[Severian]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

here's how the dark knight tries to be serious but fails:

1) in the 2nd movie the batman has the power to listen to every cellphone, right? but does he ever struggle with the temptation to become a fascist? does he spy on his girlfriend, jerk off to the neighbor's conversations, look at girls in the toilet? no he doesn't-- he just tells his loyal servant to turn off the system, which the loyal servant faithfully does. the goodies and the baddies are always predictable. yes, there's the scene at the boat, with the bombs, and that was okay, and memorable, but funny thing that wasn't batman the character making a difficult decision. he's one-dimensional, just misunderstood. okay maybe nolan made him two-dimensional but he's not human.

2) in the more recent one, there are some 99 percenter allusions, they even manage to "occupy" wall street, but the heroes are the millionaires with their charities-- funny thing about hollywood liberals, they feel sorry for the poor but think only they can save them.

3) same thing with the subtext that bane and his lady master are some sort of al-qaeda who only want to destroy new york, i mean gotham. (i had forgotten how well choreographed this airplane hijacking was by the way). but is there any question again of who are the baddies? no. worst off, while al qaeda want western forces out of islam's holy sites, this "league of shadows" only wants some sort of twisted revenge for the fuck of it.

Revenge for the fuck it? I think you're selling Nolan short here. The league of shadows restores a type of "balance" to society that draws from theories on the doomed nature of civilization that date back to Freud. They represent the inevitable downfall that Freud believed was the result of the formation of civilization itself. I'm not saying TDKR is "Freudian" but I think the league is a more complex idea in Nolan's universe than you're making it out to be.