Batman Begins

[00:00:01] Blank Check with Griffin and David, Blank Check with Griffin and David Don't know what to say or to express All you need to know is that the name of the show is Blank Check A vigilante is just a man lost in the scramble for his own gratification

[00:00:25] He can be destroyed or locked up But if you make yourself more than just a man, you devote yourself to an ideal If they can't stop you then you become something else entirely Which is... A podcast, Mr. Wayne Great impression

[00:00:42] Thank you, that's the best I've ever done in the East End You landed the plane Hello everybody my name is Griffin Hamlin I'm David Simpson We are hashtagged the two friends Taking a little yawn there, a little stretch No, I was preparing myself to land the plane

[00:00:56] We're hashtagged the two friends That's your competitive advantage with two friends There's no other podcast like that It's never happened before And the immortal words of Miss Piggy never before, never again We copyrighted it Friends aren't allowed to host podcasts now Never before

[00:01:12] This podcast is called Blank Check with Griffin and David Hello You know us, we just introduced ourselves Taking a sip of water This podcast where we look at filmographies Overanalyze them We're going to do a podcast early on in their career

[00:01:26] And then we're issued a series of blank checks To make whatever wild and crazy films they want Sometimes those checks clear Ah! Sometimes they bounce Mr. Wayne You got me Uh... We're on a podcast mini-series Uh-huh About the films of Christopher Nolan

[00:01:50] That is called The Pod Night Cast Yes And today we finally got to the point where we As your humble host Get to introduce you to The Pod Night himself Batman? The well-known man Of... Capes His name is Batman and he's about to begin

[00:02:12] You see that Lucy caped About the Batman I just think about that It's like where he's talking about There was a bat loose in an upstate New York house And he called the police And the person was like Oh, I can put you in touch with

[00:02:28] This person who's good with bats And Lucy gets halfway through real It's like this person is trying now to say Batman Ha ha ha Anyway Uh... Mike Lawrence has the great Batman bit That's the kind of joke that everyone's made But he crystallized it the best

[00:02:44] About Batman being the ultimate Republican hero Yes Where he runs down all of his villains A burn victim who's unwilling to let go Of the loose change he has A crazy cat lady The theatrical magician Who wears makeup Like it's just every sort of like Republican nightmare

[00:03:04] We'll talk about it people thought these movies Were right wing, you know that was a thread That carried through And I especially re-watching this movie Through that prism I have somewhat of a counter argument Where the battle begins The year is 2002 Christopher Nolan's hot off of insomnia

[00:03:26] He's cold off of insomnia It's chilly That's a cold movie Brrr It's cold in here There must be some Nolan in the atmosphere Terrible, let's start over Ben Delete the entire podcast It never existed Oh, producer Ben's here Aka the poet laureate, aka the haze

[00:03:48] Aka Mr. Positive, aka birthday Benny Aka the tiebreaker, aka the meat lover Aka the fart detective Aka the peeper He's not Professor Crispy, he is the fuck master If you see him on the streets, wish him a hello fennel

[00:04:00] And of course he's graduated certain tells of the course of different minis or his touches Producer Ben Canobi, Kylo, Ben Say Benny thing, Ben Knight, Shyamalan, Ben Sate And WarHass Oh also Ailey Ben's with the dollar sign Almost missed it Hey guys, I'm here to

[00:04:18] talk about this movie Yeah, he's got a take or two Oh I got some hot takes This is where Batman starts I want to save it His note paper that is headed with Batman starts I mean beginning Underlined We got Griffin

[00:04:38] Hold on let me just check that off Great So we're just Oh boy come on Alright, alright, throttle down It's okay We're gonna be okay It's two O O 2 He goes in for meeting Warner Brothers Batman? Batman himself the Kate Crusader? Yeah And you know as

[00:05:14] Mr. Wally Fester What was it worth on the take? Premiering August 25th on Prime Video Told me Because this was a little different than how I heard the story told in the press They were really happy with Insomnia, they were like

[00:05:28] this is clearly kind of a major filmmaker We're dealing with here And they had a meeting with him where they said like here are some of the hot things we have Are you interested in any of these? And they weren't even really pushing Batman on him

[00:05:40] They weren't thinking him for Batman And he kind of started going like what about that Batman guy? Of course Batman film franchise Had gone off to a humongous start With Tim Burton's film in 89 Then Parents and general audiences flip out In a negative way at Batman Returns

[00:06:00] Which is a secret masterpiece Not even so secret anymore Right But it was a controversial movie It made significantly less than the first one They ax him out, they bring in Joel Schumacher They go make it more like a comic book Sure, but I think he also had

[00:06:16] The pitch of like Hey, Batman is a kitsch hero Like Adam West Right and he combines that with his Experience as a man who used to Be a window dresser for department stores I love Joel Schumacher I'm not saying that in a negative way

[00:06:32] But that is very much the aesthetic of that movie The aesthetic of that movie is Barney's department store window Look, have you read the oral history in the Hollywood Reporter about Batman Forever? It's awesome And the production designer Talking about his vision of Gotham City is awesome

[00:06:50] And the most interesting thing about it Is Joel Schumacher saying that when the movie came out And like everyone called him being like It's a hit! He was like You're kidding me They were like we're gonna make another one

[00:07:02] Ken he was like no one wanted to make another one No one was prepared for it to be a hit It had the biggest opening weekend of all time Actually, because in my head Batman Forever was a bigger hit The biggest Batman yet

[00:07:12] But it wasn't. It just was a bigger hit than Batman Returns It was a bigger phenomenon And it opened huge Batman the Burton movie was like a phenomenon Beyond any other Right I mean it was the original Modern blockbuster People talk about Star Wars and Jaws

[00:07:28] But Batman set the template That I think we're still going off of today Yeah In terms of just general saturation Definitely and like An aggressive advertising campaign That is focused on iconography Right Not like a trailer where it's like Here comes a knight, a Batman

[00:07:48] Like you know like it's just like There will never be a better advertising campaign Than the original Batman Because it was like the one film Where they had a piece of iconography That was so simple and so iconic And so well known

[00:08:02] They could just make the poster the bat symbol With a date and you don't have to say fucking anything else They also got Seal on board That's Batman Forever Yeah, Seals on Batman Forever But they got R Kelly for Batman and Robin

[00:08:14] And they got Prince obviously did an entire album Wrote an entire album about the Batman One day we're gonna do my Batman series Blank check Like you know No I was my pitch My pitch to you Anyway Batman and Robin Flop They give him a real blank check

[00:08:36] We love what you did in the last one Do more of that And the check bounces I think they gave him But I also think there was a lot of pressure to To Include a lot of toys Toyetic The term that came out of that movie

[00:08:54] Was they said we need more toyetic sequences A bat bomb You know who they gave a blank check On set Like less than 25 He made more than a million dollars per day of work Someone I talked to worked on that movie

[00:09:08] Said anytime he's not in close up it's not him Uh yeah Anytime in that movie Right it's just like a distant shot or whatever Right it's a double He only did the close ups Or any like a moving shot where you have to See him in the suit

[00:09:24] Where the camera slowly tracks into his face Or whatever And then they went Batman Not only did Batman bounce Like the superhero movies Bounced for a little bit Where studios were kind of like I guess we can't just rely on these being critic proof Correct

[00:09:44] Maybe we should give them to real people And Batman And Robin was also one of the first Films where the studios Blamed the internet Yeah sure like the nerds Like the movie revenge But not like in the movie revenge on the nerds

[00:10:00] Booger was nowhere to be seen this time This time it was Harry Knowles Yeah exactly The nerds have been like no this is not our Batman You messed it up But there was an Aina Coole review that came out early

[00:10:12] From a test screening and said like this movie Is fucking toxic It's a bad movie Did you see it in theaters? You were little I saw it in theaters and I You were probably like 7 or 8 years old I think I was 11 or 12 That's a key difference

[00:10:28] And I remember but it was one of the first movies I saw in a theater where I walked out and I was like I'm not sure that I liked that Like I was 11 usually when I saw a movie I was like great like I had fun

[00:10:38] That was the first Batman movie I had seen in theaters So I was just so into like the fucking grandeur Of it and everything You had butts and nipples and ice And flowers It's got it all That was the tagline for the movie It got it all

[00:10:54] Anyway we can talk about the sort of Disco Sucks-esque Imagery Sorry the Disco Sucks-esque like Dismissal of Batman and Robin That maybe gets a little too But anyway the point is You got three years later you got Bryan Singer doing X-Men

[00:11:12] I feel like that's the turnaround where studios are like Maybe these should be a little smaller They don't need to have movie stars in them Like you know an Arnold Schwarzenegger or whatever And we can give them to like up and coming Serious

[00:11:24] And maybe you engage with them a little more intellectually Yes, you know Because I remember reading an interview with Bryan Singer Like where he had just made App Pupil And his agent was like they want you to do X-Men

[00:11:34] And he said like what I don't do that shit Like comic books that's lame Like I don't do that Because it was such a like Poisonous idea That you know like for hacks That you would make a superhero movie Richard Donner and Lauren Shuler Donner Were producers

[00:11:52] They had the X-Men property I was gonna say Kevin Feige was the Donner's He was like their junior assistant Executive and that was when he was on set Had never read a comic before in his life Did the research and then dug in But at the same time

[00:12:06] Warner Brothers says Batman And so for years there was this thing Yeah I was gonna say They kept on saying like okay we're trying to develop Like three Batman projects There was maybe a way to bring Batman back And they kept on throwing stuff at the wall

[00:12:20] Let me give you some ideas So first Schumacher after Batman and Robin They still are like do you want to make a fifth one Because it's before I think it flops But after it had been in the can Yeah Because he delivers the movie on time

[00:12:34] It's not like the production was torture And they were like can't miss doesn't matter if it's bad Exactly and it still made like 100 million dollars Which was bad but like it's not like it was like A total bomb it just didn't do well

[00:12:44] It was like a lower opening than expected And a lower total than expected Bad word of mouth So Schumacher was like hey why don't we make Like a dark Batman Batman Triumphant I believe was his title No it's often been known as that

[00:12:58] But the real title I am reading I did a lot of research because I just Was Batman Unchained Okay that fucking sucks Bad title he wanted Nicolas Cage to play the scarecrow Correct And he wanted to be a little more of like a darker Batman

[00:13:12] Don into play Harley Quinn Who at the time was gonna be rewritten to be The Joker's daughter And there would be flashbacks to the Joker And they wanted to get Nicholson back Which seems like a stretch They were gonna pay Nicholson like 2 million dollars

[00:13:26] To be in hallucination sequences For when the scarecrow shoots his gas out But he said he wanted to be more of a Frank Miller They were gonna get Clooney back as Batman Or so Donald as Robin Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl Because you remember Batman and Robin begins

[00:13:40] them all running out in front of the bat signal. Like it's like, finally the three heroes. I believe the tagline for that movie is family forever. I think that's one. Yeah. Right. It's like, you know, justice for now. Exactly.

[00:13:54] It was the end of a long series of taglines. Family forever. Yeah. So then they're like, Batman Robin does bad. They're like, forget it, forget it. And so Schumacher's like, what if we do Batman Year One, the Frank Miller comic? Like we reboot it.

[00:14:07] And they were like, maybe, but not you. Not you. So the Jelchumacher's gone. I don't think it ever went far, but there was briefly internally the notion of what if we did Dark Knight Returns with Clint Eastwood? That I've never heard of that actually happening.

[00:14:22] I think that was like a spitball kind of, there was never any traction to that. Everything I've read is they had two projects and developments spinning up at the same time. They had Batman Year One. And Batman Beyond. And then Batman Beyond, which was the cartoon

[00:14:34] that was like set in the future with like an old Batman. But either way, they were like hard reboot. We either need to go right back to the beginning or we need to do a new Batman in the future. And they were getting these going

[00:14:43] and they were kind of just thinking like, whichever looks better will green light. Bo is yakking. I remember the Titans was supposed to do Batman Beyond. Oh God, God. Good pull, right? Yeah, that's great. Well done. And then Aronofsky was the one who was on

[00:14:57] Batman Year One for a while. He was co-writing with Frank Miller, but the script was very different than Frank Miller's Batman Year One comic. Yeah. They were totally re-conceptualizing the material. And they had Christian Bale in mind as a possible Batman. Which is really funny.

[00:15:14] It was, I mean, makes some sense. I mean, he was an obvious choice. Like a lot of ways. He was the right age. He was a respected actor. He was weird. But Bruce Wayne wasn't a billionaire. Alfred was like an auto mechanic. Yeah. They lived in a garage.

[00:15:31] The Batman was like an old mobile. The Batmobile was an old mobile. There are other things I want to mention. Apart from this project. Also, Lee Shapiro, who is a Hollywood screenwriter, pitched them a movie called Batman, Dark Knight, where the K is capitalized. So it's like, D-R-K-Night.

[00:15:55] Like it's like one word. Griffin's just like closing his eyes in frustration. He pitched this where it was like, Batman's retired. Dick Grayson works at Gotham University. And it was like a Scarecrow movie set at Arkham Asylum and like Man Bat was going to be involved.

[00:16:17] So like, and Warner Brothers was thinking about this. They had like a lot of ideas. It is interesting that everything kept on coming back to Scarecrow. Well, I think it was like they had done all of the other major villains. Scarecrow just kind of made sense.

[00:16:29] Especially for a quote unquote darker Batman. And also he does have a pretty cinematic attack because it's like, oh, you could do these dream six and the nightmares hallucinations. Sorry, I just got gas there. No, that's fine. But there's like five years

[00:16:46] where they can't get anything off the ground. I've got more to tell you. There's so much good shit. So Aronofsky has his year one script. They don't like it. Guess who rewrites it for them? The Wachowskis. They don't like that script either. Guess who rewrites it after that?

[00:16:59] Cameron Crow. Joss Whedon. They don't like that either. So then they can year one. They're like, fuck it. They start moving forward on Batman versus Superman. Remember that? Directed by Wolfgang Peterson. Which is gonna be called World Finest. And it was Air Force One. What's his name?

[00:17:16] Andrew Kevin Walker. The Seven Guy was right in the script. Jesus. And it was Jude Law and Colin Farrell. We're gonna play Superman and Batman respectively in a movie in which the Joker murders the lowest lane. For fuck's sake. It just sounds so bad.

[00:17:31] And then through some chain of events that leads to Batman and Superman having to fight each other. And that was gonna be a real like alien versus predator fight movie where like the last 40 minutes were all fight rather than the movie we got

[00:17:42] where they fight for two minutes and then talk about their mouths. Martha. And then they talk about like maybe turning this into Superman fly by which was this other idea that anyway. So it was a lot of- But then it came really close to getting made.

[00:17:53] It was like a serious thing. And then Superman fly by came by you. Wolfgang Peterson was gonna make it. Right. Yeah. Then 2003, they for I don't even know like why it all gets swept aside except maybe it's just a lot of bullshit. None of it really connects

[00:18:08] but they said to Christopher Nolan like do you wanna make Batman? Well, but what I'm saying is apparently- I mean he pitched them. I know that. Apparently they said here's the slate of stuff we have. Here's stuff that you could have. Sure.

[00:18:20] And they weren't even really pushing Batman on him and he said I think I have a take on Batman. Right. And then with David S. Goyer who writes these movies with him and who I guess was sort of his comic book guy. Right.

[00:18:32] Like would give him the books. Because Nolan admittedly was not a big comic book. And so Goyer would be like read the long Halloween. Like here's some Batman for you baby. But he said take it back. I found it really interesting actually. You keep talking for a second.

[00:18:45] I'm gonna pull this. You know Goyer becomes the guy because he's worked on- Blame. Some of the Snyder movies. He had already worked on Blade. But I feel like he becomes the guy who everyone blames Goyer for every bad comic book movie. Yeah.

[00:18:57] And gives him no credit for the good ones. And I'm he that might be the correct take. I don't really know. Look who's yeah. But he's you know he wrote Batman Begins and he wrote The Dark Knight. The story. Yeah. And he wrote Man of Steel

[00:19:11] and he wrote Batman versus Superman. So you know. Where does a cat woman fit into the picture here? Well they had done her you know with Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns. Right. I think Catwoman and the Joker they were just scared because they felt like

[00:19:26] ah too iconic you know performances pretty recent. Let's not try to do those again. Now of course studios are like what that was four years ago. Let's just do it again. But they Tim Burton respect you know for like hey that was recent.

[00:19:41] Tim Burton for a while was trying to direct a cat woman spin off with Pfeiffer. Sure. Yes. Oh cool. Then that fell by the wayside and then there was a series of Do We Do It With Ashley Judd. Whoever the hot kind of steely

[00:19:53] female star of the moment was they try to regurgitate that script. And then in 2003 fresh off the Oscar win Halle Berry signs on and they start over to New Script with an art director named Petoff and that movie comes out the year before this

[00:20:09] which is really weird to think about. And it is a catastrophe. Catastrophe. Yeah. And of course it's more in the old model of like these movies don't have to be connected to anything. Just do a cat woman movie. It doesn't have to be based on any existing material.

[00:20:23] No it was just like she's a cat woman. Right. I mean cat woman is like I mean that's a classic bad movie. The costume is bad. It's set in like a CGI city like the whole things that God damn does that. Have you you know

[00:20:34] she plays basketball with Bringsham and Brad and And the conflict of that movie is that Sharon Stones the villain who run a cosmetics company and her cosmetics line gives her like claw proof skin where now Catwoman can hurt her. Yeah it's like it's so sexist.

[00:20:52] I don't know like to have the villain be like a beauty cream mogul. Yeah. And have Catwoman's costume be like a bra and shredded pants. I mean it was all bad. I don't know like I don't know who he's going to read. Everyone would not watch again.

[00:21:08] I paid two dollars to see it in theaters. I remember that in the other round X. Congratulations. Thank you. So Nolan and what are you looking up? He's been on his phone for a minute. So Nolan and Goyer pitch a darker realistic rebooted Batman. Yeah.

[00:21:25] And obviously you hear those words now and you're like oh boy but in 2005 you know in this sort of like new and still kind of exciting comic book movie world that was like oh cool like maybe a different take on Batman's what we want.

[00:21:42] And also someone like Nolan making a superhero really easy right which is to be fair not to similar from Burton getting hired in 1980s the late 80s where it was like this guy. Oh huh. But still it was we wanted it.

[00:21:58] I found the thing I was looking for and this was kind of his real take. This was there was a dark night Blu-ray set after the third one came out and Nolan wrote this forward talking about like in retrospect how crazy it is that he was given.

[00:22:11] It's true. Reigns to this. And as we talked about last week on the Insomnia episode like now it's not crazy at all obviously now you know you make a five million dollar indie and like get your comic book but then it was very

[00:22:24] oh and it was a weird match of aesthetics especially coming straight off of Burton and Schumacher who were different filmmakers but were both very theatrical were both very stylized and heightened dramatically. Yeah. To have Nolan who is so kind of sparse and cold. His quote is in retrospect

[00:22:45] it can only have been my absolute confidence that returned to the old school 70s blockbusters that I grew up with would be the key to bringing Batman back. I thought my references were original but it now seems obvious the 10 years ago every studio had been hoping that

[00:22:56] every temple they made would take the audience back to the great early days of Spielberg Lucas and Bond few movies had pushed that particular button and I believe that changes to the craft of film making were to blame. Right. And that was kind of a big key

[00:23:09] to his take because a lot of people have been saying Batman you're one take it back to the beginning. Yeah. But he said what if we really do this kind of old school classical kind of tangible grounded not just in terms of the story but

[00:23:23] in terms of the actual aesthetics of the film the technique of the film. You know. Right. Make it kind of real and they say yes and he gets to work on this movie. You know in any hires Bale who is long been sort of rumored

[00:23:39] just like the obvious Batman choice one what I was going to say which is kind of interesting. You know they were learning from the mistakes of Batman and Robin where the Internet and the geek a lot of Roddy turned against them so hard. They leaked out the list

[00:23:56] of the short list of candidates they had for Batman and that went out to Ena Kool and they monitored who in the comments fans were into. Sure. So the list was like Josh Hartnett Hartnett was close and some people have said he turned it down. I've heard that.

[00:24:11] I don't know. He definitely turned on Superman. Yeah. Henry Cavill was weirdly on that list. Henry Cavill was on like every list. He was on every James Bond list every year and then he finally gets Superman guy Pierce and Christian Bale and everyone goes

[00:24:24] Bale's the guy Bale's the guy and they go with Bale right because Bale had been an American Psycho and everyone was like he's got the darkness and had been a child actor but wasn't really a big movie star at that point in time. No. No. But American Psycho

[00:24:38] right. That was his calling card and equilibrium I remember people being like oh this is like this feels like a Batman type character. Equilibrium is like almost as as much as the Boondock Saints one of those movies in college where people would be like what a cool movie

[00:24:54] you've got to watch it. I watched it. I was like this is a God awful movie. Equilibrium is a lot better than the Boondock Saints to be clear that's only because the Boondock Saints is the worst film ever made. Equilibrium is like kind of

[00:25:04] cute but bad like the gun food things kind of cute the rest of it's basically like 1984 and a blender or whatever you know it's sort of like whatever but so they're off to the races and this movie comes out. It opens well. It will get to that closes

[00:25:19] well. Yeah it's not a huge hit but it's a good hit. It's a good hit you know especially when they thought that franchise was kind of like back on its heels definitely now it was like on firm ground when it came out it was

[00:25:30] not thought of as like a surefire 2005 summer hit. No no and it's weird to think about in retrospect that like wedding crashers out performed Batman begins. Yeah man you know like within that same summer but it was a solid hit. It got good reviews

[00:25:45] and people were kind of back on board and it was this big turning point of like oh but what if superhero serious. Yeah because remember the same year Fantastic Four comes out right and that's your old model. Yes now obviously again X-Men had come out X-Men 2

[00:26:00] had come out Spider-Man had come out. I'm not saying like Batman invented some new version of like making a superhero movie but definitely come on. You know there are a lot of big shifts here and it's weird watching this movie now when so much of

[00:26:12] blockbuster culture in the last 10 plus years has crept from it. But you know I mean the Daniel Craig Bond movies are reconceived very much here in the mold of for sure. And then you have a lot of aborted attempts like like McGee's Terminator Salvation

[00:26:27] is definitely trying to do a Christopher Nolan version of Terminator. Unfortunately directed by McGee. Yeah that was the problem issue. McGee had a good idea. Yes except for the fact that he was making it. Yeah what don't you fucking understand. I believe was the line. Remember that Ben.

[00:26:43] He yelled at that guy. You remember. I'll say this I was talking about that with like some of the camera guys on on tech. Sure about that like bail flip out thing and they were like yeah but that deep is notorious for that. And I was like really

[00:26:58] and they were like he still does it to this day. Like in the middle of a take he'll like walk in and like adjust the light right in an actor's face. I remember when that happened though a lot of the reporting was like you know we get

[00:27:10] it. We get why he'd be mad. It's just the clip is just so insane. Anyway. Yes and also in retrospect you could tell like he was angry that he was in that fucking move probably. But anyway OK so this movie comes out. June of 2005. Ha June 15th 2005.

[00:27:27] It was my last day of high school that year. Whatever that would have been I think sophomore junior year. Junior probably well maybe sophomore. I was in college. I was my I was a summer intern at the Boston Phoenix living in Boston.

[00:27:42] Hey but no I think I was in London the first time I saw it I saw it again and I can't remember anyway carry on. It was my last day of school there's the grad party everyone's going to and I was like fuck that I'm going to see

[00:27:52] Batman. Bartman begins. Yeah I was a loser. Yeah and I went with my friends who were not my friends from school because all of them want to go the grad party and we saw the IMAX midnight showing a Batman begins. That's cool. Back when you had

[00:28:05] to go at midnight not 7pm. None of that bullshit. Jesus I had to stay up and just had to turn my levels down. Bed time we got some cold stone beforehand. Whatever we did I don't know but we fucking we saw Batman begins. Bartman begins and I remember

[00:28:22] it was not a sure thing. I had heard people who said like this is kind of cool. I had heard rumblings like this movie's a fucking mass. Oh really? Yeah. Yeah and so I was sitting there I was hype. I was a big because it was really high.

