The Dark Knight
Well, start by going here. Then change your pants, or whatever it is you do. This is one part in a big movement. 2008 will not suck superhero-movie wise.
“Iron Man,” from all looks, promises to be a good ride, with an amazing Robert Downey Jr. performance. But what “Iron Man” will lack is one crucial component: The Joker.
What’s needed in the sequel to “Batman Begins” is the right interplay between Batman and the villain. While the first movie was fun, it seemed that the bad guys were more incidental. Perhaps this is because the Scarecrow and Mr. Ghul aren’t enraptured in the mythos as much as some characters, or maybe because the point was the beginning of the god damn Batman. But here, we have the true antithesis to Batman in the Joker. A look at “The Killing Joke,” “The Dark Knight Returns” and “Arkham Asylum” will show just why it’s so important – and why Chris Nolan can’t fail us.
Seeing the Joker, I’m excited. This isn’t a weak Cesar Romero TV villian, or Jack Nicholson playing hammed-up and polished. This is the Joker we all know and love. The batshit insane clown. He doesn’t even bother to hide that he’s raving. It adds a more “real” feeling to him, I suppose.
But now, the heat is on. They’ve got to establish the Joker/Batman mythos … and spare the Joker in the end, too. One point of contention I had with the Batman films of my youth (I feel old) is that the villains always died at the end. Even if it was a “climax,” it always seemed anti-climatic – and made no room for Arkham Asylum, either.
This also made the first series seem more like movies than mythos. Batman was really given a context to be put in. Instead, he was just assaulted by bad guys, new girls and lame gadgets. Every new part to the series was a one-up on the last. And in all of them, Batman wasn’t a detective – he was a nearly-god like human.
Much in the same respects, “Batman Begins” never established the detective aspects. Batman demanded answers. He didn’t investigate them. His power of vengeance was there, but without the deduction. In order to establish a truer arch to the stories, we need to see this develop. And, in the same way, we need to see the interplay with the other characters develop. While all of this is happening, we need to see the evolution of the Batman. By making the second movie about the Joker, we’ve got the crucial first step. That is, if the step is taken.
So, to sum it up – the trailer looks cool, Chris Nolan. Just don’t fuck the movie up.
I’ve always thought that Caesar Romero got short-shrift for his portrayal of the Joker.
First of all, it was a different time and he pretty much played the Joker that the fanboys of that time knew and loved – a madcap, goofy criminal who was a foil to a madcap, goofy dynamic duo.
Secondly, riddle me this, Batman: imagine if Romero had played the character exactly the same way, but *killed people.*
Think about that shit for a minute: what if instead of turning Gotham Harbor into strawberry jell-o, he had just poisoned it with Joker Venom (Smilex, for all you Nicholson fans out there)? What if instead of a knock-out sleep-gas gun, he was just packing heat but had played the character *exactly* the same way?
Now *that* would be some scary shit.
A follow-up thought about the end-part of your post:
Considering time, budget, and actors egos/careers, it’s *highly* unlikely that the Joker will be seen more than twice in this series. What you’re looking for has only really been done successfully – in my opinion – with the B:TAS – JLU run of the Batman character (and, to a lesser extent, the other Justice Leaguers). This is beginning to happen with “The Batman,” too, but only to a lesser extent as that program wasted the first couple of years of its run trying to reinvent the characters.
Anyway, my point is that I don’t think you’re going to find what you’re looking for in this series or any other big-screen adaptation of Batman; what’s needed is a respectable direct-to-DVD or respectful, well-funded (and most likely syndicated) TV adaptation. At $10-$20M per flick per major character, Time-Warner just doesn’t have the money to do justice to these characters.
Watching this trailer, it really seems to me like Heath Ledger is doing an impersonation of Jack Nicholson’s Joker – he just has bad makeup.
I’m with you on the Caesar Romero thing. I was actually hoping that the smeared makeup was just a small portion of the movie, and that he’d be properly dolled up – and in full control of himself – the rest of the time.
Hi, Jim.
I don’t like the makeup either, and if you watch the trailer carefully you’ll notice that only his face is discolored/disfigured. I read somewhere that he’s some sort of burn victim – apparently he was wearing a clown mask and it melted into his face. How true this is I don’t know, but it certainly seems plausible based on appearances.
It also makes sense that Harvey Dent will be set-up to become the next film’s villain as Two-Face, and you can bet the Joker will be the one to do the disfiguring. Who knows, maybe they’ll play up Harvey’s pre-Two-Face personality disorder and it’ll turn out that he’s the one who messed-up the Joker’s mug in the first place, so the Joker’s just returning the favor.
Then again, I could be completely off-base. Not trying to start a rumor or anything…
I like Heath Ledger, and I like the look of this movie, but I have a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach that by trying to make the new franchise more “realistic” (keeping in mind the subject matter) than the first that Time-Warner risks sucking the life out of it completely.
On the subject of Heath’s acting chops – any chance his Joker will make-out with Bale’s Batman before the credits role? *I* for one hope so! 😉
Wow, I really don’t see the Jack Nicholson impression. It seems like something completely different, with the demented-ness of the 90s and 00s comics villain but much more unpolished and “realistic.” That seems to be ultimately what Nolan and crew are going for – a plausible Batman world.
::twisted: