It's been a frequent topic of conversation among my friends ever since we saw, and had our balls thoroughly waxed by, The Dark Knight: how the hell do you follow that? How do you even equal, let alone top, a superhero movie that is now widely considered to be the alpha and omega of the genre? The answer, according to imdb.com, is to cast Eddie Murphy as the Riddler, Shia LaBeouf as Robin, and Rachel Weiz as Catwoman.
I'll wait for everyone to finish vomiting into their mouths.
Once you've swallowed your chunder, I hope you come around to the realization I did: this is actually brilliant. In fact, it's the only possible way to follow up The Dark Knight. Instead of dealing with the impossible-to-meet expecations set by Knight, Christopher Nolan and company are making a completely different type of movie. You expand the Batman universe, embrace the richness of life, revel in the fact that Gotham isn't just a city of corruption and despair, but of humor and love as well. You make sort of a demarcation line between the paranoia and cynicism of the Bush era and the hopeful humanism of the Obama era.
Now, there's no guarantee that this will work, but I have faith that the Nolans can make a looser, funnier Batman film that doesn't devolve into Schumacher-style leaden camp. The LaBeouf casting is really the warning sign: that little shit does not need to be in every tentpole franchise. Leave something for Jesse Bradford or somebody.
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1 comment:
your thoughts are interesting here, but i'm glad to see that these rumors have been debunked.
i don't think that something like this is "the only possible way to follow up The Dark Knight." i think it is true that they have to accept the fact that they can't 'match' TDK in scope or execution, but that they can make another kickass Batman film.
one possible direction might be to develop the idea of Batman as villain as perceived by the public. i don't know very much about what exists in Batman literature, but there's probably a graphic novel that addresses this idea in some way. maybe go with that?
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