The Dark Knight Rises Was I the only one shocked during the big reveal?

[Shpati]

Those pictures of the snow with Miranda (Tailia) were all over the web. I mean, for someone who uses a computer daily, it is kind of hard to avoid those pictures for an entire year.

Not to mention that the trailers made it too easy to figure out the plot. I knew that the sewer scene was going to be where Batman broke his back, and I knew that the snow scene was going to be the final battle.

I was hoping that Nolan was going to do a surprise fight scene, like he did in TDK with the SWAT scene. That SWAT scene was something I did not expect at all.

TDKR was predictable in general from beginning to end. But that does not mean it was a bad movie. It was very good, and I enjoyed the movie like crazy. The movie just liked suspense.

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

I didn't see the pics. I had deliberately avoided anything to do with this forum in the year or two prior to release. However, she was clearly Talia from the moment she was cast. She could only be Talia or Selina, and Selina was being played by somebody else.

 

[Macrotus]

You know what, I had totally forgotten about the pics of Marion as Talia leaking - and also about that little girl talking about how she's a young version of Marion or Talia, or whatever. I kind of tried to stay away from spoilers after that.

What I remember is how pissed off I was at David Letterman for mentioning Batman dying, that was all that went through my mind during the movie like "WTF, was David trolling or not". That distracted me completely from the whole Talia thing, and other spoilers.

 

[GothamInAshes]

i was not shocked. in fact i stood up in the theater and practically yelled "I KNEW IT!!!" at the screen

 

[jacobed]

Just about everyone in my theater was shocked. A guy screamed out holy **** when it happened

 

[AnneFan]

It was one of the most unsurprising movie twists I've ever seen. Clear as day pics of Cottiard in LOS garb walking casually with armed LOS men were all over the net a year before the movie's release.

One of the worst kept secrets for a movie.

Definitely. I wasn't surprised at all. It would've been a lot more surprising if she remained as Tate.

 

[BatLobster]

I just don't feel that the twist was ever really meant to shock people. I'm sure Nolan would be glad to have fooled some people with it, but to anyone who knows anything about Batman, or just about femme fatales and Nolan's obsession with film noir, it was painfully clear that there was more to the Tate character. Almost every line she said oozed ambiguity. She has a mysterious scar on her back for crying out loud. This is part of why I enjoyed Rises more on all my subsequent viewings than that I did the first one. Tate is written in a way where all of her actions and lines have some ulterior motive, and it's more enjoyable once you know for sure that she's Talia.

"But on the nights when we had a fire, we felt very rich indeed."

Favorite Tatelia line in the whole movie.

 

[kvz5]

I wasn't surprised since I already knew about the exact thing that will happen (stabbing) from the reports of our Burgh s (still can't believe they left the casting sheets out in the open like that ). I do remember someone muttering a shocked "that b***h" at the back of the theater when it happened.

Wasn't the word that Nolan was upset and angry about the whole thing about Tatelia leaking?

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Virtually every time she talks about her goals and philosophy on life, it sounds identical to something Ra's Al Ghul would say.

When I saw it with family that didn't know about Talia from the comics or saw any of the spoilers, they told me afterwards that they had deduced it from two main things.

1) She always seemed to be around when something bad happened, such as the special forces agents getting caught.
2) Since Catwoman was the clear romantic lead, that meant Miranda had to be either the villain or a corpse. And you don't cast Cotillard just to unceremoniously kill her off without a real role in the plot.

 

[Victarion]

Yep! I remember how crazy it was when that picture of Marion hit the TDKR spoiler forums. Honestly, the biggest shocker (FOR ME) was Bane breaking the Batman. I didn't think Nolan would keep that in the movie given how long it'd take Bruce to recover. So the timeflow of the 2nd act was a big surprise.

Those of us who knew this was a trilogy going into the film probably picked up on the hints in Miranda's lines. Prior to this, people were talking up TDK. Almost as if they didn't know about or had totally forgotten BB. So its like Nolan wanted to remind the GA about BB.

The deception here wasn't any more...surprising than Ra's reveal in Act 3 of BB. However, I think the character Nolans and Goyer developed leading up to the reveal allowed Talia to truly walk up behind Batman and stab him. She stabbed him in the side, ya, but given how they had their thing, she also stabbed him in the heart.

@kv5: I think someone reported that Nolan had said, in a frustated manner, "How are they getting this?" or something similar. I don't recall for sure. Can someone back me up on this?

 

[Kahran Ramsus]

Ra's reveal actually did surprise me. I was expecting Watanabe to come back with help of the Lazarus Pit.

Even in this film, I thought there was a chance that Ra's was going to be the real villain (with Tate still as Talia) up until the point that the Lazarus Pit was revealed as being of a different nature entirely.

 

[kvz5]

@kv5: I think someone reported that Nolan had said, in a frustated manner, "How are they getting this?" or something similar. I don't recall for sure. Can someone back me up on this?

Yeah, I think that's the one. Also, I think one of our s there reported that they tried to cover the scene up so they clearly didn't want anyone to see it.

 

[psylockolussus]

A bit. And I really didn't like it because Bane was put aside quickly after the reveal of Marion's character.

 

[Nathan]

Not really shocked. More like utterly disappointed.