[00:28:33] You didn't know Nolan though this is your first Nolan this is my first Nolan whereas I was obsessed with the Mento and I'd liked and like I was all in on this but I was very hype because I was really into the approach and I loved Batman. Yeah.

[00:28:44] I'm sorry Batman. Bartman. Bartman but I was worried. I was cautiously optimistic. I wanted to find Jesus Christ he was worried he was optimistic and I sit there opening night and just immediately I'm like fucking yeah I'm on board. This is the Batman when does it get you?

[00:29:02] When does it get you? Like almost immediately does it come in black? No I feel like when he was in the prison the Himalayas fighting the guys I was just like yeah this is like the approach to this character I want and I don't know if I've ever

[00:29:15] this ever happened in front of you but I have a problem with chronic nosebleeds. I don't think it's ever happened in front of me. Not as bad as it used to be but I will randomly get horrible nosebleeds at certain times. I remember you got one

[00:29:26] back when we were doing talking TCGS. Yeah talking TCGS. Yeah. About 45 minutes into this movie my nose starts bleeding. That's bad. And I'm popping my hands underneath my nose trying to like pull the blood and collect it and stop it from getting on my shirt.

[00:29:43] And my friends turn to me and they go like is everything okay? And I was like my nose is bleeding and they were like shouldn't you go to the bathroom and take care of it? And I was not doing it until he fucking says I'm Batman.

[00:29:51] You had to wait another 20 minutes. I know. I counted exactly when it happened. The second he says I'm Batman I ran into the bathroom at the Lincoln Square IMAX theater covered in blood my hands like I just committed murder. Murderous. Right. And I go to the sink and

[00:30:06] I'm trying to wash blood off my hands. I'm the only one in the bathroom other than a guy dressed up like the Joker. In this guy. Midnight. It was the midnight shoot. Yeah. And not ledger Joker but like Caesar Jomero Joker. And he looks at me goes like

[00:30:21] hey are you OK man? I was like yes. And then I ran back into the theater. Nerd. Yep. I'm Batman. And then I'm blood man. Yes you blood boy. Let's be clear. Batman beguards. Yeah. No I think I saw it in London before I went to Boston.

[00:30:41] I was a summer intern though that summer like July and August and I was working at the Boston Phoenix but my job as an intern was mostly like nothing. You know. Yeah. I like had to like assemble daily clips or I don't know what I did.

[00:30:52] I'm big alone. So I would every almost every day go across the street to the AMC Fenway which was literally across the street and see a movie for lunch. And I remember like on my like last week there I came back and it was the first time my

[00:31:04] boss had been like wanting to talk to me was like hey where is he. And I got away with this totally. Yeah. So I saw like two more times there. I just would go see it. Yeah. It's so good. So good. But it was especially exciting then.

[00:31:16] We like the Batman movie. All right guys look. What can I tell you it's a fucking good movie. I know it's you know like happy to think of it now but I'll say I like more so than any other movie I think we've ever covered on this show.

[00:31:30] Watching this rewatching it last night and I've seen this movie a ton of times right. Yeah. Re-watching it last night I was like I actually cannot extricate this movie from my nostalgia for it and my memories of it and sort of what it represented at the time.

[00:31:47] It's very hard for me to view this movie objectively because we are similarly like nerdy overly obsessive guys. We love pop psychology and all that shit. And to see this character be taken with that kind of level and thought in detail. Swear to me.

[00:32:04] Yeah it was just like you know I just remember like my look like a cop. When I walked out this movie I was like I've been fucking vindicated. You know. All right. All right. It felt like a personal victory. This is the problem with these movies. Right.

[00:32:18] Is that what I want to talk about. These fucking idiots are like half like I'm in charge now. Right. Right. I'm the captain now. Right. Everyone became Barkat Abdi after seeing this movie. Damn right. And I also think it created this bad dynamic with nerd culture where it's

[00:32:35] like I want you to take my thing seriously so I don't feel like a baby for liking something meant for children. Exactly. And it becomes right. Something that's become incredibly toxic which is that idea of like the very idea of making these movies for a wide audience

[00:32:50] or for children is like like antithetical to these people. Right. Like how could you. Like it has to be dark. I guess it's like the extreme version now is just those like crazy DC universe bros who are like Zack Snyder's a genius because he's so twisted.

[00:33:08] That was a really good voice. Swarming. What else does he say in this movie? Because his voice in this is perfect. Love it. Nice coat. Whereas in the dark night which will get a little. He's he's done something like I remember I would watch

[00:33:22] the Pete Holmes bad man you know the like spooce of it and I'd be like right he's like spoofing it. He's and then you watch like no he's just doing the voice that he does in the dark night. I remember reading some early review of this movie.

[00:33:33] Hockey pads. Yeah. Then it becomes this. I remember reading this early review of the movie on like probably in a cool or whatever. It's almost like it's really good. Heads up when he's in the Batman costume he kind of talks like Alec Baldwin.

[00:33:47] Like no one had known that and Batman didn't have any dialogue in the trailers in the costume. I feel like. No he probably very little. I can't remember. The marketing was like very elusive and minimalist too. You really have a sense of what the movie was.

[00:33:59] I remember like one of the key bits in the marketing was that line where the scarecrow goes like the Batman. You know he's coming the Batman and they used a lot of Ken Wontanabe's yeah. Rashal Gulman a lot. Why not. Why not. The must be destroyed. Yes.

[00:34:13] And it was just like oh the whole thing is going to be Rashal Gul trying to burn Gotham to the ground. Sure. Ken Wontanabe fist fighting Batman. Right. Right. Well yeah they use a lot of the early part of the movie. Yeah. Anyway.

[00:34:27] But but yeah it then it becomes this thing where like Batman is one property where you can dig into it on a psychological level. Sure. And the fact that they tried to just break it down and go like OK the goal of this movie is

[00:34:38] figure out what would actually need to happen for this guy to make these decisions. Right. You know get into the micro and really build it piece by piece. Because we just had Batman Robin where he doesn't talk and he just talks in normal George Clooney voice.

[00:34:54] He has a bat credit card. Yeah. He's like invited to parties and everyone's like oh Batman's here like like the you know sanitation commissioners here like he's just like a member of Gotham I society. And people talk about the dark movies. They're so insane.

[00:35:08] People talk about like this the dark and gritty thing but it's like this movie is pretty like austere looking like it's pretty glossy. Yes. And it's dark and that it's shadowy and it's not a toyetic movie. It's like the least toyetic movie ever made.

[00:35:20] Well right because I remember during the production when they revealed the Batmobile. It's like the opposite of like a cool car. Right. It's like this weird blocky tank thing. Right. And everyone was like huh. And the villains are kind of just wearing suits. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:35:34] The Scarecrow is just a guy in a suit who puts a bag on his head. Right. But like the term realism kept on being thrown around correctly and I feel like the bigger gritty because it's about like a city. Yeah. That is like overtaken by crime.

[00:35:49] I guess it's like a street level movie. I don't know. I think the bigger thing was Nolan trying to apply a level of logic to this type of movie that wasn't usually there. Yes. Character logic, story logic, these kinds of things and then people misinterpreted that as

[00:36:02] like oh the whole thing is to be self serious. Why so. No. Yeah. No but also the funny thing is Richard T Joker is not in yet he doesn't enter yet. Well he's mentioned at the end there. But no yes he's not. But this movie is

[00:36:16] though more comic booky and a little more pulpy and silly than The Dark Knight. Which I love. And here I'm going to get this right out of the way. Go ahead. I personally prefer Batman Begins to Dark Knight. Don't at me bro.

[00:36:31] I'm not going to argue it's a better movie. It comes down to personal preference. I like the fact that this movie is more comic booky. I think it gives it more latitude. I think they're both good. I think I like The Dark Knight more because I just don't

[00:36:43] think we'll ever see a movie like that again. That movie is crazy. I like this movie a lot. I've seen it a bunch of times because I saw it in theaters a million times. And then I just had it on DVD. It would watch in college over

[00:36:53] and over again. Yeah. Well the other thing the other thing I like about this movie and this just gets on to my personal preference is I like that this movie is really about Batman. Right. This is a Batman movie whereas The Dark Knight is less of a Batman.

[00:37:07] And almost every Batman way that's ever been made is more about the villain than it is about Batman. I'm like running through the moment ahead. Yes. You know 100 percent. But this is the one that really is about Batman and Bruce Wayne as a character. Yeah.

[00:37:21] I find Batman to be a very interesting character, especially in all his contradictions. It's especially true like I'm now I'm just thinking about like when you think about the four, you know, Burton universe movies or whatever you want to call them. They have like lots of scenes

[00:37:34] of the villains. Yes. The villains have like parallel a plot. Right. Whereas in this obviously you have a couple of scenes with the Scarecrow on his own. We're like not so much. Like very little. And you know Richard T Joker does in Dark Knight and

[00:37:48] Michael K Bain does in The Dark Knight Rises. For sure. But in this film it really is like it's all about. Right. Well, yeah. No, you go ahead. It's all about Batman's Chris for J Batman. No, please. But of course the sequels are going to do that anyway

[00:38:01] because like you've done the work on the legwork on Batman. But I just my personal preference I like a movie that's burrowing into Batman's head and trying to explain piece by piece and this movie does such a fucking good job of that. So let's let's just get

[00:38:14] straight into it. Swear to me. I swear. I swear. This movie does a good job. I've seen the movie with Mark Boone, Junior. I love that he gets Mark Boone, Junior back in. What a what a what a job he does. OK, so the movie starts

[00:38:27] with bats flying around and they make like a bat logo and then they just disperse fly away, which again, like think about the Schumacher movies start with these like incredibly long title sequences with the score where like each actor's name like swoops in and then like it's like

[00:38:47] and Batman and Robin, the Warren Brothers logo gets frozen. Right. Well, in the right Batman forever, it like turns into a bat in Batman and Robin. It gets frozen. Oh my God. And like, you know, they I really love those movies. We've got to talk about them.

[00:39:01] I feel like we could do an entire episode that's just on movies that customize the studio logo. One of my favorite things because it always feels more important. Like even if the movie is bad, it's like the studio was really betting on but then I get

[00:39:13] mad if the movie is bad. And I'm like, you customized your logo for the mummy? No. No, I say no. Did they know they have the dark universe, which is even worse because it's like you have your universe. Yeah. And then like the universe,

[00:39:26] the earth turns dark and it like reverses like the universe, the word spin out. The word spin away and then like from the other side comes in like dark universe. See, I would have liked it if it was the universal globe and then suddenly bandages start wrapping. Excellent.

[00:39:47] That's the kind of stuff I like. Yeah. Yeah. You know, when we'll know like there's been real revolutions when someone messes with the Netflix logo. Yeah. You know, the to do like someone like does something weird to that. Maybe they'll do that with bright. They'll make it twisted.

[00:40:04] It'll start out like Netflix and then I'll come out like flitnecks because they twisted it. Swear to me. I won't fuck. So how dare you? So you told me to swear to you. Fair enough. Fair enough. The film starts out with bats

[00:40:22] and then we see young Bruce Wayne. Yes, who plays young Bruce Wayne played a boy who is clearly British? Well, this film was mostly shot in London in London and London town. You sound like you're from London. Gus Lewis is young Bruce Wayne. He is British, right?

[00:40:39] He is an English actor. He does a good American accent, but you can tell he's putting a little too much. His foot's a little too heavy on the gas with certain American words. Apart from this, he's in the movie Asylum, you know, but that's OK.

[00:40:52] But it was this movie was mostly shot in London. They built the Batcave and Shepherd Studios. They built a lot of the set. And obviously then the city stuff is Chicago. Chicago. Chicago. Big Chicago. No, Little Chicago. Big Chicago is Academy Award nominee Michael Shannon. Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.

