I don't know, the entire point of Batman is ninja ass-kicking + magic technology + oh shit he crazy, so that whole thing didn't faze me at all.
― ^likes black girls (HI DERE), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:12 (fifteen years ago) link
^likes this post
― K DEF FROM REAL LIVE (deej), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:13 (fifteen years ago) link
i don't understand why you are still saying these things to him over and over. you are comnpletely correct, and everything you say is 100% truth bomb but he's just going to come back with some false tautology like "harvey dent is ludicrous because i think his character looked silly with makeup and also i think that maggie gyllenhaal wouldn't be his type anyway" and you're back to square one.
Yeah, arguments based on opinions are like houses on sand.
― B.L.A.M., Thursday, December 18, 2008 1:03 PM (3 hours ago)
because that's clearly the point being made!
also i agree about the cell phone thing! especially since it led to something as ridiculous as that particular technology. it didn't take me out of the movie and make me dislike it (and i honestly forgot about it until it was just brought up) but damn that was eye-rolling. it was just a weird conflict, and then nothing came of them having this conflict, for no reason, and the scene was kind of dumb in the end and it was utterly forgettable.
― the schef (adam schefter ha ha), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:15 (fifteen years ago) link
^^ this
was not necessary
― s1ocki, Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:16 (fifteen years ago) link
it was less the nature of the technology than the narrative shit it kicked off
regardless i think we all agree that AW should see the movie -- its v v good imo
― K DEF FROM REAL LIVE (deej), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:17 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah it is worth it for heath ledger sliding down a pile of money and than lighting it on fire as far as i am concerned
― the schef (adam schefter ha ha), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:18 (fifteen years ago) link
it reminded me of the waterboarding scene in iron man, just some shit cummin outta nowhere to make u b like 'hmm this makes me think~'
― cankles, Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:18 (fifteen years ago) link
nah i mean that'd be like the batman brutality scene in the jail to me, would be analogous.
― the schef (adam schefter ha ha), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:19 (fifteen years ago) link
i got a kick out of the movie trying so hard to Say Something about every ongoing conflict in modern usa life 2008. but my taste in that kind of thing is sort of perverse (deadwood lol) so ymmv.
xp heh
― joule kilcher (goole), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:19 (fifteen years ago) link
The flipside to "oh shit he's crazy" is "but he knows this"; the argument would have escalated had Bruce not made Lucius the custodian of the phone array, but Bruce being smart and generally decent (if crazy) knew he could get use out of it that one time as long as he promised Lucius that he could destroy it once The Joker had been caught. Besides, it's not like he couldn't reresearch and rebuild it at a later point if he didn't want to! The conflict basically was put off because the need go after Joker BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY was paramount.
I basically saw that whole scene (and the bits that led up to it) as foreshadowing for a much more fascist Batman in movie #3 (a move also made easier by his decision to embrace the outlaw role to protect Harvey's reputation/inspirational power).
― ^likes black girls (HI DERE), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:23 (fifteen years ago) link
^likes batgirl
― s1ocki, Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:23 (fifteen years ago) link
can't lie, ws
― ^likes black girls (HI DERE), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:24 (fifteen years ago) link
Why does Nolan hate Batgirl/Barbara Gordon so much that he wouldn't even show the child version of her in this movie? That's what I found weird.
― Nicolars (Nicole), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:41 (fifteen years ago) link
my nightmare of this thread repeating itself wholesale when the DVD was released has come true
except there was less tuomas bashing before
the whole suggest ban thing is turning ilx into some lord of the flies / crucible type shit
― Edward III, Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:48 (fifteen years ago) link
house of un-suggestiban activities
― Dr. Yakubius (and what), Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:52 (fifteen years ago) link
have you now or have you ever been a member of the troll party
― Edward III, Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:53 (fifteen years ago) link
BURN THE TROLL BURN HIM
once he's gone we'll look for the next nail sticking up
hammer 'em down
's cool
― Edward III, Thursday, 18 December 2008 21:54 (fifteen years ago) link
― Edward III, Thursday, December 18, 2008 9:48 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
sorry i disagreed with your beloved finn
― s1ocki, Thursday, 18 December 2008 22:10 (fifteen years ago) link
they came for deeznuts and I said nothing etc
― Edward III, Thursday, 18 December 2008 22:41 (fifteen years ago) link
The thing that annoyed me about the cell phone tracking thingummy was the visual aspect, it kinda gave me a headache.
