5. For the third films, the heroes have friends working in security whom the heroes visit at the hospital after a run-in with the villains: In
The Dark Knight Rises, police commissioner Jim Gordon is mocked for seemingly being over-vigilant, but his constant search for threats leads him to follow bad guys and nearly get blown up, landing him in the hospital with severe injuries. Bruce goes to visit Gordon at the hospital, and comes away deciding the threat is real and trying to confront the villain head-on.
In
Iron Man 3, Happy Hogan is head of security for Stark Industries, but he’s constantly made fun of for his over-vigilant stance. His overly-suspicious nature, however, puts him on the tail of some bad guys whom he follows, and he ends up nearly getting blown up. Severely injured, Happy is in the hospital when Bruce goes to visit him, and Bruce comes away deciding the threat is real and setting out to confront the villain head-on.
6. For the third films, the heroes begin emotionally troubled and isolated, their hopes for a normal life a shambles, and it makes them vulnerable to defeat: When
The Dark Knight Rises begins, Bruce is suffering severe PTSD (even though they don’t call it that). He has been battered and injured, he lost the woman he loves, he is unable to deal with the mental and emotional damage he’s endured, and so he locks himself away in his home and waits for things to go wrong so he can don his Batman persona once again. When a villain does show up again, Bruce overestimates himself and underestimates the enemy. He isn’t fully prepared but tries to confront the threat anyway, and his mental and emotional instability leads to his quick defeat.
Iron Man 3 begins with Tony suffering PTSD, and at face value it appears it’s due to his near-death experience in The Avengers. But the truth is much more complicated — Tony says that confronting a threat capable of destroying the world and coming so close himself to dying despite his powers as Iron Man, he is obsessed with fear of anything hurting the woman he loves (Pepper Potts). He now realizes the stakes of the superhero games he plays, and he almost died without even being able to tell her goodbye. Now, Tony cannot sleep, he has panic attacks, and he doesn’t know what to do to overcome the feeling of fear and helplessness about the inevitability of the next threat, and the next, that might come along and take Pepper from him. So he builds more and more Iron Man suits, he implants technology into his body to let him suit up faster, from anywhere at a moment’s notice. He is turning his own body partially into the Iron Man machinery, in other words, a literal embodiment of his super-persona taking over his life (akin to the way the Batman persona consumed Bruce’s identity). When things do eventually go bad and a villain shows up again, Tony isn’t ready for it and overestimates himself while underestimating the villain, and he is quickly defeated.
The scarred and struggling hero aspect of both films is a major theme in their stories, and this similarity between the franchises is one of the most prominent as well as being one of the most important for both characters’ arcs. After the stories of the first two films, these final chapters seem inevitable, and to a large extent the fact of the similarities linking the franchises in the previous two entries makes it necessary for the third installments to explore the themes about the effect of events on the flawed protagonists. In this way, I think the similarities between
The Dark Knight Rises and
Iron Man 3 were to a large extent inevitable.
7. For the third films, the heroes are broken and cast “down a hole” without their super-personas or their other advantages, and must rebuild themselves to come back and win: The Dark Knight Rises very literally breaks Batman and just as literally drops him down a hole, with the villainous Bane snapping Bruce’s back over his knee and then sending him into an underground prison. Batman is believed dead by most of the public, is beaten and without his usual resources (even losing his faithful British butler), and most of all he has to go back to the basics, exercising in a prison and a League of Shadows lair while learning to find and overcome his fears again (mirroring scenes in the first half of
Batman Begins). Bruce has to repair his shattered body and mind in order to rise up from defeat — revealing himself to be alive and stronger than ever.
Iron Man 3 just as literally breaks Iron Man, with Tony’s suits ruined and in need of major fixing. It also literally drops him from the sky into the middle of nowhere without any of his usual advantages (even losing his faithful British-accented “butler”
, as he awakens bloodied and confused and falling from the sky into a snowy field in Tennessee. There, he has to go back to the basics as a mechanic in a garage (mirroring the scenes in the first half of
Iron Man), repairing his broken armor and psyche in order to come back from defeat, to reveal himself as alive and better than ever after all.
Like the fifth item listed above, this is another of the most important similarities and most important thematic elements of both franchises. The emotionally troubled hero elements lead directly to the hero losing everything in order to find redemption again and achieve victory. It’s a classic mythical storytelling template, and both of these films represent the best portrayal of these themes in the superhero genre.
8. For several films in both series, the villains use decoys to disguise their identities: For this example of similarities between the Batman and Iron Man trilogies, we are comparing not only the third films from each series, but also the first films again. In
Batman Begins, it turns out Henri Ducard was really Ra’s al Ghul after all, and he merely hid his identity by using a stand-in pretending to be Ra’s. The film took a smaller character from the comics (Ducard) and merged his identity with that of a major villain from the comics (Ra’s), as well as altering the name of the villain’s organization (from League of Assassins to League of Shadows) and changing the group’s entire premise and methods (from sort of eco-terrorism trying to save Earth from humans, to a vigilante group of ninjas out to bring down societal corruption). Even the relationship between the villain and the hero was completely changed (in the comics, Batman was trained by Ducard but not by Ra’s and the League). Compare this to the way
Iron Man 3 takes a minor character from the comics (Adrian Killian) and merges his identity with a major comics villain (the Mandarin), as well as altering the villain’s premise and methods (the ten rings are a symbol in the film, but Mandarin’s rings don’t have actual powers, and the technology he uses isn’t — yet — revealed to include alien origins). Like Ra’s, Mandarin hid his idenity using a stand-in pretending to be the Mandarin. In both films, the “real” villain was a white character and the stand-ins were non-white, while in the comics both of the “real” villains were non-white.
