~EnygmatycNinja

The Dark Knight is here. Finally.

After almost a year of hype and anticipation, the long-awaited sequel to the cemented greatness that is Batman Begins has finally been released to the masses. Even as I write this, millions of people have already flooded the movie theatres awaiting their chance to see perhaps the biggest movie of the summer of 2008. However, with the unexpected, but apparent success of its predecessor, could this be the epic sequel we’ve all been waiting for?

Continuing where Batman Begins left off, this story has a lot to do with Bruce Wayne’s maturity as Batman as he continues his war on crime in Gotham City. With the aid of Lieutenant Jim Gordon and District Attorney Harvey Dent, Batman sets out to destroy the last of the criminal underground and finally end the corruption that plagues Gotham City’s streets. But when all seems to be going well, a string of chaos ensues under the name of the Joker, and it’s up to the Dark Knight to put an end to the misery of the Joker’s reign of terror that threatens to consume the city, its citizens, and most importantly, Batman himself.

I’m going to try not to spoil the movie too much during this review, but here’s what I thought about it. Was it good? Yes. Was it great? Yes. Would I recommend it to everyone I come across for the next ten years? Yes. But was it perfect? NO! And I know some people are going to flip out by what I just said, so before I get spammed with an inbox full of flame mail, allow me to explain: First off, this installment isn’t as action-packed as the first one, which is a semi-negative considering that the movie is almost 3 hours long. Secondly, except for Two-Face (yes, Harvey Dent becomes Two-Face in this movie), it also wasn’t as developmental as the first movie, which raises a lot of questions for the few people who are fairly new to the legend of Batman. I mean, I think it would’ve been nice to see how the Joker came to be (which Heath Ledger did an absolute wonderful job of portraying by the way). Speaking of the Joker, to me it felt that throughout the movie, he and Two-Face were constantly butting heads over screen time. And judging by the previews, I was under the impression that it was all going to be about the Joker and Batman’s never-ending emotional and psychological rivalry, which turned out to be only half the case. Pretty much everything else about the movie was amazing. I like how they slightly shifted from the ‘Batman the ninja’ route to the original ‘Batman the detective’ route without losing any of its edge from the first movie. As a result, there are a lot of twists and turns and all kinds of revelations to keep you guessing throughout the movie. The acting was flawless, the action was wonderful, and there was even a little fraction of humor, which is very rare, but relieving in a movie this dark.

Overall, Christopher Nolan should still be proud of himself. It was good. In fact, it was awesome. It just wasn’t epic. And for a whole year, epic was what I was expecting.

SCORE: 4 out of 5