A great villain should never have an anti-climatic end because he/she becomes irrelevant and forgotten.

Rating: 6/10 (24 July 2012)

When I first saw the trailer of this movie I was very excited. The first two in the series are two of my favorite movies. I also find them to be much superior to the Tim Burton ones. I won't mention the Joel Schumacher ones especially Batman and Robin because those were just plain terrible. The Dark Knight in particular should be used as the Gold Standard when making comic book hero movies. When I went to watch the Dark Knight Rises I saw a movie that had it all. It had a great villain, BANE, who was amazingly portrayed by the gifted Tom Hardy. In fact, I like Bane almost as much as the Joker. In fact, as I read reviews I find it unfair to compare the two villains as they have almost nothing in common other than their wanting to create havoc. The way Bane was portrayed in Batman and Robin shouldn't serve as any comparison to Bane in The Dark Knight Rises. In the Dark Knight Rises Bane is articulate and calculating in his destruction of Gotham City. His manner of speech is that of a highly educated and intelligent person with a great scientific mind. In short he basically wants to create a new world order starting Gotham City. The Joker was just a madman who wanted to destroy just because he wanted to. I didn't mind the long pauses in the action. I didn't mind the extensive dialog because this is what made the Nolan series standout from the Tim Burton ones. Unfortunately, the Dark Knight Rises didn't live up to my expectations for several reasons. First, I found that Ann Hathaway was trying to hard to be seductive in her role. Her manner of speech when she was dancing with Wayne (i.e. there is a storm coming Mr. Wayne) was annoying and a big turn off for me. I am glad she didn't get so much screen time. I did like how her character played both sides. This gave her character complexity. I just wished she didn't act so seductive because she didn't have to. Secondly and most importantly, I felt that Bane's death was anti-climatic. His death happens so fast that if you turn your head for a moment you would miss his death scene. I expected a final battle between the hero and villain but it never materialized. In addition, the twist at the end effectively made Bane an irrelevant character. I kept hoping for Bane to appear during the end credits but to my disappointment it didn't happen. Also the manner of death of the true villain was also disappointing and anti-climatic. Bane deserved a better end than he got. In fact his end further reinforces my opinion that after the true bad guy is revealed that Bane is an irrelevant character in the movie. A great villain should never have an anti-climatic end because he/she becomes irrelevant and forgotten. This movie could have actually been made without Bane. By far my favorite characters in the movie were Miranda Tate, Luscious Fox, Commissioner Gordon and Detective Blake. I really liked the Miranda Tate and Detective Blake twists at the end. In fact, out of all the characters Detective Blake was the most developed and complex characters in the movie and I firmly believe his character really help the movie.