The Dark Knight Was Better Than Expected

How’s that for title specificity? I’ve been striving to follow these microcontent guidelines.

As for The Dark Knight, well, I was expecting to thoroughly dislike it as I found Edelstein’s analysis persuasive in the abstract. I also very much enjoyed his reply to his braindead critics, particularly this choice line:

*Note to readers: You blunt the force of your attack when you write to an author to say, “No one cares what you think” — because, uh, at least one person does.

Man, what a cool dude.

Moving right along, The Dark Knight was approximately three hours and seven endings too long. This does address the value for money question, but I guess that wasn’t my highest priority that evening. I agree with countless others on the Two-Face question, i.e., that he was one supervillain too many, at least for this installment of the franchise, though I certainly see where the creators were coming from.

But all that said, the movie exceeded my very low expectations — this was the movie Batman Begins should’ve been: truer to the spirit of Batman: Year One, it took place in a recognizable city, not a madcap fantasia. Not that there’s anything wrong with madcap fantasias — it’s just that the Nolan Gotham as featured in his first Batman film was pretty dreadful and uninspired when compared to the Burton Gotham. Which is why I was disappointed by the hospital at the close of the film and a few other unconvincing touches, which I won’t spoil for you.

I didn’t mind some of the other absurd moments, e.g., an acrobatic side-trip to Hong Kong that appeared to serve only a very minimal plot purpose. And I liked the fact that the movie harkened back to the Dennis O’Neil era of Batman, complete with penthouse, a gritty true-crime flavor, and a vicious Joker. I only wish they had scaled back their ambitions slightly, strange as that sounds.

The really crucial moment for me was the Watchmen trailer, which has raised my expectations to dangerously high levels.