The Dark Knight Journey

The newly completed Dark Knight trilogy forms a tightly knit story about a lone hero in pursuit of justice.  Each film explores the issue from a different angle and creates a comprehensive psyche of both Batman and Gotham City.  Both pass through the different stages of life and face the various trials therein.  Batman follows a very simple progression: birth, life, death.  The story of a boy who became a man who became a legend.  A true hero for the books, through and through.  



Fear, Darkness, & Youth
Batman's story begins during childhood.  Like most children, he has a fear of scary creatures that are related to night and darkness.  His father tells him that the things that are the most scary are actually the most afraid.  As if on cue, his parents are murdered by something benign like a guy on the street.  What's interesting is that they actually get more justice than most victims.  The murderer is caught, imprisoned, and later murdered himself.  What still remains is Bruce's fear.  It's been badly shaken. 

We know little of Bruce's education, but we can assume it was pampered and full of scientific book studies.  What he needed to grow into an adult was more practical experience in his chosen field i.e. crime fighting.  So he travels abroad to learn, leaving the nest so to speak and returning a more "educated" man ready to assume the cape and cowl.  But the marks of youth don't end there.  Bruce's journey includes the act of stumbling and falling as a part of the  learning process.  Three times, he "falls" and has to picked up and reassured by a parental figure (once by his father and twice by Alfred).  He has to make mistakes in order to do things right. 

Darkness is the visual cue of Gotham City gripped in fear.  Most of the scenes within the city take place at night.  Nighttime is the when people are most afraid to out of their homes, and thus it is Batman's first battleground.  One can see a growing control over his own fear in his encounters with bats.  First, as a source of his fear, then as something benign and harmless, and finally, an ally in his fight to retake Gotham.  After controlling his own fear, he goes out to fight Gotham's.  

One of the slogans used in the Batman franchise is "Who Rules the Night?"  Well, by the end of the first film, it's Batman.  This emboldens the police and the law to take back their city.  Justice has a purpose again.   

Chaos & Villainy
Batman's example puts Gotham's population on a path of undeserved self-righteousness.  The criminal element becomes something to be looked down upon rather than feared.  They take confidence in their moral superiority since someone else can be the bad guy for them.

The largest theme explored in this film is the concept of villainy and the interplay of light and dark.  Gotham has its White Knight in Harvey Dent who uncompromisingly and legitimately pursues justice during the day, and the Dark Knight in Batman who enables him to do that by illegally attacking criminals at night.  In between there's also the Grey Knight in Jim Gordon, who stands behind Dent, but has to tolerate corrupt cops in order to do it.  This comes full circle at the end when Two-Face flips to decide their fates.  Harvey will live (at least in reputation), Batman will die, and Gordon gets a little of both.

"You see their morals, their code, 
it's a bad joke.  Dropped at the 
first sign of trouble."  

The Joker enters as the mob's equivalent to Batman.  Much like Batman, he crosses a line to do what they cannot in pursuit of a larger goal, and he has no identity or known pressure points that can be exploited.  What's interesting is there are slight attempts from both Joker and Batman at conformity.  Batman tries to act like a cop to build trust, but the Joker tries to blend with his fellow criminals so he can betray them.  He cannot be controlled and the mob realizes too late that his motivations are murky at best and counterproductive at worst.   

The Joker's quest is prove the darkness that everyone has; that under certain circumstances, everyone is a villain and he finds it funny when the forces of good try to deny that.  He tells Batman that he'll have to break "his one rule" in order to beat him and he's a man of his word.  Though Batman is able to spare the Joker's life, he is forced to kill Harvey Dent and cover up for his crimes.  In so doing, he becomes a part of the very corruption he had striven against.  Likewise, Harvey's dichotomy had been hinted at in the early part of the film and when Joker reveals his true face, the forces of good and evil all become enemies alike.

What give this film extra weight is the discussions on the price of victory.  A masked madman has no limits; he can do anything, be anything, allow anything if he so chooses.  In order for him to be beaten, Batman and Gordon have to cross every line they swore not to.  Fight fire with fire and everyone gets burned.  

Pain, Age, & Generation

Batman's final crisis is a three pronged trial.  The past versus present, old versus young, and hope versus despair.  There is a distinct age gap between the new and old characters, which ties into a generational shift.  An older Batman, now without an parental figure, faces off against a young, vibrant "Cat" woman, while an older Commissioner Gordon mentors the young hothead, John Blake, and the progeny of Ra's al Ghul comes to give Gotham its reckoning.  The younger characters are also used as a catalyst for the consequences of past sins; sins that can no longer be hidden by a mask.  

Batman is called to account for his actions against Ra's al Ghul and the League of Shadows, while Gordon's role in the death of Harvey Dent is revealed to the world.  In addition, Selina Kyle (Catwoman) finds herself locked into the life of thievery despite a desire for something else.  Meanwhile, the wealthy of Gotham are punished for any potential contribution to poverty.  Masks appear more frequently in this film than any other, and allude to their original intent: to hide something.  Bruce and Selina find their masks losing effectiveness from drawing too much attention; Bruce eventually gets unmasked by Bane.  Bane's mask also hides a hidden pain which, when revealed, is enough to make him lose some control. 

With Bane drawing everything out into the light of day, including Batman, the distinctions between day & night and light & dark no longer matter.  The dueling opposites instead become fire & ice, as metaphors for hope and despair.  We see the first Bat symbol carved in ice sheets, signifying Bruce's initial despair over Rachel's death and Harvey's fall.  Bane then arrives in Gotham City and uses the promise of fire to bring the city into wintery despair.  Though it's not an empty threat, the real fire doesn't arrive until Batman returns to free the city.  Once the fire goes out, his quest to save Gotham is finished and the torch is passed. 

Conclusions
The villains follow a very cyclic pattern.  All movies have a front villain that appears early in the film and then a hidden villain that is revealed in the third act.  The hidden villain always has a personal grudge against Batman while the initial villain never does (beyond being opponents).  Each villain attacks Gotham from different angles.  Scarecrow attacks the mind, Joker the soul, and Bane the body with each one well chosen for their specific task.  In all cases, the motivation of the final villain is justice, or more specifically, justice without law.  For Ra's, justice is about balance.  Those who gave into fear must be destroyed by their own fear.  Two-Face's pursuit of justice had broken him as Harvey Dent so he passed the burden of responsibility onto a coin; regardless of the crime, the punishment is life or death.  Finally, Talia completes the escalation by multiplying the punishment.  Instead of an eye for an eye, it's an eye for a city.  Batman is the only one allowed to pursue justice outside the law, since everyone else is a danger to themselves or others.  In a way, he has to become each villain in order to defeat them.  He is unique by being a villain that fights for the forces of good.  At the end of the series, Bruce's friends discuss revealing his identity to the Gotham, but Gordon says it doesn't matter.  The city knows what he did and who he was. 

He was the Batman.  Justice was served.