The Dark Knight Rises (Spoilers)

[ray245]

Ray, when you say "the audience," do you mean yourself?

Because the story points you mentioned as confusing seemed pretty damn obvious.

Well, that is mainly based on what I've heard from my friends who watched it, as well as some of the audience sitting around us while we are watching it.

[CaptainChewbacca]

It's something that I'm used to people knowing since I've been doing it pretty much since I've joined this board. No, it doesn't bother me, I'm just no longer used to people not knowing.

You're not always over-the-top with it, so I'm sure many posters don't notice who you really are.

[Gil Hamilton]

I generally really really liked it though:
Spoiler

Of course, the plot hole that the movie rested on was a bit larger than previous movies. That was like the worst designed nuclear reactor ever, like Wayne Enterprises designed it so that you could hold a city hostage with it if you needed to. So... it has no safety procedure written to shut it down in the event the core gets disconnected, no Dead Man's Switch safety features to prevent catastrophic failures, and exactly ONE person on the entire planet knows how it works and he was stated to not have been involved in building it? What happened to all the scientists and engineers that Wayne Enterprises must have employed to build the reactor in the first place and all the manuals they wrote? Did Lucius Fox have them put to death after it was completed and all manuals and technical bibles burned? At least it saved Bane the trouble of having to go out and by a nuclear warhead from an ex-Soviet republic like a normal supervillain.

However, I'm usually willing to figure a movie one giant plothole MacGuffin (the microwave generator and the fact that Gotham should have been tripping balls every time they took a hot shower in the first movie, the Jokers absurd hypercompetance in the second movie to the point where he can smuggle huge amounts of explosives into densely populated places and set them up with absolutely no one noticing) if the rest of the movie is awesome. That was certainly true of The Dark MacGuffin... Knight... Rises. Bane turned out to be a good villain, I really liked the plot of the movie, the Talia al Ghul plot tweest was well done (even though I was familiar enough with Batman to know that Ra's al GHul has a daughter, not a son, so I predicted she'd turn up). Sure, Batman managed to mind over matter a broken spine, but that was pretty inoffensive and necessary for him to get Bane's backstory. The action sequences were excellent, Commissioner Gordon was bad ass, and I like Catwoman as well. I'm on the fence on whether I like it or the The Dark Knight better, but I'm probably going to see Rises again in theatres, so we'll see.

Also, the movie made me a bit home sick, given just how much of the action in the movie was filmed in Downtown Pittsburgh, where I was going "Hey, that's Trinity Cathedral... and you just hit it with a missile. Damn, I liked that church." Gotham has always been a weird mash-up of New York, Chicago, and Pittsburgh in the movies, and it was a bit more Pittsburgh in this one than most. It even has the Steelers and UPMC!

[Erik von Nein]

So, uh, since this thread has a spoiler warning, I'll just go ahead and not use spoiler tags.

But, man, this movie was a confused mess. Not only were the technical aspects of a bunch of characters, technology, etc, weird as fuck (the reactor bomb, the teleporting characters, the bizarre fire-power differences on everything, the time jumps), but the messages the movie was attempting to portray were pretty muddled. It's not as if they weren't impossible to understand (destructive lies, the nature of heroes, stuff), they just weren't done very well. Why'd they go with the whole evil OWS in the first place if it didn't really go anywhere? Why was Talia set up to be a villain via sexual advances? Bane just being a cipher of Talia's will kinda destroyed him as a character for me, along with the random henchmen killing.

Although, everyone lying to themselves and others was kind of interesting. Bruce was lying to himself about his grief and his need for Batman, Anne Hathaway was lying to herself about her career as a thief, Gordon lying to himself about his relative lack of dirtiness, and Bane basically lying to everyone about everything all helped tie into that theme.

Also, the funniest moments were unintentional for me. Bane's voice wavered from incomprehensible to just downright laughable. He just reminded me so much of a caricature of a Russian dude it was funny. Also, the military commander was just too funny in his pressed lipped mannerism.

I just wished they had dropped the whole orphanage thing. Yeah, I guess it gave motivation for Robin to help the city and get involved with Bruce Wayne but I didn't feel they contributed much else to the movie, especially with the whole evacuation at the end.

[Erik von Nein]

Along with the above, why the hell was everyone so incredulous at Gordon's claims? Not only has Gotham been attacked by masked madmen before (twice!), but there was a huge shoot-out moments before with at least six SWAT members getting seriously injured if not killed outright. Hell, Gordon himself was shot multiple times from rifles before ending up being found half-drowned. It's as if everyone was wearing the biggest derp hat possible, or just trying to brazenly ignore reality. If that had shown people just didn't want to confront the fact that there might be another Joker-esque threat to the city that would have been a touch more acceptable, but instead it was just chief WhatHisName saying "Oh, silly Gordon. He's just seeing things!"

Why'd Talia and Bane need Dagget, anyway? It's not as if Dagget wasn't already pursuing Wayne Corp's holdings, nor was he required for Bane's group to contract Anne Hathaway to rob Wayne of his fingerprints. The concrete explosives was kinda hard to buy, since Bane's group already had run of the sewers and had managed to ship ass-loads of heavy weapons into the city in the first place. I guess they needed him to spur Wayne into showing Talia the reactor? But they already apparently knew about it, along with the weapon's cache Lucius assured Wayne was "off the books."

The more I think about it the more they really dropped the ball with the whole communist revolution aspect of the story. Sure, they were just using the discontent to do ... something (they had already trapped the police and had full run of the city, who gives a shit that they were blathering on about "returning Gotham to you!"?), but there was no clear idea that anyone was suffering in the city. I guess Selina was supposed to represent that, and the orphans as well, however Selina comes off as obviously jaded and clearly lying to Wayne about her motives, and the orphans plot just spun its wheels and took up screen time. They could have tied the theme of lies being destructive pretty well into corruption of ideals and authoritarian takeovers through abuse of law with the Dent Act. It was a perfect opportunity to show that the police had more far-reaching powers, that people who may have committed minor crimes were being held without bail, or anything of that kind. Instead all we get is Selina being the least harmful person getting sent to Blackgate (?). Like, when Bane comes in to break into the prison there wasn't a single prisoner there who didn't take up a rifle and join him in his quest to start murdering the rich. Apparently everyone they showed arrested with the Dent Act deserved to have bail revoked, if they were all crazy murderous fucks to begin with.

Anyway, I'll probably have more to say later, but for now I've gotta head to work.

[Grumman]

Along with the above, why the hell was everyone so incredulous at Gordon's claims? Not only has Gotham been attacked by masked madmen before (twice!), but there was a huge shoot-out moments before with at least six SWAT members getting seriously injured if not killed outright. Hell, Gordon himself was shot multiple times from rifles before ending up being found half-drowned. It's as if everyone was wearing the biggest derp hat possible, or just trying to brazenly ignore reality. If that had shown people just didn't want to confront the fact that there might be another Joker-esque threat to the city that would have been a touch more acceptable, but instead it was just chief WhatHisName saying "Oh, silly Gordon. He's just seeing things!"

"Ah yes, 'supervillains'. We have dismissed this claim."

[Korgeta]

Right, Where do we begin?

The film was ok, I can't say outstanding because i was looking at my watch given the overussed screen time on the orphanage plot, if there was one major thing that was eating up too much screen time it was the relation of poverty and orphanage, it just never led to anything and the kids themselves were of little use (not to mention many didn't show the characteristics of having had a tough childhood etc)

nolan took a risk leaving Michael Caine out for a lengthy period of time but it did work in my eyes given the solid emtional performace he delivered with his lines. I still don't think Christian Bale's depiction of bruce Wayne/batman is still the best (keaton's 1989 depiction is still my favourite) but it's good to see how his role was tested at the latter part of the movie.