― Number None, Friday, 19 December 2008 03:14 (fifteen years ago) link
see i think a major fallacy of your argument, tuomas, is the idea that because TDK is dark & serious that it is somehow "realist." it's no more realistic than a joel schumacher batman. there's nothing REALISTIC about any of these movies at all. nolan's is as much a fable as a tim burton batman movie, just in a different key. i agree that superhero stuff works better as fantasy, but fantasy does not have to = goofy or funny. most fables and fairy tales are pretty f'ing dark.
Yes, I do realize DK is a fantasy, just like Burton's Batman is. However, there are different ways of doing a fantasy story. Burton is more interested in using the characters as archetypes and pays less attention to character psychology. Nolan's approach has much more to do with individual psychology; hell, about half of BB was spent explaining the psychological reasons why Bruce Wayne wants to be Batman. Now, I felt that within this more psychological, more "realistic" approach (I'm not using the word "realistic" here to say that DK is less of a fantasy, rather than to describe a certain aesthetic and narrative approach that is more prominent in the Nolan Batman movies than in the Burton movies, and which generally ties with "realism" as applied in art) Dent's transformation to Two-Face didn't feel credible. In less realistic and more fable-like stories, like Burton's Batman movies or many Batman comics, this wouldn't have been an issue, because psychological explanations are less important in them.
Also, when I said that I liked Burton's more fable-like movies more, I didn't mean that I necessarily want Batman to be less dark. Like you said, many fables are very dark, and Burton's movies are dark too, but they're dark in a different way. I feel that the "grim and gritty" approach pioneered by Frank Miller, and followed by many other Batman stories (including Nolan's two films) isn't a particularly good one, because it tries to insert "realistic" themes (such as an individual psychology) and issues (vigilantism, the political implications of Batman's work) into these stories, which is at odds with the inherently fantastic/fable-like nature of the whole idea of superheroes. I think superhero stories work better when they're closer to LotR or Dracula or Star Wars than Dirty Harry.
― Tuomas, Friday, 19 December 2008 10:26 (fifteen years ago) link
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
― K DEF FROM REAL LIVE (deej), Friday, 19 December 2008 10:28 (fifteen years ago) link
Batman's not a superhero.
― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Friday, 19 December 2008 10:59 (fifteen years ago) link
Eh? He is one of the two or three best known superheroes.
― Tuomas, Friday, 19 December 2008 11:04 (fifteen years ago) link
He's a detective, kid.
― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Friday, 19 December 2008 11:08 (fifteen years ago) link
Normal human being who happens to be a billionaire and a ninja.
No super powers. Which makes him... allegory, or urban legend, rather than myth.
― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Friday, 19 December 2008 11:09 (fifteen years ago) link
Also, Burton's Batman (the first one at least) is a horrific narrative mess that makes no sense, a procession of unconvincing aesthetic tropes and miscast ideas that has aged terribly.
― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Friday, 19 December 2008 11:13 (fifteen years ago) link
Have you ever read superhero comics? There are a kazillion superheros with no supernatural powers.
― Tuomas, Friday, 19 December 2008 11:38 (fifteen years ago) link
― K DEF FROM REAL LIVE (deej), Friday, December 19, 2008 11:28 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
― special guest stars mark bronson, Friday, 19 December 2008 11:38 (fifteen years ago) link
Well yeah, I'm not saying Burton's movie are perfect (though the second one is better than the first, it's the best Batman movie IMO), just that his approach to Batman is better than Nolan's.
