The Dark Knight Review

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. We are tonight's

entertainment. Hello and welcome to the 30th

episode of the MWIRE Movie Weekend Review. Today

we are finishing up the DC Spotlight series with

the critically acclaimed 2008 Super Smash hit

The Dark Knight. This will be the end of Volume

1 for the DC Spotlight. We will come back later

in the show episode airings. I think it's around

Episode 51 when we start Volume 2 with all of

these Superman films, which includes Supergirl.

I am your host TFG1Mike, and as usual, I am joined

by Steve Megatron. Hello. Hello. I find this

very, very weird. We actually, if I can get this

episode put together before later this evening,

We - I may actually have you release this today

on my birthday because we're doing the 30th episode

as I have just turned 30 years old. That is kind

of funny. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, what have you been

up to this week? Um, well we have most often

remind the listeners that this is uh, uh, record

attempt two. Of course this is not attempt, this

is actual. Yeah, we're not even gonna - There

was no first record attempt. Let's just put it

this way. I have a new microphone and it sounds

a hell of a lot better than that piece of shit

headset I used to have. Best $86 I've ever spent.

Yeah, no. I gotta do it next. Yep. I can send

you the link to this microphone. I mean, it's

not that bad. Hell, it's... Oh, I know. You sent

it to me already. I was just... I mean, hell,

it's overnight shipping or whatever or something

like that. It's not bad for the price. It's like

$69 .99 plus whatever the overnight shipping

is comes to like, it's like 20 bucks or something

for shipping, which is fine by me, because hell,

this thing is like super awesome, so. So. Yes,

sir. Again, what have you been up to? Um, well,

I've cut since last week, um, Batman Beyond Return

of the Joker. Uh -huh. Yes, because I'm such

a like freaking animated Batman freak right now

cool This is something I will bring up once we

get to it in the secret origins podcast once

we get to we haven't gotten there yet because

we're just record we're gonna be recording episode

2 later this evening, but Once we get to the

once in future thing part two I will be bringing

this up because I have actually been going back

and watching Batman Beyond the entire series

because I have it on DVD as Well as the return

of the Joker movie. I'm actually even though

I know Batman Beyond came before Justice League

I Wish they would have went back and did another

episode kind of like what they did with the epilogue

episode But I wish that they would have said

something about old man Bruce and Batman Beyond

remembering The time travel in the once in future

thing part two That would have been kind of cool

Yeah, that would have been neat to see you know

um yeah me uh like I said before As we're recording

this it is my the date of my 30th birthday. I'm

three decades old I feel like I'm 60 years old,

but anyway Shut up you have to make fun of you.

It's fun but the good thing is I'm getting all

kinds of cool presents so that's good of course

they're probably gonna be a while before they

freaking get here because of the freaking people

that my girlfriend ordered them from but whatever

I've never actually ordered anything from GameStop

.com, but apparently they have to verify that

it's you that's using your card or whatever,

whereas instead of just putting the card on file

and using it, it's like, oh, we actually put

a placeholder on your order because we need to

make sure that you're who you are, which I understand,

and that's more than fine, and I'm not really

trying to turn this into a headshot, because

we already recorded headshot, but I think it's

kind of stupid. But anyway, yeah, I'm going to,

I've said before, I'm going to be getting a PS3,

the 60 gig backwards compatibility version, which

I learned from Mike Laidman, who was the special

guest host on the nerd news this past week. with

myself and David Double -D Dennis, that the PS3

60 gig version is also backwards compatible with

PS1 games as well. So I will be getting Metal

Gear Solid 1 and 2 to go along with my Metal

Gear Solid 4 purchase at some point. Because

I didn't like 3. 3 was way too hard for me. But

anyway, I digress. That one word. Huh? was joking

about how you said I digress I says yeah that

one word oh well well at least I'm not doing

diarrhea but anyway so we are going to get into

our Dark Knight discussion after this A year

ago, these cops and lawyers wouldn't dare cross

any of you. I mean, what happened? So what are

you proposing? It's simple. Kill the Batman.

Here's my card. Bruce, this is Harvey Dent. Rachel's

told me everything about you. Well, certainly

I'm not. You once told me that we'd be together.

Did you mean it? Bruce, don't make me your only

hope for a normal life. You're Alfred, right?

That's right, sir. Any psychotic ex -boyfriends

I should be aware of? Oh, you have no idea. Good

evening, ladies and gentlemen. We're tonight's

entertainment. Well, hello, beautiful. You look

nervous. I've seen how it would have to become

to stop men like him. The night is darkest just

before the dawn. I promise you, the dawn is coming.

And here we go. This city deserves a better class

of criminal. I'm gonna give it to him. No! You'll

see. I'll show you. You either die a hero, or

you live long enough to see yourself become the

villain. What do you want in the back part, sir?

In the middle of the day, Alfred. Not very subtle.

The Lamborghini, then? Much more subtle. And

here are we. Hello, and this is Movie Week in

Review. This week we are closing out the DC Spotlight

Volume 1 with The Dark Knight, which is a 2008

superhero film directed and co -written by Christopher

Nolan based on the DC Comics character Batman.

The film is part of Nolan's Batman film series

and a sequel to 2005's Batman Begins. Christian

Bale reprises the lead role, the film follows

Bruce Wayne, Batman, uh... District Attorney

Harvey Dent slash Two -Face played by Aaron Ecker

Assistant DA Rachel Dawes replaced by Maggie

Gyllenhaal the original was Kate Katie Holmes

which I think Gyllenhaal is a big improvement

and Police Commissioner James Gordon played by

Gary Oldman and their struggles in the journey

combating new and rising threat of criminal who

goes by the name the Joker played by Heath Ledger

Want to also mention to everybody this episode

is dedicated to the memory of Heath Ledger Unfortunately,

he passed away very young 28 years old It was

blue. It was February 22nd 2008. I think that's

that was the date of his death. I don't know.

I don't have it pulled up here Yeah, did you

see this in theaters? No, I did not see it in

theater. Huh? I did twice I think This movie

was so so great. I like this one a hell of a

lot better than Batman Begins Fun this time around

Yeah, yeah, I mean they kind of even make mention

at the end of Batman Begins Gordon says to Batman

Oh, we got this this clown like criminal running

around the city that we will be busy with so

I like how Nolan Has tied begins in Dark Knight

together with some sort of continuity Yeah, that

was kind of nice to see him like the previous

batch of Batman movies where they just kind of

Cluster -fucked everything together. Well, they

did reference Batman forever chase Merdian did

reference Catwoman with You know the line or

do I need skin -tight vinyl and a whip? But that's

pretty much the only reference between any of

those original Bat films from the late 80s early

90s. Yeah, but they still weren't totally I mean,

they were connected, but they weren't. I mean,

it was kind of, you get it kind of a weird, I

don't know, set up from those movies compared

to these. These seem more cohesive and well thought

out. Well, that's because these are set in more

of the real world time, whereas the original

films were meant to be comic book type movies.

Which I still think that You know, I would say

that Batman 89 and Returns are each other's original

and sequel. And Batman Forever and Batman and

Robin are each other's original and sequel. Because

like you said, there really isn't that many things

to tie all four films together. No. And the constant...

The constant actor change pissed me off too.

Yeah, it's like they turned Batman into James

Bond now. Don't get me wrong I love James Bond

movies, and I understand that I know we're kind

of getting off topic here But I understand that

they have to you know do a different bond or

whatever after so many years after Contracts

go up or whatever or they want to go in a different

direction But you don't turn Batman into James

Bond. You don't have six different people playing

Batman. You know You just don't But anyways,

back to this movie, this one is actually my favorite

out of all the Batman movies out so far of live

action. Oh yeah, I completely agree. This movie

was just awesome. What did you think of how it

actually started? Because we don't actually get

the time. You don't actually, I mean, outside

of say, say you saw this in theaters. you go

to get the ticket. The ticket says Dark Knight

or whatever it's, you know, little label printing

on the ticket says. You go into the theater,

you watch the previews and all the fucking commercials

which that's a whole other headshot that we could

do because I hate advertisements in movie theaters.

But anyway, the movie starts off, we see the

Chicago skyline which is supposed to be Gotham.

You don't actually see a title. You won't see

the title of the film until the very end of the

film after it ends right before the credits.

So what did you think of the way that they opened

this film? Very different from the last one and

they kind of started off on fast pace. I was

kind of surprised to see the scarecrow back so

soon. Yeah, but he wasn't really... He was a

quick shot. It wasn't really a main feature.

Yeah, and you really couldn't make him a main...

It goes back to the fact that comic book movies

nowadays should not have... I like... different

aspects of spider -man 3 but spider -man 3 on

a whole sucked ass mainly because of the fact

that there was two or three or four or five or

six or however many villains spider -man 3 had

you know two villains is pushing it three villains

is just you know you're going off the fucking

edge but in this one you have the joker the mob

two -faced the mob really doesn't have the mob

is pretty much in with the Joker So you don't

really count. I mean you really could count the

mob, but you really don't have to Yeah, and the

two -faced thing that doesn't come up really

until almost the very end of the film So you

really only had one main? Yeah Yeah, so Basically

we have the you know we get introduced to the

Joker who was played by Heath Ledger who I you

know I think is probably his the best role he

ever did this is also the last full completed

project he did there was another film after this

I don't remember what the title of it was he

started doing work on it but they would eventually

have to replace him with somebody else I don't

know what that film was I can't think of it for

the life of me what it is but if you told me

three -and -a -half four years ago that Heath

Ledger was going to play the Joker, I'd have

looked at you cross -eyed. I would have laughed.

I wouldn't have laughed. Like the Joker. Well,

you can't pull that off. I wish. You cannot pull

that off. You are not Mark Hamill. No, I wish

I could do that voice, though. Yes. You know,

I mainly knew Heath Ledger from his very first

Hollywood Americanized film, which is a teen

comedy based on the Shakespeare Taming of the

Shrew. It's an updated version of Taming of the

Shrew called 10 Things I Hate About You. And

then I saw him in The Patriot with Mel Gibson,

and then I saw him in A Knight's Tale, and he'd

been in a couple other things like Brokeback

Mountain and whatever else. He started doing

more like, I don't know if he started doing more

theater or more independent films, but after

Brokeback Mountain, you really didn't see a whole

lot of him in the mainstream until you got the

news for this. And it was like, oh my god. No

kidding. Yeah. Because he pulled this off just

with flying colors, I think. I don't think anybody

else could have pulled it off as good. No. He

pulls off the creepy. He pulls off just the overall

look of the Joker. The attitude of the Joker.

I mean this is pretty much the serial killer

version of the Joker. And I am so glad. I understand

in Batman 89 they had to give that Joker an alias

or a nickname or whatever. Jack Napier. As far

as my understanding is, and people can write

in or send us voice mails and let us know, as

far as my knowledge of the Joker goes, they often

change his origin, but his original origin, he

was never to have a real name or anything like

that, and they don't do that in this. They pretty

much say he has no other aliases, his clothes

are all custom made. He has nothing but knives

in his pockets. I think it was a really great

portrayal of the Joker. Well, they for once gave

him an original, like just totally different

standing that nobody knows who the hell this

guy is because every mark of identification that

what he would have... He doesn't have. ...doesn't

even lead to him. He doesn't have any identification.

There's no fingerprints. There's no, you know,

defining face or, you know, he's totally screwed

up. I love the joker masks in the bank scene.

I thought those were kind of cool. It was kind

of funny, like, how the whole plan played out

in that. Yeah, and he's like, oh, so the boss

told you to kill me, too? He goes, no, I'm supposed

to kill the bus driver. What bus driver? And

then the school bus comes backing into the other

thing, and he's like, and the bus driver's like,

hey, where'd all the other guys go? Boom.