The film had a theme of lies but it was underused and at worst felt force fed, nearly every revelation about the past was forced in by flash backs, I'm not a fan of them myself and in the age where everything is easier to watch because of DVD's (and the number of releases of the previous films) my memory is not short, flashbacks just feel like a tutorial and at this stage the only people likely to see this film are the fans of the last two.

There were some characters who did nothing, Dagget (along with reasons explained by erik) was just another suit who had no clear intentions and is remarkbly short sighted along with that acting police chief (did anyone remember his name?)who wanted to capture batman, even if he had to be ignroant or whatever showed remarkable lack of respect to Gordan, the guy who came out of the sewers with bullet wounds not to mention all of the past events! I was expecting the chief to say 'Oh, Grandpa's just being senile again'

There is a issue from TDK over the Joker's crazy prep skills, to be fair the film did get away with that by the theme oif choas and the joker was a effective metaphor for gothom spiralling out of control, as said the theme isn't really well conveyed it becomes simply a case of seeing Spoiler

the police of Gothom becomming the french resistance in a city where the bad guys have a nuke that they use to control a city but have every intention of setting it off anyway. Why instead of doing this for over three motns just bane and talia not just get of the city after a week or so and THEN detonate it by remote. It gets even worse as Talia (with trigger in hand) waffles on and on to Batman which gives Gordon the most improable time needed to get delay the bomb's signal! Though Talia and her disguise does explain how they knew so much about bruce wayne's secret and weapons

However despite that batman's heroisim is very striking, the shots of the city are still impressive and the soundtrack is just great, Bane's voice isnt so bad but to be perfectly honest I would be more concerned about the guys who had guns then a unarmed guy with a scary mask, at least the Joker gives the promise of his henchmen to run riot with Batman, Bane is so ruthless on his own men that how it dosen't backfire on him I don't know.

One big pro Spoiler

Liam Nesson's

cameo was great to watch.
Spoiler

Some bits that did stick out a bit badly

Selina is not convincing as a someone who can take down burly characters, athetic yes but it's no build of muscle, of course the idea of women is having some muscle is called 'fat' by media and hollywood for reasons that escape me.

Is it me or were there several instances when guys with guns should try 'shooting' batman instead of running upto him, same could be said with catwoman, if the music during combat wasn't good then some of the fights would had felt quite dud, nonethless good to see batman show a decent fight display.

Talia does explain some points of the film but given her and bane want to destroy gotham then why hand around for the timer to go down, terroists useing timers for detonation is a cliche that was dead since 9/11 when people realised that timer for bombs was never in the terroists manual.

Did the Dent act make it ok for women to be in a male prison such as selina, espacilly when bane takes over the prison and sets everyone free that they don't turn on her? Nicest prison mob ever it seems, and that's not including them lot getting rid of bane and taking the city for themselves.

A city where all supply is cut off for 3 months is looking quite structured, no streets filled with rubbish, disease, rats, fires etc guess bane's model does work afterall.

How did they get bikes in the stock excange or bane walking into such a area with helmet on right upto the scanner?

The stadium bomb was poor, in that situation nobody is going to care if the guy you killed is an apprent scientist to a bomb, either people overpower Bane's mob (who are few anyway) and run havoc or the stampede and crushing effect takes place, survival takes over in that situation.

The quality of bane's henchmen were clearly downgraded since the hesist of the CIA plane, saying that a secret ops crew flying a plane who can't deduce that their being followed is probarbly not much of an accomplishment anyway.

Just how many of his men were there anyway?

And why dosen't Lucius make a phone call, or even facebook to the FBI etc that his coporation has the details of the bomb WAYNE ENTERPRISES HAD BUILT

Normally these would be something people pick apart after seeing the film over and over but they were very notable, it could had been done better as a structure and better themes. The fime starts with some good themes but quickly becomes a french resistance scenario.

[Haruko]

Since the title says spoilers I won't bother with the tags either.