 

[Doc Samson]

It was baffling to me how easily people here predicted the entire plot of the film. Except maybe JGL's role (a lot of us were convinced of his villainy). Despite how fluidly the dots connected, we were in denial, telling ourselves the plot couldn't be that predictable, that it was Nolan!

Which is exactly why I think a lot of hardcore fans don't like TDKR as much as more general fans do. I've been saying this from the time the movie came out, because it was one of my initial issues with it.

I kept myself away from this site but not before I saw the spy pics of Marion, not to mention Liam Neeson getting spotted on set which only lends credence to who she really was (and further spoiling the Ras cameo in and of itself)

I also read some of the Blake theories, that after some thought, made sense. Obviously we also know what Bane's original purpose was in the comics, so even when that happened it was less of a shock to us then to someone who has no idea who Bane is. Even the fake death is reminiscent of Dark Knight Returns, and something we speculated about months prior.

Going into a movie with all that swirling in your head ultimately just gives everything much less of an impact and also undermines Nolan's "twists" that are his usual MO. Just about every pivotal scene or moment in TDKR is robbed of surprise & suspense if you're any type of hardcore Batman fan.

 

[jmc]

Thing is people were figuring out the plot long before filming had even started. The whole Bane leading the LoS to finish what Ra's started was discussed pretty much the moment it was revealed Bane would be the villain and that Miranda Tate was a character.

 

[Ryan]

My dad has never read a batman comic and has only see a few of the tv shows, batman 89, and the first 2 nolan films. He spotted right away that Miranda was going to turn out to be a villain. My wife, who probably knows even less about batman, figured out half way through the movie that blake would be robin. I didn't find any of the 'twists' in the movie to be a twist or surprise and probably the only thing I wouldn't have seen coming was if Dent reappeared.

 

[TheDreamMaster]

It was one of the most unsurprising movie twists I've ever seen. Clear as day pics of Cottiard in LOS garb walking casually with armed LOS men were all over the net a year before the movie's release.

One of the worst kept secrets for a movie.

Yep, this spoiled it for me too.

 

[BatLobster]

To me, the biggest twist of the film was the fact that the key to Bruce's rise was allowing fear back in. That's the core of the story and it flips his entire journey on its head while bringing it full circle.

Everything else, like Talia's true identity, Blake's real first name and Bruce surviving the blast are more like "cosmetic" twists. They're fun and they give the story some more color, but they're relatively easy to spot and better enjoyed on subsequent viewings when you can appreciate the nuance and deeper meanings of things.

 

[FeedOnATreeFrog]

The young Bane (child of Ra's thing) threw me off, for the better.

Perhaps Nolan knew the comic audience would know, so he tried to fake them out. I appreciated it.

 

[The Joker]

Thing is people were figuring out the plot long before filming had even started. The whole Bane leading the LoS to finish what Ra's started was discussed pretty much the moment it was revealed Bane would be the villain and that Miranda Tate was a character.

Yeah, I've never seen so many big details to a CBM movie get figured out so accurately long before the movie was due for release.

 

[kvz5]

To me, the biggest twist of the film was the fact that the key to Bruce's rise was allowing fear back in. That's the core of the story and it flips his entire journey on its head while bringing it full circle..

That was a nice surprise to me.

Yeah, I've never seen so many big details to a CBM movie get figured out so accurately long before the movie was due for release.

Yeah... And I remember a lot thinking that it can't be it. It can't be that simple. There has to be something more. It's Nolan after all.

I remember when the 3rd trailer came out, someone suggested that the back shot of Catwoman riding the Batpod might be the last shot of TDKR (since it kinda mirror's Batman's last shot in TDK) and I scoffed at the suggestion. I said there's absolutely no way that Nolan will end TDKR and his entire Batman trilogy with a shot of a character that's not Bruce and someone not even introduced until the 3rd movie. I said that even if Bruce dies, it will end with something/someone consistent within the 3 movies like maybe Gordon, the Batsignal, or Gotham. Oops. I was so wrong.

 

[Monicabbm]

It was a surprise to me because I forgot a lot of things.

Days before seeing the movie, I thought she would fall in love with Bruce and betray Bane. Then Bane would kill her. lol

This picture always makes me laugh.

When I first saw it, I thought it was the final scene of the film. I thought she had gone to the funeral of Bruce, just to divert attention, but then she was leaving Gotham and going to meet him in somewhere.

Then I laughed thinking it was a cliche and that Nolan would not do that!

 

[MagnarTheGreat]

Devin's report said that Batman would be taking on Bane while Catwoman took on Talia in the climax. I was fine about the Bane and Talia angle, only was dreading a guy v guy/girl v girl scenario. So he got that wrong. And Bane and Talia weren't lovers either.

I'm starting to really hate spoilers, it really does eat away at the joy of watching movies when things get taken out of context. Glad I'm completely spoiler free so far for Man of Steel, Star Trek and Iron Man 3.

They likely changed the script since his source(s) received their information and "game of telephoned" it to him. The published script deviates from the movie a lot near the end. Interesting enough, there's names and dates such as "PINK REVISION", "BLUE REVISION", and "WHITE REVISION" on some of the script photos in the Second Screen app and dates that took place from March to June 2011. Might have been some minor production rewrites going on elsewhere in the script.

 

[PyroChamber]

Even without seeing the pics, I'm sure people would have seen it coming after that one scene of her looking out the window during the big brawl.