[00:41:06] Screwed it up. He's running away. He's playing a game with his the local, the help's daughter. Rachel Dawes. Rachel Dawes. The gardener's daughter. They're hanging out in the greenhouse to chase each other and he walks over an unstable patch of wooden boards

[00:41:24] and falls into a cavern and is attacked by bats. Which is a scene that Burton had done. It's a scene that Schumacher does in Batman Forever. And it's a scene that Zack Snyder does in Batman versus Superman, where he's like lifted up by the bats. Remember that?

[00:41:39] Yes, I do. Now the complaint, of course, is do we need to see this again? And I think this is great. This is the movie where you need to see it again because this movie and it's also this movie is all about the building blocks.

[00:41:49] It's all about giving you every little piece. So by the time he wears that suit, you get it all. Yes. I would say I love this movie, but even in this movie when he puts on the suit, you still have to make the leap of logic.

[00:42:01] But I think that's fine. It's a final leap. But they've explained to every piece. They've done a better job of it for sure than just being like he saw a bat once. So he's Batman. You get it? All right, thanks.

[00:42:11] Which is a 1930s comic book way of doing it, which I'm also fine with. Right. He's doing something different and... So then immediately cuts to bearded Bruce Wayne in a jail. Yes, in Asia. Yes. In... It's actually supposed to be Bhutan. OK. The small Tibetan adjacent kingdom.

[00:42:34] But it's just your bog standard mystical Asian country. Right. And this was like immediately I was on Boertham movie watching at this point because I was just like, this is such a weird place to introduce us to Bruce Wayne. Sure.

[00:42:49] Like already this movie is throwing you off the hump. Yeah. Now, Goyer tries to replicate this exact same script structure for Man of Steel. Man of Steel. Sure. Right. Where you're cutting back and forth for the first hour. Childhood, origin, childhood, origin. Yeah. Right.

[00:43:08] But the problem with Man of Steel is by picking those two poles, you're missing all the interesting stuff, which is when Clark Kent kind of comes into his power. Let's not talk about Man of Steel. Not going to. But I agree with that.

[00:43:20] But I'm going to say what's brilliant about this movie is the childhood stuff gives you the emotional background. Yeah. And then you get the stuff that's leading up to him becoming Batman and the movie just glosses over the stuff you don't need to see. Agreed.

[00:43:31] But also the Superman, Batman rocks are just very different. Very different. Right. I'm saying this... Superman's about like a hero who's been given a mantle, Batman, he has to make the mantle for himself. Exactly. So this structure works for Batman because you're seeing everything that happens

[00:43:44] before he ever becomes Batman. With Superman to apply that structure to it, you're missing a lot of key steps. Yes. Also, it's about a man in prison, right, at a low ebb, intentionally low ebb, who is trying to sort of put together like,

[00:43:59] why, how did I get here? What do I want to do? Right. And it's like part A. It's like a teen tour gone wrong. I mean, that's what happens. Right. Part A, I'm afraid of bats. Yeah. Part B, I want to be a ninja. Yeah.

[00:44:11] Part C, my parents die. Oh my God, I love this movie. This movie is so goofy. It is. It's great. It's the best combination of like, really like self serious logic and just goofiness. I agree. So he's in prison. He's fighting with prisoners.

[00:44:28] He's just, you know, he just... Taking part. Because of course, in the movie, this movie leans on this heavily like Batman fights criminals, right? Why would someone be so interested in fighting criminals? Like... Yes. And like, isn't the idea like he's in this prison

[00:44:44] because he enjoys fighting the criminals? Yes. I guess. And the other element I like of it is that, you know, this thing about Batman being this very Republican conservative hero when you really examine his ideals, this is a place where I think this movie deconstructs that

[00:44:59] and tries to work around that because like, this is a Bruce Wayne who actively resents his wealth and his privilege. Sure. And feels like it disconnects him from the actual troubles of the world. OK. And I think him ending up in this jail is,

[00:45:10] A, he wants to fight criminals, but B also, it's extrapolation of him just trying to find his place in the world and try to get as far away from his shit as possible. As Ducard points out, like it is the pulps on common people.

[00:45:20] He's like, you're not really a criminal because you could just leave your rich. Which is why he becomes Batman because he realizes this is a lie what he's doing right now. Sure, right. There is a way to weaponize his privilege. And still... Privilege, oh boy, here we go.

[00:45:32] You know what I'm saying? So Ducard shows up. He shows up. He shows up. Rather than try to deny it. Liam Neeson, who had not yet made taken. No. But this is the beginning of his road to taken in my opinion. Yeah, I mean...

[00:45:44] Sort of like self serious gravitas. I'm going to say something controversial. All right, I'm going to say that. I think Liam Neeson is the worst thing about this movie. Oh my God, I couldn't agree more. I couldn't disagree more, sorry. Fair enough.

[00:45:55] I know that's not to say that he's bad because I like everything in the movie. I love him in this, yeah. I mean, OK, maybe I guess Katie Holmes is... I think she's fine in this. I think she's fine. Exactly.

[00:46:04] I think Neeson is great in the first part. When he comes back, I'm kind of like a little sick of him. I love it. He's good. So you know who they originally offered the role to? Guy Pierce. Ducard? Yeah. But who else? Gary Oldman. Oh sure.

[00:46:22] And Gary Oldman said, I don't want to play the villain. I've done this too many times. Yes, you're right. What if you play the good guy? And I mean, what a great choice that was. The minute you see him, you're like...

[00:46:37] I think he's secretly the best performance in this movie. Everyone's good in the movies. I agree, but he's really fucking good in this one. Anyway. He's great in all of them. Well, he's great in the first two. Yeah. Neeson comes into his jail cell.

[00:46:50] Neeson comes in and he's like... And just calls his bullshit because you're fucking Bruce Wayne. You can get out. Come on. Come on. Flips him a bird. Says a legend, Mr. Wayne. Yes. Legend, Mr. Wayne. Yeah, that's right. Sometimes I'm like, OK, Liam. See, I love it.

[00:47:04] I love... Here's what I like about this performance and this is going to be the most controversial thing I've ever said on this show. That's going to be hard to do, but OK. Ready? Yeah. I like that he's putting too much paprika on the sandwich.

[00:47:14] Oh, that is controversial. I think Neeson knows exactly what he's doing. That he is in this movie the bridge between the self-serious ambitions of the movie and the pulpier origins of the material. That's fine. I mean to that, it's fine. He's good. I think he's really good.

[00:47:35] And he's got a really... Here's the thing with Liam Neeson. He just got a musicality to his voice, right? He's got a grateful... There's a depth of feeling to everything he says, but also a weird rhythm to how he delivers dialogue,

[00:47:46] which especially when you're doing these long kind of monologues about philosophy, he just kind of makes this shit sing. It's got a rhythm to it. That's the thing. I agree. He makes it great, but some he can boogie along to it.

[00:47:57] Sometimes you're like a little sick of his whole like we burned room. I was gonna say that's the line. That's the line where if you lose your faith in the performance of it, but see, I love that line delivery. You took my... I'm moving to the ground.

[00:48:11] You took your London, sorry. You took my advice about theatricality a bit literally. Okay buddy. I love it. All right, paprika. Because I would say what obviously what the Dark Knight has going for it is it's got better villains. Of course. Of course, but this has great villains.

[00:48:29] And what I like about the movie is it's not really about the villain. Right. And that's I think that's a good argument. So he comes in, he's like, look you want to be a real ninja and come talk to me.

[00:48:37] I live on the highest mountain in the Himalayas. Bring me a blue flower. See you later. Right. Bruce Winsor, can I just follow you there? He's like, no, you need to give me a head start of like two weeks. So he climbs up the mountains.

[00:48:49] As I was telling Ben off Mike, this was shot in... Yeah, great music. Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard. Which is another thing I like about this movie. Go ahead. Because Hans Zimmer gets very famous for his Dark Knight score and then the Batman themes.

[00:49:04] But this movie has this dialogue between the two composers where Hans Zimmer is kind of doing the Batman music and James Newton Howard, who I think is a more emotional composer. He's doing the more... The Bruce Wayne. ...classic orchestral music. And he's really representing the Bruce Wayne character.

[00:49:19] He's fucking with it. He does the emotional stuff. And then... Hans Zimmer does the action stuff, the scale stuff and someone tweeted at us, I hope you'll talk about the fact that certain tracks on the Batman Begins score sound like Unbreakable Rejects. They do.

[00:49:31] That's because James Newton Howard also did the Unbreakable score and it's the same kind of... He's the Tim Nyechamalins guy. Right. And then in Dark Knight, you know, Hans Zimmer was like, I'm going to do Joker, you do Batman. Yeah. And that's...

[00:49:42] I love that too because in Dark Knight, it's Hans Zimmer. Hans Zimmer, I just like that he messes with himself every time. Yeah. He's good with these scores. Sometimes he can lean on boring shit, but like he wants to fuck with his music. No one pushes him,

[00:49:56] I think in interesting directions. For sure. OK, so now Trek, Trek, Trek. And you're getting these gorgeous fucking landscape shots. And this is where that sort of... Christopher Nolan, let's go back to the 70s blockbuster aesthetic. It's like this movie has a fucking veracity to it.

[00:50:10] Like even if it's about goofy Batman, it's like you're seeing these fucking landscapes and these huge... These Vistas and it's just gorgeous details. I mean he's very wise to do a lot of location shooting. Yeah. Do real sets. Yeah.

[00:50:24] Lean away from the 90s aesthetic of like these art deco kind of like, you know, made up location. And this is like a $175 million movie, which was huge at the time. Like you had very few... $150 is what I see. I think it crept up.

[00:50:39] I remember here and it was getting to 170. Who knows? But a lot of that is just spent on like we're gonna fucking fly the whole crew out to the mountains. I think we mentioned on Insomnia, you know he doesn't do second unit. He does everything himself. Yeah.

[00:50:52] Oh, blessed o' tour Chris Nolan, we salute you. And here's this montage of him like trekking to find these places and like it was... It would have been so easy just green screen a couple shots of Chris for Nolan. Or maybe Christian Bale. You know what I'm saying?

[00:51:05] Nobody can tell that he's... No, Chris for Nolan plays Batman in this film. Yes, he does. He plays Richard T. Drattman. I'm fucking out my own jokes. I'm so tired today. Why are you so tired? You should have taken a nap. Just take a little nap.

[00:51:14] No one should make a TV show. Yeah. Bartman. He goes to Ninja Camp. He gets there. And here is Academy Award nominee Ken Wontanabe who's been set up as the chief villain of this new Batman movie. He was announced to be playing Rasha Ghul.

[00:51:28] Which is already a weird choice to make like, you know, you're rebooting Batman, you're not going with any of the classics, you're going Scarecrow and Rasha Ghul is the primary antagonist. But I really do think that was partly the studio being like you can't do Joker. Yeah.

[00:51:41] You can't do Catwoman because they've been done too recently. Yeah. And I really do think it's funny that that's how they thought because obviously now it's like, what? Do Joker. This was very much still that culture where like if someone's been done, you can't do it again.

[00:51:53] Not for a while. As opposed to Fox like now threatening to make Fantastic Four for the third time. Yeah. Sure. Go ahead. Yeah. It is Rasha Ghul is usually like Egyptian. He's Middle Eastern. Yeah. It's always kind of vague. Well, when he was come, you know,

[00:52:08] he was basically like a Fu Manchu villain back when he was created and he's been sort of obviously like many a comic book villain, you know, sort of toned down. He's toned down. Yes. Slightly woker. But he's like a mastermind, a criminal mastermind who's the head

[00:52:26] of the League of Shadows, but also he's like a practitioner of the dark arts. Right. His big thing is he's got these Lazarus pits where he can constantly bring himself back to life. So he's immortal. And I remember everyone being like. He's the closest to like Lex Luthor

[00:52:39] that Batman has in his rogues gallery because he's definitely often like behind the scenes, pulling the strings. Right. One in the other big element which we'll get to a couple of episodes from now is Daughter Talia, Batman's, you know. One of his squeezes.