― Tuomas, Friday, 19 December 2008 11:39 (fifteen years ago) link
I think superhero stories work better when they're closer to LotR or Dracula or Star Wars than Dirty Harry.
http://www.coverbrowser.com/image/captain-america/1-2.jpg
― Emergency Rainbow (Pancakes Hackman), Friday, 19 December 2008 13:03 (fifteen years ago) link
Having watched this for the first time last night, Tuomas completely OTM here, couldn't agree more!
― tomofthenest, Friday, 19 December 2008 13:22 (fifteen years ago) link
― Tuomas, Friday, December 19, 2008 12:38 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink
If they don't have super powers, they're not superheroes; they're comicbook characters.
― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Friday, 19 December 2008 13:27 (fifteen years ago) link
If they don't have super powers, they're not superheroes; they're comicbook characters. masked adventurers.
http://jordanhoffman.com/wp-content/uploads/watchmen-zack-snyder-update-big.jpg
― ^likes tilt-a-whirls (Pancakes Hackman), Friday, 19 December 2008 13:29 (fifteen years ago) link
Good call. Except Ozymandias, who might be considered to have super powers. And that blue dude.
― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Friday, 19 December 2008 13:40 (fifteen years ago) link
Well, you can call the characters what you want, but I was talking about superhero stories as a genre, and to me it's pretty obvious that characters without superpowers such as Batman, Robin, Green Arrow, or Daredevil are part of the same genre as superpowered characters like Superman, Spiderman, Flash, or Green Lantern. Batman and Spiderman are both masked adventurers with secret identities who devote their lives to fighting crime because a criminal killed their (surrogate) parent(s). The ezistence or lack of powers is not really an essential difference between them.
― Tuomas, Friday, 19 December 2008 14:24 (fifteen years ago) link
Daredevil has sonar. Just so long as we're keeping track of powers.
― ^likes tilt-a-whirls (Pancakes Hackman), Friday, 19 December 2008 14:34 (fifteen years ago) link
it's very sweet of Mouthy to give Tuomas a pointless argument to be on the right side of for once as an act of Christmas charity.
― e|t|c (some dude), Friday, 19 December 2008 14:38 (fifteen years ago) link
So far we have three super heroes with no super natural powers. I'm not feeling wrong.
― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Friday, 19 December 2008 15:03 (fifteen years ago) link
And just to be really pedantic, Green Lantern himself has no powers at all. His ring does.
― ^likes tilt-a-whirls (Pancakes Hackman), Friday, 19 December 2008 15:07 (fifteen years ago) link
― Sick Mouthy (Scik Mouthy), Friday, December 19, 2008 10:03 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark
maybe you should spend a little time alone trying to get in touch with your wrongness
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superhero
― Edward III, Friday, 19 December 2008 15:08 (fifteen years ago) link
Thread is missing a comicbookguy.jpg
― DavidM, Friday, 19 December 2008 15:09 (fifteen years ago) link
I didn't like batman begins precisely because its realistic and ludicrous attributes don't jive in a satisfactory manner but TDK doesn't suffer from the same issue due to its stringent policier vibe
I swear I said the same thing 5000 posts ago but clicking on show all messages will probably take down the internet
― Edward III, Friday, 19 December 2008 15:10 (fifteen years ago) link
you don't need jpgs when you've got the real thing
xpost
If you're going to make an argument that Batman isn't a superhero, it isn't because he has no innate powers; it's because he's an antihero.
― ^likes black girls (HI DERE), Friday, 19 December 2008 15:11 (fifteen years ago) link
(And even that is changing what with our embrace of gritty realism as virtuous in our storytelling)
― ^likes black girls (HI DERE), Friday, 19 December 2008 15:12 (fifteen years ago) link
I was about to reflexively disagree with you, Dan, but then thought for a second that there's really not much difference between, say, Batman and The Punisher, aside from Bruce Wayne having a respectable public persona.
But if you want to pursue that line of thought, then maybe Iron Man and any post-Civil War registered heroes aside, most comic book heroes are really antiheroes, operating as they do outside the confines of the law.
― ^likes tilt-a-whirls (Pancakes Hackman), Friday, 19 December 2008 15:15 (fifteen years ago) link