While the first Batman film and third Iron Man film share this similarity regarding the literal use of decoy villains, notice too that the first Iron Man film and third Batman film share a different version of the “hidden villain” revelation. Just as Obadiah Stane turned out to be the secret villain directing the terrorist group in
Iron Man, a betrayal that shocks Tony and changes the whole perception of the real motives behind the terrorist group’s targeting of Tony, in
The Dark Knight Rises we see that Miranda Tate is revealed as the secret villain directing Bane and his terrorist group. Bruce is shocked by the revelation, and we see a new perspective regarding the true motives behind the attacks against Batman.
9. For each franchise, there is a very specific progression of the portrayal of villains through the lens of terrorism: In both franchises, the first films are about a larger terrorist organization, then the second films are about solo rogue terrorists, and the final films are about the return of a larger terrorist group linked to the first film’s story and with a motivation partially driven by animosity toward the hero for something he did that created the new threat unintentionally.
Remember that the “ten rings” actually did appear in the first Iron Man movie, although we didn’t know what it really was at that time. When it reappears again in
Iron Man 3, we find out Tony’s treatment of Adrian Killian led the man to nearly commit suicide before experiencing a life-altering realization and setting out on new course of conquest and revenge. This mirrors the League of Shadows originally appearing in
Batman Begins and then returning in
The Dark Knight Rises as a means of Talia’s vengeance against Batman for the death of her father in the first film. Between those tales, however, comes the “rogue terrorist” who represents escalation and the revelation of the hero’s flaws, leading to the hero losing some favor among the public and power structure.
So the terrorist threat that originally births the hero and turns him into a symbol of hope is followed by a terrorist threat that questions the hero’s status and knocks him down a peg, until the original terrorist threat appears again to provide the chance for the hero’s redemption in overcoming his flaws and proving to everyone that he is deserves his heroic status after all.
10. For the third films, the heroes finally overcome their need for their costumed identities and hand it off to a new generation: The final major narrative element in the two franchises, and again among the most important for both, is when the heroes’ journeys reach the point where they don’t need their alter egos anymore and actively destroy that part of themselves while seeming to pass it on to a new generation. In
The Dark Knight Rises, Bruce has been obsessed with a need to be Batman, and now that need is even more intense because it’s all he has left after losing his hope for a normal life with Rachel. Then, he faces defeat and has to find a reason to live again, discovering not just fear of death in a literal sense but fearing loss of hope that would destroy everything he fought for in life as part of honoring his parents’ deaths, which helps him find renewed hope for his own life. At last, Bruce sees the chance to move on to a normal life again, having finally achieved what he set out to do in
Batman Begins — Batman is now truly a symbol of hope that won’t die, of sacrifice that can overcome impossible odds, and Gotham honors him and sees him as the true hero the city needs and deserves. But in leaving behind his persona as Batman (in an “explosive” way), Bruce arranges to allow John Blake — a young man much like Bruce himself — the opportunity to train and study, giving Blake equipment in the cave to pursue a super-destiny for himself.
In
Iron Man 3, Tony is obsessed with being Iron Man and building Iron Man armor, because confronting death and a world-threatening menace has made him perpetually fearful of the danger to Pepper Potts. Tony already has a fear of death, but more importantly he has been overcome with a fear of failure, a fear that as the threats grow worse he might be unable to protect the people he loves most. He becomes unable to have a normal life, and then he faces defeat and must rediscover faith in himself and in his abilities to protect Pepper — and, ultimately, faith in Pepper’s ability to protect herself without a need for Tony to be a knight in shining armor. He knows now that he is willing and able to face death if need be, he has faced failing the woman he loves, and he has risen above it to achieve victory. His PTSD is not gone, but he realizes what it takes to feel safe and that his Iron Man persona was keeping him from fully committing to his relationship with Pepper. So he chooses to get rid of the Iron Man persona (in an “explosive” way) to further rid himself of what stood between him and a normal life, and what in part put his normal life at risk in the first place. But he arranges to allow Harley Keener — a young kid much like Tony himself — the opportunity to build and train, giving Harley equipment in the garage to pursue a super-destiny for himself, perhaps.
It’s a great way that both trilogies come full circle with the concept of why these heroes became who they are. Tony had to do it to survive, and so did Bruce in a less obvious but just as valid way. They both had to become their superhero selves to deal with life and do what is right, in other words. However, they also eventually needed to stop being their superhero selves and leave it behind, in order to deal with life and do what is right in the end.
So they both had to find “life beyond that awful cave” so to speak. Both men retreated to their caves (Tony even calls his basement a “cave” at one point, I believe) unable to deal with the traumas in their lives, and the women they love aren’t sure they can be with the hero anymore due to his obsession with his alter ego. But the heroes finally face their traumas and redeem themselves while learning that they must let go of their loss/fear of loss and find the strength to want to live life happily instead of letting their pain blind them to the chance for life/love in front of them. The heroes walks away with a “clean slate,” as it’s called in both films in a very pointed example of how similar are these films and their arcs. Notice how perfectly this outcome contrasts with the earlier breaking of the heroes — they are broken down and have to repair themselves as the heroes to come back, but in the end discover they don’t need the super-personas after all. It’s a great balance of contrast and mirroring of narrative elements within a story, to see the alter egos stripped away from them when they are beaten, then to see them build it back up only to reject it themselves in a final moment of true personal victory.