[00:52:54] He wants to give her the day. He wants to give her the dark night. I don't want to talk to you anymore. Tumblr, he barely knows her. You got me back. All right. Okay. He goes to Ninja Camp. Kam Watanabe who had indeed was a legend

[00:53:13] of Japanese cinema who had just been nominated for The Last Samurai, which he's great in a bad movie that he's great in. He's always great. Yeah, he's great. This is maybe his worst performance in an American film because he doesn't have much to do.

[00:53:25] He has very little to do. And I love that Nolan really does repay him with his role in Inception, which is my favorite thing about Inception. You can talk about it on the Inception episode. A favor, a promise between two friends. We're gonna talk all about it.

[00:53:38] Yeah, but he's kind of a MacGuffin. He's a misdirect in this movie and you have him. He is spoiler alert, Liam Neeson is the real Rosigill. Right. I revealed this spoiler. Unbreakable. You have him. Finger. Ben just got actively annoyed. Yeah, go ahead.

[00:53:56] I sit next to Ben now so I can see him mark things on the console. Brrrr. Swear to me. Fuck. Do I look like a cop? I love saying it. So he has, Ken Watanabe dressed up in this sort of like,

[00:54:22] more grounded version of a Roshal Gul costume, which is red robes. But it's still Ninja Camp. Let's be clear. But he's looking, yes, but that's the point. He's looking a little more comical. He's this mystical figure. Right. Sitting in a throne. Liam Neeson's just wearing a suit.

[00:54:36] Yeah, Liam Neeson's like, right, his like. Intaginistic mentor care. His like chief operating officer, where he's like welcome to Ninja Camp. And Roshal Gul isn't talking at all. He's just sitting in a throne. Once in a while he sort of talks in Japanese for a second.

[00:54:50] And throws his cape over his shoulder and walks away. See you later. And Ducard is just like, hey, welcome. Now guess what? I'm gonna fucking kick your ass. I'm gonna kick you. Jeff does not wait for you or whatever. He's gonna yell at him. Yes.

[00:55:02] And then he's like, you want to be a Batman? I'll help you. Right. So he, and this is, you know, Nolan likes, especially in these movies, especially starting with this movie, to like make everything come back later. And like everything Batman learns at Ninja Camp

[00:55:19] is referenced one more time, if not two more times. He's a puzzle filmmaker. Even when he stops making films. We talked a lot about it with Amy Nicholson where in the Memento episode where it's like he loves, and I feel like audiences love to be like,

[00:55:32] oh, I see the line. And that's the thing. He makes people feel smart because he doesn't say it. He shows it. He shows it very clearly. Exactly. But you give yourself credit for putting the pieces together. So when there's sword fighting on the ice

[00:55:44] and you see the sword get caught in his gauntlets and you go like, oh, that's why Batman's arms are designed that weird way. Because he was like, oh, that's a cool ninja thing. And then the whole thing with like deception and theatricality.

[00:55:55] And I'm just like jizzing in my seat. It's like a 15 year old, 16 year old. I was like, this is the best theatricality and deception. And then powerful tools. But then more than anything, there's this idea of fear as something that you conquer

[00:56:09] and then something that you can use against people to be scary because like, I think it's something that had basically been forgotten probably in all of the Burton movies, maybe a little bit in the first Batman it's there. But like Batman-

[00:56:21] He just becomes a detective who wears a bad costume for some reason. That's the thing, it's like the whole point of him dressing up as a bat is to frighten people. Like he's supposed to be this like specter who like, you know, haunts criminals at night.

[00:56:32] Like the whole idea of Batman is you're afraid to do crime at night because like the Batman will be there. I think Burton rationalizes it by taking this angle of he's just a guy losing his mind. Then that's great. Like it's a disassociative thing.

[00:56:47] He just doesn't know what is going on in this suit is the only thing that keeps him sane. It's like his security blanket. But then you get to Schumacher and it doesn't mean anything. The costume doesn't mean anything. That's what I love about Batman and Robin

[00:56:57] like I said, where it's like, oh we're opening the new opera house. Batman do come by. Be it we're gonna have an auction to go on a date with Batman or whatever. Like I mean it's just the best. I really would love if it was a scene

[00:57:10] where Batman's just like talking to like, you know, the planning commissioner about like something boring. Alfred, I'm going to bodega. Get me my costume. But Mr. Wayne, you don't need to get me my costume. Well, I mean, but that's Batman forever starts with that line where he's like,

[00:57:25] shall I make a sandwich? So he's like, I'll get drive through. It's a great line. That's like the line at the start of the movie. Yeah, the car, check stick the car. I hate Batman forever. David likes it. I like both Batman forever and Batman and Robin.

[00:57:39] I think Batman and Robin is interesting. I think Batman forever is boring. When's the last time you watch it? I find that so crazy. I watched it like six months ago and we thought about this. You're so crazy. It's so good. It's a dumb movie for you.

[00:57:51] Yeah, it's real dumb. It's a dumb ass movie. But I think- Breaking news. I think Batman and Robin is at least dumb fun. I think Batman forever is boring dumb. I think Batman forever is more fun. I think Batman and Robin is honestly tough to watch.

[00:58:07] It's more fun in that kind of like, I can't believe it, like every time way. Because the action in Batman and Robin is like so, it's so bad. Partly because one of the villains is wearing a 140 pound metal suit. Hey, hey, David, chill out.

[00:58:24] And the other one's a lady who can't like, you know, just sort of like walks around like this. Hey, hey, David, find out. So- He's now fully in the Descartes school of being a crazy magician fighter. It's true. His like graduation exam is like,

[00:58:44] take some fear drugs and then like, we're all gonna get in line and attack you. It's how well can you hold your shit? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Take this bong hit and then open the chest of pain and fear.

[00:58:58] I love the shit with them fighting on the ice and it does feel like Descartes becoming this weird father figure for him even though it's obviously very different than how his father was. And then what we should say, of course, you're cutting between these sequences

[00:59:08] and the flashbacks to Batman's father, Thomas Wayne, wonderfully by the line of search. And I was saying to join him while we were watching it, like right this is the only movie- That makes him a character. That makes any effort to make either of his parents a character.

[00:59:22] This movie doesn't make any effort with his mother or unfortunately. But Thomas does. And it's so funny because like, you know, in the Burton Batman, the death of his father is this very like theatrical thing but that's partly because they're tying the Joker into it, right?

[00:59:39] In the Snyder Batman, the death is like this, I think we talked about it, you know, quasi pornographic scene where Jeffrey Dean Morgan's got like a pushbroom mustache and he like shoots Martha while the pearls are like, it's this like execution murder.

[00:59:55] And for DX there's a ripple in the seat every time he gets shot. And in this movie, I think the murder scene is so, so well done. Really upsetting, genuinely upsetting. It doesn't just feel like checking it off the list. It's just like a bullshit nothing scene

[01:00:11] which is what it's kind of supposed to be. You know, the original idea was just this, you know, this poor criminal Joe Chill looking for some money. Right, and I love the way that Thomas Wayne is characterized in this movie.

[01:00:22] I mean they kind of, he talks about his father. The idea is he's this like, it's sort of like, he's a benevolent billionaire who's trying to help the city. He's almost like a Bill Gates figure if Bill Gates was third generation old money.

[01:00:34] But you get this idea that like, even though he means well, it is sort of a half-hearted thing. It's not going to do it all by itself because you have to believe that Batman thinks like it wasn't enough, right? To just like build some infrastructure.

[01:00:47] He was doing it all from the ivory tower. He wasn't getting his hands dirty. And that's what Bruce sees. But I think last rest shows a really good job playing the most difficult thing which is just a good simple person. It's very hard to play an unconflicting person.

[01:01:02] I agree. No, I think he does a terrific job. Love Linus. And I love the way the city is visualized. It's obviously based on Chicago here. The coolest Linus? Yeah. Yeah, cities visualized really well. Yeah, I mean, I love Linus Fanpal, but he's a fucking nerd.

[01:01:16] He's a nerd. I mean, that's another challenge is, you know, you've already had Anton First's iconic Gotham. That's Art Deco expressionist. Exactly. And then you have like the cartoon does that too. Sort of dials that up and Schumacher's dialing that up.

[01:01:30] Like, you know, can you do Gotham again? Like what do you do? He's adding more purple. Every building is on the back of a giant statue. Yeah, right. And they each have their own designated spotlight with a different gel, a different color gel

[01:01:43] directly in front of that building. Now that you pointed out it's sort of vapor wave. It is very... Come on, it's 90s as shit. I mean like this is one thing I love about Batman Forever. The gangs that are entirely a neon

[01:01:55] and like somehow they all have like black lights on them at all times. Yo, yo, yo, but wait a second. What if Batman vaped? He will. Mark my words. I mean, Ben Affleck vapes? There is no question. When do they finally just decide like let's merge them?

[01:02:11] Okay, on the record, let's make a bet that Batman vapes in Justice League. Wait, what are the odds you're saying? Or we just say declaring it's gonna happen. More of the odds. Or declaring it's gonna happen. I'm gonna declare. I'm gonna declare.

[01:02:25] I'm gonna go Griffey on the record. I have a question though. Is it that it's gonna be like branded, like a sponsored thing? Or is it gonna be the Bat Vape? I think it's gonna be neither. I think it's gonna be generic vape technology,

[01:02:38] but the idea is just oh, it's a character detail. The Bat Vape? Yeah. All right, okay anyway. So he learns to be a ninja. He graduates from ninja school. I'm just moving us on. There's the scene I love five hours in. A bad hour.

[01:02:50] Yeah, there's the scene I love on the ice after they fought. Yeah, you kept talking about the ice when he kicks into the- No, but when he's warming up afterwards and Liam Neeson talks about his classic Christopher Nolan dead wife. Yeah, he's like I had a wife once.

[01:03:02] My great love. Yeah. She was taken from me. You see- He's explaining why he hates criminals so much. A flip side of the coin. This is a guy who had his love taken from him in his life. And he's- He has a very specific set of skills. Right.

[01:03:16] Thank you, man. Skills that make him a nightmare for Batman like Batman. He is the opposite side of the coin. He is a man who became focused on anger and vengeance. And Batman is trying to prevent these things from happening again. I agree.

[01:03:33] Descartes is trying to make them happen again. Right, because of course the final test in his graduation is- Here we go. Here's a thief who murdered someone, some local schmo. You gotta chop his head off, here's a sword. He's like you should be under,

[01:03:47] you should experience a trial, fair trial. And he goes, What, corrupt judges? Lawyers? Yeah, he's like we burned London to the ground. Burned London to the ground. I am a thousand years old. And yeah, Liam Neeson's just like, you know, right, bureaucracy. This is all shit. Right.

[01:04:05] Like we are the ultimate judges, we know better so time for you to kill this guy. Batman sets it all on fire. He burns London to the ground. He does. And he leaves Rachele Goulford dead. He does. Oh, he also briefly fights Ken Watanabe.

[01:04:21] They have like a 30 second sword fight. Which they used all 30 of those seconds in the trailer to make it seem like this movie is him fighting Ken Watanabe. Watanabe is killed by a falling beam. Oh no! Perfectly placed. Watch out for the beam, immortal crime legend.

[01:04:36] You get the one close up of the blood coming out of the side of his mouth so you know he's dead and the movie never has to think about him ever again. Right. And yeah. Look out, a beam. He saves Ducard from falling over the top.

[01:04:49] Swear to beam. Fuck you, beam. He saves Ducard from falling off a cliff. Yeah. Leaves him passed out. Yeah, he does him a real solid. Burns his house down, kills all his friends. Leaves him on the side of a mountain. Thanks Bruce. Real cool.

[01:05:06] Then he calls up Alfred, his butler. Who we've already met. Let's just say the other stuff we've seen up until this point is you know, he goes back home from college. No, but we also seen the scene right after his parents were dead when Alfred hugs him.

[01:05:19] So did I, Mr. Wayne. So did I. He's done this great, so Alfred been played by Michael Goff in the first four movies where he is a stereotypical English butler guy. I love Michael Goff. But he was playing very much the archetypal butler character. Yes.