Almost the entire police force being trapped underground for a long period was one of the more interesting ideas to me. Was thinking how odd it would be for the society above to change so much until suddenly the police make their way back up with a few people on top laying the ground work for their return. Made me think of that Edgar Allen Poe story where the madhouse patients made themselves at home for a while so that a visitor almost thought nothing amiss until the security personnel escaped from confinement and the patients went banaynay.

[FaxModem1]

More thoughts to come later, but anyone else think about the fact that Gotham being blocked off like that(and if it's supposed to be New York), that means the World economy crashed. Also, won't they have to do something about the nuclear fallout off the coast?

[Korgeta]

Almost the entire police force being trapped underground for a long period was one of the more interesting ideas to me. Was thinking how odd it would be for the society above to change so much until suddenly the police make their way back up with a few people on top laying the ground work for their return. Made me think of that Edgar Allen Poe story where the madhouse patients made themselves at home for a while so that a visitor almost thought nothing amiss until the security personnel escaped from confinement and the patients went banaynay.

i think that was amissed opportunity, the fact so much officers were trapped over a period of time would had brought about a survival situation, and it would had been interesting to see hoe that would play out, would the law eveentually turn on itself, who could rations/sane/order and what circumstances does it take to break your own laws, though that's more joker territory really.

but anyone else think about the fact that Gotham being blocked off like that(and if it's supposed to be New York), that means the World economy crashed. Also, won't they have to do something about the nuclear fallout off the coast?
More thoughts to come later, but anyone else think about the fact that Gotham being blocked off like that(and if it's supposed to be New York), that means the World economy crashed. Also, won't they have to do something about the nuclear fallout off the coast?

Pretty much, it just re-enforces the argument as to why bane and co bothered to stay given cutting off gotham would cause the global market to crash, just have the city run amok for a few weeks, then leave and detonate the bomb and all that would just cause a utter collapse of the world economy full stop.

[Gil Hamilton]

And why dosen't Lucius make a phone call, or even facebook to the FBI etc that his coporation has the details of the bomb WAYNE ENTERPRISES HAD BUILT

This is the thing that struck me the most. They built that "reactor" (worst reactor design ever, it's like they wanted it to be a bomb that you could take a city hostage with) and Lucius could predict to the second when it would fatally destablize and explode... but exactly one person on the entire planet knows how to shut it down and he wasn't even involved in building it? Wayne Enterprises must have had a team of scientists and engineers who worked on the damn thing who must have wrote technical bibles and instruction manuals for operation of the reactor, but they couldn't be arsed to figure out a safe shut down procedure in the event that the reactor started critically failing? Where are those dudes, anyway? It's not like Lucius Fox is the ONLY guy who works for Wayne Enterprise's R&D, though you wouldn't know it from the Nolan movies.

[Questor]

And why dosen't Lucius make a phone call, or even facebook to the FBI etc that his coporation has the details of the bomb WAYNE ENTERPRISES HAD BUILT

This is the thing that struck me the most. They built that "reactor" (worst reactor design ever, it's like they wanted it to be a bomb that you could take a city hostage with) and Lucius could predict to the second when it would fatally destablize and explode... but exactly one person on the entire planet knows how to shut it down and he wasn't even involved in building it? Wayne Enterprises must have had a team of scientists and engineers who worked on the damn thing who must have wrote technical bibles and instruction manuals for operation of the reactor, but they couldn't be arsed to figure out a safe shut down procedure in the event that the reactor started critically failing? Where are those dudes, anyway? It's not like Lucius Fox is the ONLY guy who works for Wayne Enterprise's R&D, though you wouldn't know it from the Nolan movies.

You had two problems that were inter-related:

1) The only person who knew how to defuse the bomb was the doctor. He was also the only person (at the time) that knew how to make that reactor into a bomb.

2) The fusion core was decaying.

Problem 1 was solved by jamming the detonator. Problem 2 was to be solved by putting the core back into the reactor.

