Jim]

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.

[GrahamKennedy]

I really never got the problem with his voice. He talks to people who know him as Bruce... so he disguises his voice. It's not only logical, it's mandatory to maintain credibility.

[Teaos]

You'd think with all this tech he could make a voice modifier which changed his voice but kept it sounding like a real person...

[stitch626]

Why would he want to sound like a real person? Wasn't the point being something unreal, to strike fear into the criminals of Gotham?

[Teaos]

Sound like Michael Jackson then...

[Jim]

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...

[Praeothmin]

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...

[stitch626]

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...

I don't know. The ones that actually care in the Marvel Universe about hiding their identity do a pretty good job of it.

Most of them just don't care though. Costumes are simply cool (or in Hulk's case, useless).

[Captain Picard's Hair]

I really never got the problem with his voice. He talks to people who know him as Bruce... so he disguises his voice. It's not only logical, it's mandatory to maintain credibility.

Especially true of Bruce Wayne/Batman since as Wayne he's a very famous person in that fictional universe. Comparatively a person like Peter Parker is just an ordinary guy in his non-superhero role. I wasn't bothered by the growl either. Batman, since he has no special powers, needs all the tools at his disposal to create an aura of fear around him.

[Jim]

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"