[01:05:35] And then this my Christian Nolan said, what if we hire the greatest screen actor of all time? Well, I mean, and right, this was part of Batman Begins' marketing for sure. It's like Nolan, you know, and like the billing is like all the actors above the title,

[01:05:48] not like Christian Bill, Batman Begins. You know, he's assembled a big eight actors. Right. Neeson, Cate Holmes, Gary Oldman, Morgan Freeman. You've got Morgan Freeman being the fucking Whippin' Skye. Right. It's like that's when I was like the bench on this movie so fucking deep.

[01:06:03] He gets the end. Yeah. Freeman, he gets his end. Well, I want to play the credit game with you. OK, sure. Yeah. But the billing game rather. Billing game. But there's the moment when you are first introduced to Alfred and they do a loving close up.

[01:06:19] The camera pushes in as right. Alfred, by the way, he's like a cockney lovely. And now it's Michael Cain and the score swells and the movie is just going like we know we got a real never. We got a powerhouse here. We got Michael Cain playing Alfred.

[01:06:34] This movie is going the next fucking level. I mean, we've all seen the trip, right? You know, he's the best in these. But Alfred, like this is the first time that Alfred in a movie is like a real fucking character. Yes. Although Batman and Robin has

[01:06:47] the linchpin of Batman and Robin's plot. Right. He's not sick. He's dying. He has a McGregor's disease. Yeah, you and McGregor infects him. He has sex with you and McGregor and he gets the deadly McGregor virus. I know. So yeah, we've got that.

[01:07:03] And then we have we have grown up Bruce comes back home from college. Right. Like college. He's naughty. Wayne Manor is all covered in gray. His hair is all like down and flat. They do a really good job. They do. They make them look like a little.

[01:07:14] His shirt don't fit him really well. He meets up again with Katie Holmes. But he sees Alfred and he's like Wayne Manor sucks. And Alfred's like, well, you know, watching out for it, you know, he meets up with Katie Holmes, who's like, is she already an assistant DA?

[01:07:26] Or no, I think she's still living there because she's supposed to. I think she's in college, whatever, whatever, they're both in college. But like that's when they go to the the the Joe Chill. Is that happening then? Correct. Correct. And and yes, Wayne's plan is

[01:07:40] I'm going to shoot Joe Chill at the murder of his parents. So Bruce Wayne has this right. He's only come back home for the hearing. It's he's up for a fucking release. No, he's being released because he's testifying against Carmine Falcone, the head of the mob snitching.

[01:07:55] And so Bruce goes and yes, his plan is I will shoot this man because that's Bruce's conception right now of fighting crime is like, what if I kill the guy who shot my parents? Won't that make me feel better? Yeah. And instead, the mob shoots Joe Chill

[01:08:08] before he even gets a chance. Bruce is there with the gun. He's ready to do it. And then he tells Katie Holmes he was going to do it and she gives him a slap in the face. And is this the point where she gives

[01:08:18] on the tour of the Narrows? Yeah, because I love the Narrows. The Narrows. So it's like the conception of of Gotham is like Chicago, but with crime Island in the middle. Which is amazing. And it's like this old weird shanty town

[01:08:33] that's just all brown and poop colored and gross. Yeah. And Prince Joffrey lives there. Yes, baby Joff. And like the monorail goes through there, but I guess it's like it's expressed stops. It goes through very quickly. It's looking over a shoulder a lot as it's steering through.

[01:08:50] And Katie Holmes is like, this is real Gotham. I'm committing my life fighting for this condition. I want to rebuild this through the law, you know? Right. This was your father's idea and it's Rachel Dawes, which I believe she did.

[01:08:59] It was just an invented character for these movies. Right. I believe so. There's not like a Rachel Dawes in the car. I don't think so. They might have put one in later. He reveals the thing about the gun. She saw some of his face. She drops him off.

[01:09:08] She goes, look, this is where all the fat cats hang out and he goes into the bar and it's Falcone. It's the judge. It's these gross cops. It's everybody. Yes. And he tries to face Falcone and Falcone is like, you're some rich kid.

[01:09:20] You're the son of Bruce Wayne. You have to go 100,000 miles to find someone who doesn't know your face. No, well, the idea you got to go to the Himalayas. But we got to talk about this scene because I knew

[01:09:30] that Tom Wilkinson had been cast to play Carmine Falcone. Isn't even above the title is not incredible. He's not because it's not like a huge role. He's probably a word nominee. He is for a great performance in the bedroom and later nominated again for Michael Hayden. Right.

[01:09:42] And I knew the comics well enough and I loved the Long Halloween, which Carmine Falcone is a big part of. It's the principal kind of antagonist, really. And I know that Carmine Falcone is supposed to be a, you know, Don Corleone-esque. Yes.

[01:09:55] And so I remember even in 2005 being like Tom Wilkinson. That is bizarre. Gandolfini or Daniela Yellow or some very obvious. Yeah. And that scene where he sits down in the bar and Falcone's basically like, you're a snotty rich kid points the gun at him and says, don't know.

[01:10:14] You're always afraid of what you don't understand. Great. Amazing. He's fantastic in this movie. I love every scene of his. I love that scene. I love the I'm Batman scene and I love the scene where Scarecrow fucks with him where he's like, duck, duck, I can't take it.

[01:10:28] I'm going. Blah, blah, blah. He's such an underrated actor. I agree. Love you, Tom. I was going to say he should have won for Michael Clayton, but that was one of the fiercest best supporting actor categories on a long time. Who won that year? Or them.

[01:10:42] And he also had a whole performance. Holbrook's great. But I mean, look, he's got those baguettes. He's got those big gets. That's the biggest performance of all. I know. But he had his big gets here. No, no, he had some Chewbacca. Yeah. Chewbacca. No. All right. So right.

[01:11:00] So after this rude awakening to Gotham's crime and the complexity of fighting a criminal enterprise, he gives his coat to a homeless man. He gives his coat to a homeless man played by. I can't say his name, but he's he's Rod. Rod Shabaga.

[01:11:15] Shabaga has, you know, the Serbian actor taken to love him. Is he Serbian? I want to get that right. I think so. He's a Croatian actor. OK, never mind. I'm sorry. And then he boards a boat. Boards of boat goes off to a crime.

[01:11:30] The timelines are kind of convergent. Continent. There's one moment I do want spotlight that we move past, which is after Tom and Martha Wayne are shot, you know, and Thomas Wayne's trying to just crisis management the situation, but gets out of hand and panic. Joe Chill shoots them.

[01:11:45] Sure. We speak. Right. Then he goes to the police station and Gary Oldman is the kindly cop. Who's there? Sergeant. With the photo. Jim Gordon. Jesus. And he's the one guy who's kind of dealing with this kidney human level.

[01:11:57] And there's a moment I love where the chief of police, I guess. The commissioner. Right. Misplayed by Colin McFarlane, who is like, I think he's an English actor who I mostly know from like sitcoms and stuff. Oh, really? And he usually talks like this. Yeah.

[01:12:14] And it's really funny because obviously he's cast just because they were shooting anyone. Right. Right. I don't know if like Nolan knew him or anything. Yeah. But it's just he's he's odd in these. He's in the dark night as well. He's weird.

[01:12:27] He's got that really forced, odd American accent. Yeah. But yeah, he's there and he's like, we got him. Right. That's the moment I love is he goes, Son, we got good news for you. And Bruce Wayne looks up and then he goes, we got him.

[01:12:39] We found the guy. And it's a great moment of like it's it's a small little thing, but that if you're a kid and your parents have just been murdered and someone walks in and says, we got good news for you. Sure.

[01:12:50] You're expecting they're going to say your parents are in debt. Right. But instead it's like we caught the guy. And it's like that's not fucking mean anything. Right. And it's this whole journey of the movie of him trying

[01:13:00] to figure out what is the kind of revenge that is satisfying, you know? Right. It's not it's not getting revenge. It's preventing these things from happening in the first place. OK, so now the two timelines have converged. He comes back. Alfred picks him up in the private jet.

[01:13:15] Makes a bunch of great jokes. Makes some great jokes about you can have the roles if you want because he had declared Bruce dead. Right. No, no, no, Rucker Howard declared. Oh yes. Rucker Howard, the first of so many reclamation projects for Christopher Nolan.

[01:13:28] You've got Beringer, Eric Roberts. I think we talked about this Matthew Modine. Who else? God, there's an obvious one that I'm forgetting. Inception. Not in terms of right where I was going to say Interstellar doesn't really have one. It's got a couple partial like John Lithgow

[01:13:43] isn't quite a redemption guy. No, no. Where you go. Oh, Tofer Grace. Yes, but you know, Wes Bentley. Correct. Correct. It's just weird because usually his redemption projects are guys who peaked in the 80s. Yeah, for sure. But this is definitely one of his 80s redemption project. Yeah.

[01:13:59] Is Rucker Howard's William Earl, the new CEO of Wayne Enterprise. And he's always said The Blade Runner was his favorite movie of all time and that's his kind of blame runner tip of the hat. William Earl who sucks. He's he's bad. He's a he's a shitty CEO. Right.

[01:14:15] You know, he should be CEO Lucius Fox. OK, this guy by Morgan Freeman. So Bruce Wayne shows up, shows up at Wayne Enterprises. He's like I'm back baby. And William Earl is like nice to see you. We're going public. So I guess that'll make you even richer than

[01:14:28] before. Yeah. But we're kind of just doing our thing here and nice to see you like, you know. And he's like what about applied sciences? He's like Lucius. OK, he's down in the basement where no one sees what he's up to. Right.

[01:14:41] And immediately Lucius Fox is like, I don't know, I got like this bat suit. I've got a Batmobile. I've got a bunch of weeks. Yeah, but a bunch of shit I sort of been like we were going to make all these Batman.

[01:14:53] But this is just like how Tony this movie is. It's like they could have cast fucking anyone to deliver that shit. But he was like, no, why not hire one of the best actors alive to explain the technology? Coming off an Oscar win.

[01:15:03] Or a year before he wins this Oscar for million dollar baby. Maybe he had already. Yeah. Yeah. It's like you got Morgan Freeman batting clean up in this movie. Yeah, he's great. Yeah, he's great. Isn't he? He's great. He rules in this. He's great.

[01:15:16] I mean, he's the best thing he has to deliver these lines where he's like, Oh, what this old cloth. Well, you put an electric current through it. It turns into and it's like, like if someone does that wrong, you're like the electric cloth. Yeah.

[01:15:29] What are you talking about? That's not a thing. This is a movie full of a cast full of actors who have such supreme control over tone and know exactly where to pitch stuff. Yep. Wilkinson, Killian Murphy, Old Moon. Yeah, because they're all going a little big,

[01:15:43] but still being sort of grounded behavioral with a little bit of tongue in cheek, just a little bit tongue in that cheek. David for the listener at home has put a little bit of tongue in his cheek. Little saucy tongue. OK, so now now everything's converged.

[01:15:59] We're in the present day and Bruce Wayne you know, has explained to Alfred on the plane, I got to become something bigger. I got to become a symbol. I got straight fear into the hearts of everything that's wrong in Gartham. Gartham. In Gartham. In Gartham.

[01:16:14] So he becomes the Bart man. No, so with Lucius, he starts and another thing he does is he goes into the caves below Wayne Manor. He confronts his own fear finds a bunch of bats. See, this is a waterfall. This is my thing. Oh, here comes Ben.

[01:16:30] He's roaring in in the bedmobile. All right. So yeah, he's afraid of bats. It's this representation of his fear that he wants to instill in his enemies. And it's of the moment his parents died. Right. Right. There's a lot of symbolism there, but I had this thought.

[01:16:51] Technically afraid of opera. Look, Ben's not wrong. That's the scariest thing to him. He's afraid of the opera. He was at a performance of Don Giovanni. Yeah. I had something that looked like bad ears. No, it's the people are tumbling down in black.

[01:17:04] But also there's that great moment. Oh yeah, right. Right. The silhouette of the guy, the horns on his head. But listen, you can't go. You can't call him opera man. That's what if you. What if you're already. What if you lost the Phantom of the Opera?