[Gil Hamilton]

You had two problems that were inter-related:

1) The only person who knew how to defuse the bomb was the doctor. He was also the only person (at the time) that knew how to make that reactor into a bomb.

What about all the scientists and engineers who worked on the project for Wayne Enterprises? The movie stated that the fusion reactor had already been underway for three years when that doctor published his article and Bruce Wayne pulled the plug on his own guys. Surely the people who built it know how it works and wrote volumes of documentation on the matter. It's a damn nuclear reactor, after all.

2) The fusion core was decaying.

Problem 1 was solved by jamming the detonator. Problem 2 was to be solved by putting the core back into the reactor.

That's some seriously shitty design if the only way to keep the thing from exploding is to keep it running in the reactor. What if you have to disassemble it for transport or need to shut down the reactor for maintenance? Or god forbid a disaster happens or nut jobs decides to steal it (both being a rather serious problem in Gotham City)? That they had absolutely no way to safely shut it down without plugging it back in is absurd.

That's the thing with the Nolan Batman movies is that they decide they want something, like Bane facilitating his revolution by holding Gotham hostage with a nuclear bomb to explain why the national guard doesn't take him out, and increasingly painted themselves into a corner with wilder and wilder implausibilities until they arrived at something rampantly silly. It's alot like the magic microwave gun in the first movie of the Joker being a magic angel baby. It counts on you liking the REST of the movie so much that you'll forgive a heaping pile of crap. Nolan made the Batman franchise less goofy than previous showings, but he didn't make it more realistic in execution.

[Surlethe]

I'm with Gil: the big thing that pissed me off was the bad physics. How do you stop a nuclear bomb from exploding? These things rely on very precise geometry and timing -- all you have to do is blow the damned thing up. You'll have a radioactive mess on your hands, but you won't level half the city (actually, was it a 4 MT bomb or was it a neutron bomb? they said both at different times in the movie). And a fusion reactor turned into a bomb? Give me a break.

Other than the physics, though, I really enjoyed it. The Talia al'Ghul reveal caught me completely by surprise. I had actually marked the movie down in my head earlier because of the sudden, unforeshadowed sex between Bruce Wayne and Miranda. Turns out, this was actually foreshadowing that she was Talia manipulating him, so the movie earned the lost points back plus some.

Bane was fucking scary. Not only did he have a great voice - the weak, precise, well-spoken Bane was actually much scarier than the deep villainous voice I had imagined. I immediately contrasted Bane with Ledger's Joker. The Joker was chaos personified, moving from act to act without any self-reflection, with events arranging themselves just so. It's not clear at all that the Joker has any ultimate goal; he just moves from game to game. Meanwhile, Bane is pretty clearly self-aware with a final goal in mind. Whereas the Joker prances from scheme to scheme, Bane meticulously works the levers of Gotham's society to manipulate the city into effectively destroying itself before the he delivers the final blow.

I wish the Talia reveal had been fifteen or twenty minutes before it actually happened. With just ten minutes left, there was no time to develop Talia's real character. Instead they paused the action at a crucial moment for a monologue exposition. The reveal also undermined Bane's status as villain: it appears that instead of being a mastermind, Bane is a pawn in the game of a villain who only exists for another five minutes. On the one hand, we find out at the same time as Batman. On the other, there was potential for more plot tension: if, say, the reveal were by Talia turning in the entire resistance movement while Wayne was still imprisoned, the audience would have been just as surprised and there would have been a bigger problem for Wayne to solve upon his return to the city. We could also have explored the character of Talia and had more time to contrast it to the adopted character of Miranda. The writers could also have developed the relationship between Talia and Bane, instead of the ten-second interaction we got on-screen.

Catwoman was well-written and -executed. I wish there had been more romantic tension between her and Wayne/Batman. More thoughts on this relationship later.

