The Dark Knight Rises Recast Joker or Resurrected Two-Face

[colonel sanders]

i certainly do realise that. i am all for dent returning for batman 3, though. in flashback form of course, considering he's dead as a door nail.

yeah if it serves a purpose to the story then yes. Nolan did say that he would one day answer the question as to who exactly the five that harvey killed were. He was either just trying to avoid the question because it was just an honest mistake or he will answer it in batman 3. There has to be some that we did not see so maybe we could see who they were via flashbacks. Or maybe Bruce has a nightmare about dent or something. I wouldn't be disappointed if he just didn't show up at all considering he has completed his part in the story.

 

[feanorel]

The Dark knight follows references the Batman graphic novel “The Long Halloween” in which he fights the joker and two face is created. “Dark Victory” the sequel graphic novel then continues with the story of two face. You can read the plots summaries on the links provided. In a nutshell "The Long Halloween" is almost identical to the story we see in The Dark Knight. Dark victory continues the story with Two Face/Harvey Dent in Arkam and the mob breaking in to kill him to avenge their dead bosses... it doesn't go as planed and Two Face gets out. They are not creating new story lines here. The script may be new but the plot was written a while ago in the comic books. Its just up to them how much of it they use.

"You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain" They let "Harvey Dent" die a hero but we know that he lives on to become the villain.

 

[feanorel]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman:_The_Long_Halloween

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman:_Dark_Victory

 

[mothy]

dent, two face, whatever you want to call him, is dead in this series. i can't believe this is still being debated. i'm sure the character will turn up in another series, but here he's flat out dead.

they are creating new story lines here. the dark knight does reference material in the long halloween, but it is not the long halloween. it has nothing at all to do with it. dark victory has no bearing whatsoever on batman 3, but they could take inspiration from it.

for example, heres my own batman 3 plot:

centre batman 3 around a killer mystery, ala the long halloween and dark victory. A killer is taking out different bad cops, leaving pinned riddles and clues on them. the thing is, the clues and riddles are written on harvey dent's old case files about the mob. it is mighty bizarre for somebody appearing to be two face doing these crimes.

in reality, the whole things just a mind game set up by the riddler, but it takes the film a long time to get to that revelation. it is keeping alive the character of dent in a way, so this plot line has the lasting effect it should.

with that going on, then loosely take dark victory, which is a murder mystery set in the context of gotham's gang wars, but don't make it as clean cut as that. make it messy - lots of little gangs fighting each other.

the villains need to get crazier than they've been in this post-joker gotham, both in actions and appearance. get more costumed foes here, and have a basic freaks vs. mob conflict going on ala dark victory, where the standard criminal element attempts to recover their grounds from the costumed crazies and ultimately fails to do so.

regardless of what may have had been in store with the joker for batman 3, i think the way the dark knight ended was perfect. the joker is caught (for now) but he is destined to battle batman forever. the joker has inspired people similar to him to come out of the woodwork and go to war. note: they’ll need an army to be essentially how chaotic the joker is just by himself, who is locked away in arkham asylum.

in the finale of the dark knight, batman is on the run from the police for taking the blame for dent’s crimes to uphold his memory as gotham’s redeemer. remember maroni said to batman that the criminals now know that he has no rules, and the joker has none? well, with batman taking the responsibility for these murders, people will think that he now has no rules. consequently, they will dread him even more. it is a kind of un-intended result that can work in batman’s favour, giving him street credibility, so to speak.

the freaks/mob conflict has to be so out of control that the police are then forced to come back to batman to help sort out this chaotic mess. this doesn’t mean Batman is on good terms with the police, either.

 

[feanorel]

I love your plot... but I still think Two-Face is not dead

 

[mothy]

even if not dead, (which he is, the script says so) it is doubtful we would see two-face again, and he may as well be dead. he broke his neck in the fall. dent would be locked away in arkham asylum, hidden from the public to hide the truth of his madness and crimes to keep his reputation as gotham’s saviour intact. he wouldn’t be escaping from jail or be seen in public any time soon, if ever. he’d be wheelchair bound and wouldn’t posses much, or any threat anyway.

two face dying is not a colossal wasted opportunity no matter how well done it is. this character will leave an everlasting influence on the narrative, possibly more so than he would if he were left alive.

two-face isn’t anywhere near as interesting after his origin arc as he is before it. after his origin, two-face plateaus, since the origin effectively addresses pretty much everything about the character.

i was apathetic about him driving a third film for that reason. what can you do with two-face in a third, besides retreading elements that were already in the original arc to begin with? ending it right after the origin story creates a very solid arc for the character.

this new spin also creates a false legacy for the character, becoming a mythical proportion in the eyes of gothamites, when he in fact ended as a rotten criminal. gotham city is damaged goods, so it makes sense for its idol to be as well.

two face’s death is the climatic moment of the entire film and the completion of the film’s narrative; not a ploy by nolan to wash his hands of a sequel. the move is bold, and makes great sense in how the story progresses.

i don’t like comic book movies killing off major villains, but this is the exception. this is done extremely well and with fine calculation. it’s not a simple, pointless throwaway moment. two-face, who already was a tragic character, has become even more so. to say this, i think is a testament to how well nolan utilizes him.

 

[Brother Jack]

In a nutshell "The Long Halloween" is almost identical to the story we see in The Dark Knight.

There are several similarities but TDK did not copy it verbatim.

And Two-Face is dead. It's pretty much a fact.

 

[Mr. Earle]

I love your plot... but I still think Two-Face is not dead

Its your feanorel...

 

[colonel sanders]

The Dark knight follows references the Batman graphic novel “The Long Halloween” in which he fights the joker and two face is created. “Dark Victory” the sequel graphic novel then continues with the story of two face. You can read the plots summaries on the links provided. In a nutshell "The Long Halloween" is almost identical to the story we see in The Dark Knight. Dark victory continues the story with Two Face/Harvey Dent in Arkam and the mob breaking in to kill him to avenge their dead bosses... it doesn't go as planed and Two Face gets out. They are not creating new story lines here. The script may be new but the plot was written a while ago in the comic books. Its just up to them how much of it they use.

"You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain" They let "Harvey Dent" die a hero but we know that he lives on to become the villain.

But thats not how the people of gotham will view it. If two-face is alive he would serve no futher purpose except to escape arkham and commit more crimes. Everyone will see that its harvey dent, their fallen savior, commiting those crimes and lose hope. It wont be as if he the view two-face as two-face. They will see him as the former district attorney gone mad. It would make batman's actions at the end of the dark knight pointless.

Eckhart himself said that Nolan considers him dead and to not expect him back.

And while these films might reference many comic book stories, they are not following a specific storyline so just because there were some similarities between the dark knight and the long halloween does not mean the dark knight sequel will be based off the long halloween sequel

 

[Rincewind]

There really wasn't that much similarity between TDK and "The Long Halloween" to start with, IMO... There was a lot more similarity between TDK and "The Killing Joke", for example, if you ask me/

And the "Harvey Dent is dead, but Two-Face is alive" thing gotta stop. The Nolanverse Two-Face doesn't have a split personality disorder, just like the Nolanverse Joker doesn't have a chemically bleached skin and like the Nolanverse Ra's Al Ghul isn't immortal.
The script says he's dead, the actor who played him says he's dead, the director and the creator of these movies apparently considers him dead, and common sense says that he's dead. What's there left to ponder about?