[01:17:15] Adam Sandler already had the copy. You're right. OK, I was just going to say though, there's potential for maybe a villain called opera man. OK, would it be wet? Would it be Sandler? Would he be big? Yes. I mean, what was your Batman character? Batman murder. Batman murder.

[01:17:34] Remember during the Star Wars days, you had like the Jedi that was like a man bat. You had bat pecky. Yeah, pecky. Right. That was it. Yes. Yes. Thank you. Yeah, yeah. He's a he's a Batman. Yeah, I would love to see an opera man.

[01:17:53] Well, let's be clear. I mean, the opera killed Bruce Wayne's parents. It did. It's the damn opera because usually it's Zorro. Like that's the comic book thing was he was seeing Zorro at the theater. And then a fucking Batman versus Superman. It's Empire Strikes Back. Is no.

[01:18:07] No, it's Excalibur or Sorcerer. They said it in the 80s. I think it's Excalibur. The Borman picture, I think. Yeah, it's I believe it's Excalibur. Yeah, you're right. But yeah, anyway, because it's the 80s now or whatever, you know, times have changed.

[01:18:23] Yeah, but now it becomes the opera. It's the opera. You know, it'd be great if he put on like a, you know, Harlequin mask and he can, you know, he sort of like flounced around his opera man. But once again, they wanted to, but Sandler had the copyright.

[01:18:34] He had a candle candle opera. He forced he forced crime. He plays the music of the night. I was that's the joke. He comes in with like a boat. I was going to say he forces crime to listen to the music of the night.

[01:18:50] It wouldn't be great if he like wrote around on a gondola. Yeah, that'd be great. A bat gondola or a chandelier. They do both live in caves and like catacombs. That's what I'm saying. Yeah, it's not. It's it's a distant cousin. Jarrah Butler could have played Batman.

[01:19:03] There's a world where Jarrah Butler is up for Batman. 100 percent. Like if it happens at the right time. If it happens two years later. Yeah. Oh boy, I'm excited. There was a rumor that Warner Brothers wanted Jarrah for the Snyderverse 2, which makes sense.

[01:19:17] Or that Snyder wanted for the Warner Brothers. It does make sense. I think he's yeah, no it does. But anyway, so he starts working on this Batman character. OK, how am I going to be able to listen to you? We need to design fucking antennae in the ears.

[01:19:35] Sure. Oh, the gauntlets will buy 10,000 of this piece and then 20,000 of this piece put together. I like all this shoe leather. I do too. I get really jazzed watching this part of the movie. But then you have the most important moment where he's carving a bat batarang.

[01:19:50] Yeah, right. And Bruce, Alfred's like what is going on here? He's like, that's frightened me. OK, so we're at like the 50 minute mark and you're like Batman still really taking his time again. Yeah, I mean, again, I kept checking the time while I was watching it.

[01:20:04] It's like still no Batman. And he puts the suit on, but oh, it's not finished yet. Doesn't have a symbol. Scheme ask instead of the gauntlet mask. But the first thing he goes out is his first thing where he's kind of crashing around the narrows

[01:20:16] and he's like kind of crappy at it. He's got this kind of harness on and he tries to question people, talks to Jim Gordon and establishes that bond. Yeah. But then he tries to jump off a building and hits a bunch of fire skis. Yeah, I think so.

[01:20:30] His idea is like, OK, if we there's a corrupt judge, yeah, if we can get the judge on our side, we can actually force the people. And we can get a DA, Rachel Dawes. Right. We need one honest cop, Jim Gordon.

[01:20:42] Get Jim Gordon the cop and then we can prosecute Carmine, who is bringing in some sort of substance in his drug deals, which are being helped along by Dr. Henry Crane, who is a Henry. Yeah, right? Yeah, Jonathan Crane. So Jonathan Crane played by Kylian Murphy,

[01:21:04] who's like a psychologist. Was also someone who came very close to playing Batman. Yes, he auditioned and Nolan said he was like maybe two or three. Nolan loves Kylian Murphy. He's putting him in his stuff. This is what you discovered, I mean.

[01:21:14] And he's in all three of the Batman movies, which I've always appreciated. Yeah. But he's just a little weirder looking than Bale. Yeah. And Nolan's like, how about Scarecrow? My mom's whole theory on Kylian Murphy is that he's too pretty to actually work as a leading man.

[01:21:30] He's quite pretty. He's got that sort of gaunt prettiness with the high cheekbones. Right. And he kind of only works if you make him creepier, haunted because of that. So that's that? Yes. And there's a drug deal going down. And now the costume is finished.

[01:21:45] He goes to Lucius Fox. He says, I need something to make me fly. Yeah. At first, Lucius is like, sure, I'll make it. And then Lucius is like, well, I know you're doing something. Right. And he goes, just don't think I'm a fool. Right. Right.

[01:21:58] And so he makes his back costume. And now it's awesome. Sure. He looks great. It's a nice costume, right? It's great. And I love that still a little goofy and wieldy. I love that he still can't totally move properly in it. Yeah, it's like Dark Knight.

[01:22:10] They make this segment thing. They make it a lot more practical in terms of actually but I like having an actor move. I like this. But in the dark night, they literally have him redesign it on screen. Yeah. Right.

[01:22:21] I just like in this, that it's a little unwieldy. But you know, there was this whole obsessive thing in the fan base of like the costume can't have nipples. Like there was like this like pushback to Schumacher's idea of like Batman as like a Greek statue. Yes.

[01:22:34] You know, with this sort of like ridiculous molded plastic. Right. And then this suits very tactical looking and then he's modified it with bets. So cool. I love it. I'm a nerd who loves realism twisted. So yeah, the hour mark, he goes to the docks.

[01:22:52] These cops are coming around and you know, it set up like a horror movie sequence. I mean, it's something weird is going on. I'm sitting there pulling blood in my hands and I'm waiting. And then suddenly guys start disappearing. They're being pulled up into the sky.

[01:23:04] And then you have that great shot where the guy's like, where are you? And he just backs into Batman who's like hanging upside down. And he's like here. It's great. Love that. And he and the guy runs away screaming and it's annoying because he was trying to initiate

[01:23:17] like a Tobu Maguire Kirsten Dunn's kiss. He was. That's why Batman was upside down. Here I am. Hey, another thing that I feel like doesn't get me. I feel like something that doesn't get talked about enough is Batman's good with ropes. Very good with ropes.

[01:23:30] He's like, like I don't know how to tie knots and make ropes happen. Why else do you think Army Hammer was considered to play Batman? OK, I'm just going to let that drop top rope heroes. Number one slipknot from Suicide Squad loves his ropes. Number two, Army Hammer.

[01:23:47] Yes, the real hero of ropes. Do you know about this? If not Google Army Hammer ropes and have a blast. OK, I have a great time. Any time my friends say Army Hammer, I just go ropes. Hey, you don't even have to Google it.

[01:24:02] Go on to Army Hammer's Twitter account and look at his likes. His faves. His faves. He doesn't apparently know that they're public or... All right, all right. That's enough about Army Hammer. Good man. Who was literally going to play Batman in George Miller's Justice League? Justice League, mortal.

[01:24:18] Why do all movies have dumb subtitles? Justice League, mortal. Justice League, forbidden kingdom. Justice League, dead man, tell no tales. Salazar's revenge. Hola, Batman. We're having fun here on Blind Check. This is really the punchiest episode we've done in a while. For Batman Begins.

[01:24:40] Yeah, this is sort of like a Lincoln-esque episode where we're quite punchy, but in a good way. I hope so. I hope it's a good way. So Batman has now begun and he immediately tracks down Rachel Dawes at the subway. She's the above ground train system.

[01:24:56] She gets off because some guys are trailing her and there's Batman standing. Right, because Falcone's arranged a hit on her. This is a scene I missed because I was cleaning up blood from my face originally, but he kind of reaches out to her. He's building his base.

[01:25:09] He's going, look, there's a new kid in town. His name is Bartman. And crime's going to pay. You win here against me. So then you've got, come on, the narrow scene. He finally one hour and five minutes into the movie, which is just about halfway in. Yeah.

[01:25:24] He Wilkinson Falcone's like, who are you? And he grabs him out of the sunroof and goes, I'm Batman. Right. And then he turns and Roger Vega is still there at the same spot he's been for 10 years. And he goes, nice coat, nice coat.

[01:25:38] And then the kiddie who's seen it happens. Right. That's as away the hero. Now we have seen him in suit. He's begun. He has begun. There's this shot. Nolan does a shot of him standing on top of the skyscraper. Iconic. The helicopter shot. Very nice shot. Yeah.

[01:25:54] Which I think he tops in the dark night with a shot of him in the wreckage. That great shot of him. It post explosion where he's standing in the wreckage. Just great shot. But anyway, yeah, nice hero shots. I think he must have been drawing a little inspiration

[01:26:08] from the nineties animated movies and series. Right? Like I think so. There's just a little of that vibe. There's an iconography. And that back in the day, that was the hacky thing you would say about Batman was like, but the real one is mask of the phantasm.

[01:26:22] Like I'm a real Batman fan because I think that's the closest to real Batman. That movie does rule. It's a great movie. I just it just became so hacky to be like insert animated thing here is the closest to the great.

[01:26:35] And also it's tough to talk about like it's it's kind of stupid to compare mask of phantasm because mask of phantasm is the one Batman movie that doesn't have to worry with being a self contained narrative in any sense. Yeah, like it's a continuation of the animated

[01:26:48] series, so it doesn't have to do any world building. It doesn't have to cross these things off the checklist. You know, it's just like here's a cinematic episode. Agreed. It's a great movie, but it's like it doesn't work without the series. Agreed. Yeah, agreed.

[01:27:02] Anyway, so Batman's on the prowl. Yeah. So then there's like 15 minutes of Batman just like going to bars hanging out being like, hey, everybody, I'm Batman. Just want you to know he goes to some society event. He's on the prowl.

[01:27:15] But he comes home and now like Alfred starts working on the other angle. He's like, look, you got to build up a kind of public reputation. I mean, it's going to be weird. Bruce Wayne's back. You're in the news because people thought you were dead.

[01:27:27] You're just going out and bass jumping all the time. Mysterious injuries. And I love this. And he's like, you got to pretend you're a billionaire playboy. Yeah. He's like, you know, you're supposed to buy things you don't own and, you know, stop pretending to have a little fun.

[01:27:41] Right. You had a little fun. That's what happened. Did someone punch him in the mouth? Was that the work of the Joker? Please, Richard, you Joker. We're useful names on this show. Oh, boy. So now he goes out and he's got three models under

[01:28:00] each arm when he's pulling up in a cool car and he's at a hotel. And the woman from from following is one of the women going like this Batman showing up fighting criminals. That's right. I forgot about that. Right. He's definitely already introducing, which will

[01:28:17] become a little more of a thing, I guess, in the dark night. That idea of like some people are like, well, I think vigilante ism is wrong. And other people are like, but he's saving the city of Gotham. Right. And Christian Bale goes, I mean, clearly the

[01:28:29] guy's got issues. I'm Bruce Wayne. This is where I think Bale's performance becomes great because now he's playing like four different characters. I think he does a great job being Bruce Wayne, especially in this one as yeah, as like an aloof idiot playboy.

[01:28:43] I've always argued that he's the best Bruce Wayne we've ever had. I mean, I don't disagree with you, but I also think that's because none of the other movies put any effort into Bruce Wayne. Even the Burton Keaton ones. Yes.

[01:28:54] Burton's take is like, this guy just wants to put on that suit and run around again. Val Kilmer is fine as you know, he's just kind of asleep. And then Clooney is really just playing it like he's Clooney. Like he's like a movie star.

[01:29:09] And he's dating El McPherson. There's no characterization. The subplot in Batman and Robin is like, will he ask El McPherson to settle down with like because like the idea of that movie is almost like it's time for Batman to start a family, right?

[01:29:22] Which is what Lego Batman does properly. Well, Lego Batman's got a great Bruce Wayne. Yeah, the best. Oh, you're saying it beats Bale. No, no, I think I think Lego Batman has a better Batman. Would you say that Will Arnett is the

[01:29:35] third best Batman or is Kevin Conroy ahead of him? Yeah, I mean Keaton's number one, right? No, I prefer Bale. I know Keaton's your guy though. Keaton's my guy. Yeah, I think Keaton's a better Batman. I think Bale is a better Bruce Wayne.