Overall, I greatly enjoyed the movie (except for the physics, which made me facepalm every time they mentioned it). It wasn't as tightly cut as it could have been, but that only detracted slightly. The two great flaws were the late Talia al'Ghul reveal and the horrible physics. The great moments included Wayne climbing out of the pit, every scene with Bane before the Talia reveal, the national anthem, and the closing montage (especially with Robin). I also really liked that we got a definite feel for the shape and scope of Gotham. In the first two movies, I just remember generic cityscape with action moving from place to place with no larger context to relate the places. Here, the city was given a much more definite shape. (This is one of those cinematographic techniques that set the later Harry Potter movies apart from the earlier ones: establishing shots relating different parts of Hogwarts to each other.)

[Questor]

You had two problems that were inter-related:

1) The only person who knew how to defuse the bomb was the doctor. He was also the only person (at the time) that knew how to make that reactor into a bomb.

What about all the scientists and engineers who worked on the project for Wayne Enterprises? The movie stated that the fusion reactor had already been underway for three years when that doctor published his article and Bruce Wayne pulled the plug on his own guys. Surely the people who built it know how it works and wrote volumes of documentation on the matter. It's a damn nuclear reactor, after all.

And how would all those scientists and engineers know what, if any, anti-tamper devices are on the modified version? It's not like it's sitting at Bikini and the only ones who'll notice if they do the wrong thing and blow it up are them...

2) The fusion core was decaying.

Problem 1 was solved by jamming the detonator. Problem 2 was to be solved by putting the core back into the reactor.

That's some seriously shitty design if the only way to keep the thing from exploding is to keep it running in the reactor. What if you have to disassemble it for transport or need to shut down the reactor for maintenance? Or god forbid a disaster happens or nut jobs decides to steal it (both being a rather serious problem in Gotham City)? That they had absolutely no way to safely shut it down without plugging it back in is absurd.

That's the thing with the Nolan Batman movies is that they decide they want something, like Bane facilitating his revolution by holding Gotham hostage with a nuclear bomb to explain why the national guard doesn't take him out, and increasingly painted themselves into a corner with wilder and wilder implausibilities until they arrived at something rampantly silly. It's alot like the magic microwave gun in the first movie of the Joker being a magic angel baby. It counts on you liking the REST of the movie so much that you'll forgive a heaping pile of crap. Nolan made the Batman franchise less goofy than previous showings, but he didn't make it more realistic in execution.

Not saying it's realistic, all I was doing is saying that it's not as crazy as you made it out to be.

[SylasGaunt]

Is the spoiler tagging really necessary given the thread is labeled?

Doing so anyway.

Spoiler

This also confuses the audience when it comes down to understanding the motivation of Bane. Is Bane targeting the rich in Gotham because of their lack of apathy towards the rest of Gotham? What does Bane truly want with Gotham? This are questions that was not raised nor answered in TDKR.

Spoiler

Uhm.. yes it is. Bane doesn't give two fucks about the rich or the poor as ultimately he's planning on blowing everyone the hell up. His plan was basically a mix of the League of Shadows plan from BB and the Joker's plan from TDK. He riles the people up and gives them the hope that by falling in with him and his 'message' (which is total bullshit) that they're going to not get blown up.. after all they're giving Bane what he wants, and bonus he's even helped them topple the city government that's been lying to them, the police who helped them do it, AND they get a chance to vent on the people formerly running things from on high. None of this is his real point though. His point is to give them that hope (not dying/some power) so that they'll throw themselves into it even more. Even that is secondary because the point of all this chaos, anarchy, and terror is to HURT Batman. So that Batman can watch the city rip at itself, watch people cheer as kangaroo courts send people out to die, and watch as Gotham shows that it really hasn't changed at all down at the core. All that to hurt him and drag out the agony for months before Bane goes on to murder every last one of them while he's helpless to do anything. The world is shocked and horrified at what Gotham does to itself over the course of that time before its destruction, thus fufilling the original plan of the League of Shadows in the first place.

[Surlethe]

Yeah, it's not like he came out and said to Bruce Wayne "I am going to give Gotham hope, torture it, and then kill it." He certainly didn't say that at all. Nope, Bane's ultimate goal is completely inscrutable.

[Erik von Nein]

Yeah, except we never see anyone but the prisoners joining Bane and they have freaking Scarecrow overseeing the kangaroo courts. They botched the whole thing pretty badly in my opinion. The best you see are some rich people being pulled out of apartment buildings and then a bunch of people living in them for a bit. And then that's it. So ... what about the rest of the city? You see some bread lines, some of the board (and a bunch of other people?) from Wayne's corporation, and then some people coming out of their houses after the resolution of the bomb plot. Apparently by "tearing itself apart" it's more that the police are locked away and criminals are holding it hostage. Because, aside from that scene mentioned earlier that's all we're ever really shown.

As far as Wayne being tortured by that happening, what do we get? He throws a rock at the TV and ... pontificates about fear with some old dude. Maybe I missed some dialogue about that but it seemed more related to Wayne as a person looking to have something beyond the persona of Batman than anything related to whatever was happening in Gotham.

[Surlethe]

I'm not saying the execution was great, I'm saying that Ray is clueless because the movie made perfectly clear what Bane was intending to do to the city.

[Gil Hamilton]

And how would all those scientists and engineers know what, if any, anti-tamper devices are on the modified version? It's not like it's sitting at Bikini and the only ones who'll notice if they do the wrong thing and blow it up are them...

They'd absolutely be useful in identifying and removing anti-tampering devices in the modified version, since they could see and understand how the reactor had been modified, as well as disabling the reactor. Of course, the movie didn't even acknowledge that they exist, claiming that not a single person, other than the Russian scientist, knew how the thing worked even though he didn't build it. That's pretty damn silly.

Not saying it's realistic, all I was doing is saying that it's not as crazy as you made it out to be.

No, it really is.

[Erik von Nein]

I'm not saying the execution was great, I'm saying that Ray is clueless because the movie made perfectly clear what Bane was intending to do to the city.

Fair enough.

[Dr Roberts]

The only thing that really annoyed me was the way Bane was killed.

[Alyeska]

Movie starts in 11 minutes. But this chain loves commercials. Probably gotta wait 30.

[AMT]

And how would all those scientists and engineers know what, if any, anti-tamper devices are on the modified version? It's not like it's sitting at Bikini and the only ones who'll notice if they do the wrong thing and blow it up are them...

They'd absolutely be useful in identifying and removing anti-tampering devices in the modified version, since they could see and understand how the reactor had been modified, as well as disabling the reactor. Of course, the movie didn't even acknowledge that they exist, claiming that not a single person, other than the Russian scientist, knew how the thing worked even though he didn't build it. That's pretty damn silly.

then it's good thats not what actually happened isn't it?
Wha was said was that he was the only one who knew how to weaponize it, and it was the weaponized version that was going to explode. Presumably without the actual weaponization the exploding part wouldnt have happened if the weaponization did not occur.

[Jim Raynor]

Just got back from seeing this. I will refrain from posting a numerical rating for now, since I've been sleep deprived for most of the past week and felt tired going into the theater today. I enjoyed the movie thought it was very well crafted, but I don't think I was able to get into it as much as I should have. I'll probably go and see it again in the next week or so just to get a better feel for it.

It might have slipped by me, but was Bruce actually crippled in the beginning, and if so, why? Was that supposed to be an injury sustained from his fall at the end of The Dark Knight? At first I thought that it was a total front meant to deceive people after Bruce decided to become a recluse. But then I saw him limping around with his cane in private, when he was alone or with Alfred. They even showed him resorting to some kind of exoskeleton on his leg. Then after getting his back messed up by Bane (an injury which he recovered rather quickly from), Bruce just trained himself back so that he physically seemed good as new.

