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The Dark Knight The Joker and Batman/Bruce Wayne parallels...

  • Thread starter Thread starter LakersMaz
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Bruce, on the other hand, wants Harvey to fill the spot of Batman by using the law to rid the city of criminals.
If anything, Bruce was altruistic about Harvey taking over. He knows that he is working outside the law and he knows that Harvey is the real hero that operates inside the limits of the law. "He is the true hero of Gotham, a hero with a face". When he explains this to Rachel, you can see that he isnt looking for someone to take over because he is tired of being batman, he is looking for a legitimate legal hero to carry on.

Also, hurr hurr, they both spilled their champagne. Bruce because he doesnt drink, the joker because he is nuts and grabbed the glass awkwardly. OMG the similarity! The mirroring of the personalities!

What's next? Both wear a suit?
The joker bales from jail, and Bale is playing batman. Bale and bale....wait a minute....this cant be a coincidence. NoLaN iS a gEnIoUzZz!

ITT: We overread everything.
I hate when people try to draw paralells between Batman and The Joker. It always seems really, really forced. The entire point to their interactions is that they are almost polar opposites. Their similarities are very minor, and mostly have to do with both of them essentially creating their personas.

Which we all do, so that's...not all that deep.
At least i am not alone in this.
My favourite similarity between them is very indirect.

In the dinner scene, when Harvey Dent is talking about the Romans suspending democracy and putting one man in charge...well the "Roman" was the name used for Carmine Falcone in The Long Halloween, and the mobsters elect The Joker to take care of their business, in TDK.
And in Batman Begins, Gotham is compared to Rome (when Liam Neeson refers to sacking various cities), and Gotham has now unofficially elected Batman to do its dirty work.
That's my favourite comparison between the two.
And the point of all this? The symbolism? Christ, a word used in both films = instant symbolism!
 
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Also, hurr hurr, they both spilled their champagne. Bruce because he doesnt drink, the joker because he is nuts and grabbed the glass awkwardly. OMG the similarity! The mirroring of the personalities!

ITT: We overread everything.
I wouldn't be at all amazed if it was one of those pleasant surprises - something that Heath did on one of the takes and then Nolan decided it would be fun to edit it in because it did show a parallel. It doesn't make him a genius, just very observant. I doubt they went so far as to write it into the script or direct Heath to do that. :oldrazz:
 
I wouldn't be at all amazed if it was one of those pleasant surprises - something that Heath did on one of the takes and then Nolan decided it would be fun to edit it in because it did show a parallel. It doesn't make him a genius, just very observant. I doubt they went so far as to write it into the script or direct Heath to do that. :oldrazz:
But Bruce didnt grab a snack while the joker ate a shrimp. Hmm.... Lets see....
Shrimp = sea = water = ....what about.... Croc or Penguin are in the next film?

Also, since Bruce didnt grab a snack, he is definitely the opposite of the joker who ate a snack.

It all makes sence. Nolan is a genious! I think he left some more clues on his painting, the Mona Lisa. ITT: "The DaNolan Code".

[/harmless sarcasm]

Seriously now. The joker came in and grabbed a snack and drank some champagne. He only spilled it because he was acting as if he was having a seizure. Bruce spilled his champagne because he doesnt drink. I am curious why people havent made any parallels between the champagne drinking and the scotch that Loeb drank. Come on you guys, you can come up with a conspiracy theory. All three of them drank a liquid in a glass. One drank a cheaper drink and died.
How's that?
 
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However, there's also a tinge of contradiction in their aforementioned philosophies. At one point in the movie, the Joker explains the difference between the "schemers" (the guys with plans) and him, an "agent of chaos" who plays with no rules. But as everyone who has watched the film can notice, he very methodically double-crossed the mob, pushed Harvey Dent to the brink madness, planned ways of getting out of impossible situations (think the bank heist and the prison scene), and generally stayed "ahead of the curve" in nearly every instance.

The Joker wasn't contradicting himself. He clearly defined the "schemers" and "planners" as people trying to control their world.

Yes, the Joker plans and schemes but not in that sense, which was his point.

"It's not about money. It's about sending a message."

Good analyzes, otherwise.
 
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The Joker did contradict himself, because he is a liar and a manipulator. He tells Harvey Dent that he is not a schemer, but just a "dog chasing cars." Yet, we see that is false in almost all his actions. He does not just chase cars. He plans methodically to betray the mob, to get the money and take away their power. To cause Gotham to spiral out of control. Why else would he build his entire motives to his social experiments, such as blowing up a hospital, hijacking and rigging the ferries or making Batman choose between Dent and Dawes. The biggest tell there is that he intentionally switched the addresses on Batman, thus causing him not to save the one he wanted. It was part of his plan to bring Batman (and Harvey Dent) down "to his level."

If that cruelest joke wasn't part of a masterplanner's anarchist scheme, I do not know what is. He even ends his scene by saying "Do you think I would risk the fate of Gotham's soul in a fist fight with you? Everyone has an ace in the hole and mine's Harvey Dent."

He set it all up, as he thought he was making a social explanation for the existential meaningless of everything and the humor in that. It was all "part of the plan." He lied to Harvey Dent about his motives, just as he lied to Gambol and Rachel about his origins.

And I do think that Batman and Joker are polar opposites, but to use that as an implication that they have no connection or parallels is to miss every interpretation of the two characters since the 1970s. They are connected by "completing each other," hence their inseparable link and need for one another.

And Nolan acknowledged how they are in many ways the same with simple subtle visual clues. In many ways they created Two-Face in this movie together. Batman's appearance not only brought the Joker (and that style of theatrical crime) to Gotham City but also opened the doors for a "good government" man like Harvey Dent to rise to power, when beforehand it would be impossible. Batman's influence gave to the rise of Harvey Dent.

And Joker's appearance gave way to his fall, when he had Dent scarred. And they both gave him an item in the hospital that would complete the persona of Two-Face. The scarred coin which speaks to Harvey's side/Batman's side and the gun which speaks to the darker side/Joker's side. It's all right there.
 
Read my post again. Try to get past the first sentence this time.

Yes, he's manipulating and twisting the truth.

The point is that, by the definition of a schemer he gives Dent, he is not contradicting himself.

It basically boils down to semantics.
 
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But it does. Everyone has their schemes. He may be trying to upset the establishment and go against the grain, but he is trying to make a point and "improve the world" as he sees it (to make people more like him). He is lying to Dent, because he is a schemer and even admits it in his last scene. Whenever Joker has a long conversation with anyone: the mafia, Gambol alone, Rachel, Batman in the interrogation room, Harvey dent in the hospital room, etc. take what he says with a grain of salt. He is the classic unreliable story teller given he has two complete contradicting stories of how he got his scars in the movie.
 
He's not trying to "improve the world" though.

He's trying to prove his point that at heart everyone's a killer.

He's just sending a message. The only thing he gets from this is the satisfaction that he's right. And of course he sees these situations as quite comical.
 
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But Bruce didnt grab a snack while the joker ate a shrimp. Hmm.... Lets see....
Shrimp = sea = water = ....what about.... Croc or Penguin are in the next film?

Also, since Bruce didnt grab a snack, he is definitely the opposite of the joker who ate a snack.

It all makes sence. Nolan is a genious! I think he left some more clues on his painting, the Mona Lisa. ITT: "The DaNolan Code".

[/harmless sarcasm]

Seriously now. The joker came in and grabbed a snack and drank some champagne. He only spilled it because he was acting as if he was having a seizure. Bruce spilled his champagne because he doesnt drink. I am curious why people havent made any parallels between the champagne drinking and the scotch that Loeb drank. Come on you guys, you can come up with a conspiracy theory. All three of them drank a liquid in a glass. One drank a cheaper drink and died.
How's that?

I was thinking "Not funny... not funny at all" of your post, until I arrived to the part in bold, I dunno why it made me laugh, but it did. But I guess you're right, there are some people overanalyzing things.
 
And the point of all this? The symbolism? Christ, a word used in both films = instant symbolism!

Sure, being a jerk works too. You don't think there's any similarity between the Joker and Batman in that respect? They are both elected leaders by their respective parties.
When Batman and Dent get tough on the mob, they get the Joker to do their work for them.
When **** hit the fan for Gotham, Batman took the lead and the citizens let him do all the dirty work for them.
I'm just saying the Roman analogy was a nice way of putting it, and yes, it directly parallels both Batman and the Joker.
 
Sure, being a jerk works too. You don't think there's any similarity between the Joker and Batman in that respect? They are both elected leaders by their respective parties.
When Batman and Dent get tough on the mob, they get the Joker to do their work for them.
When **** hit the fan for Gotham, Batman took the lead and the citizens let him do all the dirty work for them.
I'm just saying the Roman analogy was a nice way of putting it, and yes, it directly parallels both Batman and the Joker.
Ok i get that, but where does the Rome quote from BB come into all of this?
Ras was just mentioning big imperial cities that met their doom, supposedly because of his league of shadows. Rome and Constantinople fell to the barbarians and Turks respectively, London was burned to the ground, etc.
 
I think it's very interesting that there are similarities to these two polar opposite men. Bruce comments on how alone Joker is at the end of the film, when Bruce is alone himself, having lost Rachel in addition to his parents. They are two lonely men on opposite sides of the fence.

i have to disagree, I think there is another opposite in the fact that joker is alone yet batman isn't. i know he lost his parents and rachel, and argueably even gordon in the end (through his own choice), but from where im sitting batman will always have alfred.
 
