The Dark Knight Rises

What a wild and amazing ride Christopher Nolan has taken us on. In the past seven years he's revolutionized superhero movies, made Heath Ledger legendary, created hundreds of internet memes, and brought philosophy back to blockbusters. He has changed the way the world looks at action movies, and of course made Batman more relevant than he has ever been. So after two nearly perfect films, his conclusion must be even better right? Right? Eight years after the events of The Dark Knight, Gotham is nearly rid of crime, and Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) has hung up the cowl. Hoever, he hasn't been able to move on, and spends his days as a shut in. After an encounter with Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway) and some encouragement from Alfred (Michael Caine), Bruce seems ready to rejoin the world as everyone's favorite eccentric billionaire. That is, until Commissioner Gordon (Gary Oldman) is nearly killed by Bane (Tom Hardy), a mysterious masked man with a hard-on for Batman. Bane is bigger, stronger, and more cunning han Bruce, so when Batman returns to the streets, he might not get the triumph he expected. See that big paragraph I just wrote as a plot summary? It's about five run-on sentences long, which is standard for me. And I left out almost half of the movie. I didn't mention Marion Cotillard or Joseph Gordon-Levitt, nor did I actually develop the stakes of the story. That's how much this movie has going on in it, and I don't necessarily mean that positively. Nolan proved with Inception that he could masterfully handle complex plots, but here is cup overflows. By going all in immediately, The Dark Knight Rises loses the carefully structured narrative of its predecessors and is honestly a bit of a mess. It's like The Godfather 3; there are just too many new characters and plot points, and there's no real binding piece like in the last one. Also, while it's unfair to compare anyone to Heath Ledger's Joker, Bane is a disappointment. His big Darth Vader mask covers so much of his face that we see no movement, so even though he has a cool voice and is the amazing Tom Hardy, it sadly feels dubbed in. And I love Tom Hardy, so this is hard to say. But it's like seeing a shark in a tank; menacing yes, but not very scary and a bit detached. That isn't to say I didn't like the movie. I could nitpick it all day, but I had a great time and was satisfied. I wasn't blown away, but besides Bane the acting is top-notch, and most of the script is too. I shouldn't even have to tell you about how great the music and direction is. Interestingly, the best part for me was Anne Hathaway. They never call her Catwoman, but Hathaway owns the role, being smart, cool, and sexy all at once without missing a beat. So in the end, it kinda sucks that The Dark Knight Rises isn't the earth-shattering conclusion to the trilogy that I wanted so badly for it to be. Yes, I'm a bit resentful that I didn't cry at the end. The film really should've given Tom Hardy a better mask, and they never should have kicked David Goyer off the writing team. But this is still a solid and worthwhile ending to an incredible franchise, so my gripes don't really matter.