Bane was a terrific villain. I liked the mysterious intro, with the CIA agents demanding answers about him as a man they knew nothing about. Also, the extremely ballsy way that he took them out. Lots of people were wondering how this movie's villain would follow up the Joker. While Bane wasn't as distinctive, he certainly stood on his own. I liked the confidence and bluntness of the character, as he tore the city apart. This guy was scary, and had a voice to match. I thought he was hard to hear at a few points though. He showed absolutely no hesitation to kill off underlings with his bare hands, which along with his breath mask made him seem very much like Darth Vader (which I hear is one of Nolan's influences). I liked how they kept the part about him growing up in a prison, and emphasized that he had truly lived in the darkness while Bruce had merely "adopted" it. I thought his second fight with Batman was a bit underwhelming though. Bane had been built up as this nearly invincible mental and physical giant...but Batman just took him down by punching him a few times in the mask?

I thought that Catwoman was very well done, even though her part in this movie really wasn't very big. Anne Hathaway was DEAD ON as Selina Kyle, and this casting choice seems just about perfect now that I've seen it. She was everything the character should be - sexy, playful, selfish, and cunning - all without being oversexualized and turned into over-the-top T&A like she might have been in less capable hands. I loved the way that she handled herself when selling Bruce Wayne's fingerprints. I just wish that they had found more time to better fit her into this movie. Her relationship with Batman seemed a bit rushed. Despite her stealing from him and repeatedly demonstrating that she looks out for herself, Bruce seemed very quick to trust her and bring her into the fold.

The villains' plot was cool, and much bigger in scale than the trailers would let you believe. I thought that Bane would go around inciting riots, sort of a much more violent version of "Occupy Wall Street" (a point that the media leading up to this film probably overemphasized). I didn't know that he would have full control of the League of Shadows, seize control of the city for months with a nuclear bomb, and tell off the US military. The nuke stuff was probably silly from a physics standpoint, but this is a superhero movie and I like fantastical tech and out-of-this-world plots (just like the weird "microwave emitter" from the first movie).
Spoiler

The Talia plot twist was really cool. Despite trying to avoid spoilers, I had inadvertently seen a couple about her. I liked her "Miranda Tate" alias, and how she made a connection with Bruce as an honorable businesswoman looking to do the right thing. She was so good, and spent so much time as Miranda, that I had even been convinced that the rumors were wrong. So when the rumored plot twist actually cam, I was still surprised.

I liked how The Dark Knight Rises not only brought the League of Shadows back, but brought the trilogy full circle. Loved all the callbacks to the first and second movies, and the way they gave closure to Bruce Wayne as a character and publicly redeemed Batman as Gotham's greatest hero.

One thing that I did find strange was how little the middle portion of the movie spent on Bruce/Batman, after his defeat at the hands of Bane. In a way, Joseph Gordon-Levitt's original "John Blake" character kind of took over things for a while. I thought he did a good job as an idealistic young cop, and he carried himself like a real dramatic action hero.
Spoiler

I really don't think they needed to make him the Nolanverse's Robin though. Robin is not a thirtysomething cop with a generic name like "John Blake," later revealed to be "Robin John Blake." That felt really tacked on. I had read in an article that the last shot of this film was something that Nolan and Goyer had in their minds since almost a decade ago, before Batman Begins was completed. It was hyped as something that brought tears to their eyes. After seeing it, all I can think of is "Really?" I mean the last scene was pretty stylish. I liked how Blake swung into the Batcave, and how it came to life around him, telling us that he had a future ahead of him without showing us too much. But I just can't get over the John Blake thing. I think geeky references like this only work if they capture the heart of the character and do things right. They could've made Blake a teenager or young man who gets caught up with Batman after the city goes to hell. That would've been a lot closer to what most people think of as "Robin," although it would've been much harder to integrate the character into the plot without the policeman angle. John Blake worked well as a character in this movie. I don't think he works as some kind of watered down Robin. If anything I would've left out Robin completely. The character is a big but awkward part of the Batman story, but there have been enough solo Batman stories that I don't think anyone would've missed Robin at all if he went unmentioned.