They've always been similar. I remember seeing it the first time I read Arkham Asylum. They are almost identical, the only thing is one fights for justice (Batman), and the other fights for chaos (The Joker). When you take that away they are very similar. They both do what they do because of tragic events in their pasts, Bruce had to watch as his parents were murdered, and The Joker in the comics was thrown into a vat of biochemical waste, and The Joker in the movies was somehow brutally scared. Both are in ways the extreme extents of what they want, Batman is a vigilante who will stop at nothing (minus killing someone) to get justice, and The Joker will stop at nothing to create chaos. They both fight the system and they both break laws. They both are referred to as "The Batman" and "The Joker", they are the only two of their kind. The list of similarities goes on. But I think that was the point many authors tried to make in their comics and graphic novels, was that The Joker and The Batman are very similar.
 
i have to disagree, I think there is another opposite in the fact that joker is alone yet batman isn't. i know he lost his parents and rachel, and argueably even gordon in the end (through his own choice), but from where im sitting batman will always have alfred.

Yeah I guess you're right, he does always have Alfred.

I just noticed another similarity. Joker and Batman both use cellphones to help them reach their goals. Batman uses it to capture Lau, Joker uses it to bust out of jail.
 
But it does. Everyone has their schemes. He may be trying to upset the establishment and go against the grain, but he is trying to make a point and "improve the world" as he sees it (to make people more like him). He is lying to Dent, because he is a schemer and even admits it in his last scene. Whenever Joker has a long conversation with anyone: the mafia, Gambol alone, Rachel, Batman in the interrogation room, Harvey dent in the hospital room, etc. take what he says with a grain of salt. He is the classic unreliable story teller given he has two complete contradicting stories of how he got his scars in the movie.

The idea that the Joker thinks he's somehow helping mankind is proposterous. He's just proving his point.

Something happened to this guy that drove him over the edge, and now he wants everyone to see that they're capable of doing to eachother whatever someone did to him, and what he does to everyone else.

It's as if Bruce would've chosen to go around killing people so that they could feel his pain and the repercussions of living in a chaotic, unjust world, instead of choosing to protect innocents from that world.
 
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Completely random, but I realized they both wear black eye makeup or have panda eyes.
 
I never took the two spilling their drinks as a parallel. When Bruce throws his champagne over the edge I always interpreted that as him "tossing away" his playboy image, for the time being of course
 
It's as if Bruce would've chosen to go around killing people so that they could feel his pain and the repercussions of living in a chaotic, unjust world, instead of choosing to protect innocents from that world.

"American Psycho". :woot::woot::woot:
 
Maybe i'm looking too hard, but their opening scenes are similar:

-Joker unexpectedly bursts in with several men dressed like him (clown masks), and leaves in a giant vehicle (bus) that enters through the wall with everyone else incapacitated (dead robbers/bound hostages)

-Batman shows up in a giant vehicle that crashes through a wall (batmobile) w/ several men dressed like him (copycats, though he wasn't working with them), and leaves with everyone else incapacitated (criminals tied up)
 
^^
Nice find, actually. Reading about the whole party scene made remember that the end of it also has similarities:

Right after Bats and Rachel fall on the cab, Rachel asks Bats about Harvey, in the deleted scene when the Joker gets inside the car after throwing Rachel, one of his goons also asks about Harvey.
 
If anything, Bruce was altruistic about Harvey taking over. He knows that he is working outside the law and he knows that Harvey is the real hero that operates inside the limits of the law. "He is the true hero of Gotham, a hero with a face". When he explains this to Rachel, you can see that he isnt looking for someone to take over because he is tired of being batman, he is looking for a legitimate legal hero to carry on.

Also, hurr hurr, they both spilled their champagne. Bruce because he doesnt drink, the joker because he is nuts and grabbed the glass awkwardly. OMG the similarity! The mirroring of the personalities!

What's next? Both wear a suit?


Ok, silly as it may sound, it's in the film for a reason - the only only characters that don't drink are the ones trying to influence the elite (batman - to promote harvey, Joker - to intimidate) may be something. Maybe it's something to do with never being "off duty" as it were, either of them.

Joker is a man of "simple taste", Batman sleeps in a bunker, instead of a penthouse.
 
This is a pretty interesting thread.
It's something I'd thought about but there are some pretty solid ideas here...personally, I don't really think people are reading too much into it.
Good films should be interpereted in a number of interesting ways.
This definitely qualifies
 
Ok i get that, but where does the Rome quote from BB come into all of this?
Ras was just mentioning big imperial cities that met their doom, supposedly because of his league of shadows. Rome and Constantinople fell to the barbarians and Turks respectively, London was burned to the ground, etc.

I thought they were talking about "The Dark Knight" analogy here with the suspension of democracy for the protectors i.e. Batman/justice/order and Joker/mob/chaos. I think they meant the "Batman Begins" quote as just pointing to Gotham = Rome parallels (so not just one film but both sort of).

Angeloz
 

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