[01:29:50] I think Keaton worked that suit better than anyone. I yeah, they're both great. I mean, we'll talk about in the dark night. Yeah, I think Will Arnett's top three, though I just can't settle on where in the three he is anyway. Anyway, he's fighting crime. He's fighting crime.

[01:30:08] He's going out working in the narrow. People are starting to talk about him. There's that great little moment. Ben was just punching the air. He mind punching little punches. Yeah, because you know the the beef on Nolan is he's a bad action director, especially back

[01:30:20] him. People used to say that a lot. Hand-to-hand combat in this movie is sweaty. It's sweaty, but he mostly just doesn't do a lot of it. Exactly. And he's good with vehicles. He's good in action sequences when it's a large swath of space.

[01:30:33] That's why the hallway sequence works in insomnia because it's about the relation between. You mean inception? But it would be cool if in insomnia, Al Pacino was in a revolving hallway. He's got too many eye movies. That's my take. You know, I I organized my blue rays. Yeah.

[01:30:47] Alphabetically like a big old nerd. He just owns the eyes. He writes insomnia interstellar inception three in three inns. He's got to fucking cut it out. At least Dunkirk you got a nice D. You should have called it in Dunkirk. Have you heard that Dunkirk's an hour 40?

[01:31:03] Yeah, baby. That's amazing. Because he's just began longer and longer and now he's tightened that belt. I like it. I like it. David is putting his hands together as he whistles as if he is bringing it in. Yeah, I'm bringing it in. OK, so back.

[01:31:19] The shortest movie, short of the memento. Yeah, which is cool. Yeah. I mean, following. Following is his shortest movie. Right. Following is the length of. 69 minutes long. Following's a two realer. It is. Yeah, it's the length of a couple loony tunes cartoons.

[01:31:33] So now what the fuck are we even talking? He's going out. He's making a name for himself. He's played, pointed up. He runs into Rachel. He's embarrassed and he's like, Rachel, this isn't who I am. And this is an act. She's like, it's not the things we say.

[01:31:44] It's the things we do. Yeah. The masks. You're wearing these masks. And now, yeah, he goes out. He tries to get to the bottom of this of this shipment of these. This contraband that's being delivered down the docks. Yep.

[01:32:01] Rachel Dawes' boyfriend also was trying to figure this out. Yeah, fuck that guy. He gets moided. This guy's a drip. He gets moided. That fucking Baxter if I've ever seen one. But then you have the scene where Batman encounters

[01:32:13] the Scarecrow by mistake almost and the Scarecrow gives him some fear gas. And he flips the fuck out. Yeah, man. It's good. It's good. And then he wakes up three days later. You got those dream sequences, not whatever, fear sequences. This is the thing.

[01:32:26] It's funny that after all these failed projects about like hallucinations by the he does him and he does them well. He does them really well. Like the Batman fear sequences are great. The Scarecrow one where you see Scarecrow see scary Batman and Batman

[01:32:41] looks like this like golem, like, you know, and he's like oozing black puss. Great. Well, my single favorite image in this entire movie is when they've started infecting all the citizens of the Narrows and they look above

[01:32:52] and Batman's flying over them and his mouth is like on fire. Yeah. And he's like, yeah, it's great. It's great. It's great. Yeah. Because this movie was almost called Batman colon intimidation. Intimidation game. Game. Right. That's right. Cause it's about fear.

[01:33:09] And then you have that great scene right in the same time as all this shit where he catches Flass, Detective Flass or Sergeant Flass were played by Mark Boon Jr. From Memento. A dude who scrubs his face with salami every night. The greasiest man in the world. Yeah.

[01:33:23] This guy sleeps in a pizza pie. I'm just picturing. Mark Boon Jr. He uses a grandma pie as a blanket. He's a fine actor. He's got two calzones as pillows. I'm sure he's a great man. He's great. I love him.

[01:33:39] I'm picturing him coming home after a long day on set. He's a total pro. He knows his lines. He hits his marks and he just wants to sleep well. Get his full eight hours before he has to be on set six a.m. the next morning.

[01:33:50] And he walks into his bedroom. It's just the entire wall to wall is a grandma pie. He lies on top of it and then folds part of it on top of his body. He flops of his calzones. He scrubs the salami on his cheeks.

[01:34:05] He just like sweats vegetable oil. He's so good. He's got that great. He's got like two scenes. The one where he like gets his money and then he's like to Gordon. He's like Gordon, you know, those you why he's like eating three things.

[01:34:21] And then he's talking to the street vendor guy and he's like the guy he's taking money from the guys. Like I got kids to feed. He's like what they don't like falafel. You know this fucking guy and Batman grabs him by the ankles with some rope. Ben's excited.

[01:34:37] Swear to me. Yeah. And he's like fuck shit. Who are they working for? Cock. Who are they working for? Well, I get in trouble if I say the C word. What's on the table? What's on the table? Like a cop. Oh, that's C word. Where Batman is scary.

[01:34:55] Very scary. And again, like I just we've already said it, but you know, Batman hadn't been scary for a while. No, he was cool for him to be scary. Now I think. It's scary. Right. It's been tipped too far in one direction and that's what happens with Hollywood.

[01:35:08] Trends get taken to their logical extreme and then they have to pull back. Yeah. This is why we can't have nice things. The idea that Zack Snyder saw this movie and was like, hmm, darker though is the whole problem, right? Especially literally. Turn down the brightness.

[01:35:26] So yeah, what happens in the plot of this movie? I'm trying to remember. It's mostly just like he's uncovering this thing, which is that Scarecrow working for Raz Agul is bringing the fear toxin. Like blue flies. But why a burlap sack? Does he put it on?

[01:35:42] I don't get it. He has that line where he says like, it's kind of silly. I know it looks silly, but it's scary. I mean, that seems great when he's introducing himself as a villain. Batman, you know, Batman's got vision. He's thinking about what he represents.

[01:35:54] Scarecrow is kind of a hack. Yeah. He's like, look, I got this toxin. I don't know what I got. Someone hit me a sack or something. Right. But I love his sack face is so unsettling in this movie. What if it was a crow face?

[01:36:05] And he'd be the crow. What do you, Ben, come on. It's a simple format. I like his sack face. I like it a lot. Yeah. And so the Scarecrow is bringing this in. Yeah. The fear toxin. Yeah.

[01:36:17] And he's going to move it, put it into the water supply. Right. He reveals this to Rachel Dawes before he toxins her. My favorite joke in the movie is when Bruce Wayne wakes up out of his birthday coma and he goes, what happened?

[01:36:29] He goes, well, you know, you go around and go to the club. Party. Someone's passing around. The weaponized hallucinogen. It's a funny line. But I like that the fact that he's in league with Rossegul is revealed when Batman has used the toxin on him. Yes.

[01:36:45] And he's like, who are you working for? And he's like, Rossegul. And he's like, Rossegul is dead. That's what short circuits the Scarecrow's brain. It's like one, this guy's heard of Rossegul. Two, he thinks he killed him. Yeah. I am in over my head.

[01:37:00] And this is, you know, in this movie's balancing act, it's dance with the pulpier aspects of the material. They're sort of metaphorical way of representing the idea of Rossegul being this immortal, being this Lazarus pit guy who can resurrect himself. You're watching the movie and going like,

[01:37:19] is Ken Wananabe going to come back? And it's like, no, it's Rossegul's bourbon idea. Yeah. A legend, Mr. Wayne. A legend, Mr. Wayne. Who is it? It's Liam Neeson. Oh, Liam Neeson. He's back. Here's his plot. It's his big birthday party.

[01:37:33] He's just trying to have fun pretending to have fun. Right. And Wayne goes up to a bald guy being like, it's Wananabe. But then it turns around and it's just a random Asian guy. Well, this woman goes, oh, I've just been speaking to the most interesting man.

[01:37:44] Mr. Race Algul. Which is a joke on the fact that no one knows how to pronounce Rossegul in the comics. Or in the movies. Or in life. Within the headquarters of DC Comics. And he thinks it's, no, it's another fat bald guy. And then Liam Neeson's there.

[01:38:00] And he burns London to the ground. And he talks about how the League of Shadows whole thing is when society has reached a tipping point, they reset. Much like Batman and Robin, it was time to reboot the Batman franchise.

[01:38:10] He thinks Gotham needs a dark and gritty reboot in which everyone dies. This is my only problem with Batman again. So it's kind of ties into my Neeson objection, which is just this is the one thing where I'm like, I just don't totally buy their plan.

[01:38:25] Because he's like, we've done it lots of times. Ancient Rome, London in the 17th century. Pompeii, we built the volcanoes. No other examples. It's like, have you been burning down cities recently? Is that something you still do? And what is supposed to happen after Gotham

[01:38:41] is burned to the ground, witted in America? What is this? And also their plan to burn Gotham to the ground is to make everyone afraid. And then they'll all kill each other? Is that the idea? He wants them to destroy it themselves. OK.

[01:38:57] Sometimes man is the deadliest volcano of all. It's a flawed plan. I like it. Because they're dumb bad guys. Sure, it's fine. And I mean, I'm offering a half-hearted objection. It's fine. So yeah, they realize. I just think the turn is a little more forced

[01:39:13] than like Neeson part one. Neeson part two, I'm just kind of like, all right. They realize they've worked the blue flower into the water supply of the city. They got this sort of like a machine that evaporates. Right. There's this subplot where like a wane and invention

[01:39:31] that vaporizes water. It got stolen in shipment. He's going to be part of this. Whatever, it works. He's doing the leg work. Yeah. And the plot is get the thing onto the train. You drive the train. It vaporizes all the water. Everyone's going to breathe in this toxins.

[01:39:46] It's in the air. They'll all kill each other. But they hit the narrows first. Who has to stop them? A legend, Mr. Wayne. I think Earl. Who's Earl? My name is Earl. What? I don't know. David, I need food. Yeah, I'm hungry too. OK. Yeah, the ending's good.

[01:40:09] The ending's good. You should mention the Batmobile. Oh yeah. Does it come in black? Right. And it's great. I mean, I remember thinking it looked dumb when they revealed it. And you see, this is the best action sequence in the movie. It saves Rachel, who's been dosed.

[01:40:24] Yeah, and he drives. That's when the Hans Zimmer, James Newton Howard theme is really pumping. And right. He's flying on a rooftop. He's dealing with the cops. And the cops are like, it's a tank. They're afraid of it. And that's all good.

[01:40:40] And I think it's a part of Nolan's whole idea with all his action sequences, which is they should be tactile. And they should be real. And these devices should work. Like they built these cars. But they got to go big.

[01:40:49] The second Nolan's focusing on two people in close quarters. It gets fucked. Yeah, he's not. He's just obviously not as interested in it. Like it's just a little more hard. Right. Yeah. But so all the Bat stuff and then he works with Gordon

[01:41:06] to like Gordon gets to drive the Batmobile. Yeah. He says, I got to get me one of these in one of the cornier lines. Yeah, it's hard to like. Recap in the movie in this way doesn't do Gordon any justice. But I just like peppered in.

[01:41:21] He's this pillar of moral integrity. He's one good man left in the city. Right. But it's not in like a sort of over the top way where he's in jelly. It's not sanctum onus. You know, there's that. It's good that there's that scene where

[01:41:33] Flass is like we're worried about you. And he's like, I'm not a rat. Like, you know, like I'm a cop. Look, I'm not going to rat on you guys. I'm not going to get a taste. But let me let me do whatever you want.

[01:41:43] I'm just trying to get a cop. I get that I am like an outlier here. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And then he fights Descartes on the train. And this was the year kind of quasi kills him by 2004. You got Incredibles and Spider-Man 2 both do big elevated train sequences.

[01:41:59] And then this is 2005, the following year. And then after that, they they hung up that jersey. Elevated train in the middle of a superhero movie. Trying to think if there's any of that. It's lifted to the rafters. There were three in like 18 months. Bomb voyage. Remember him?

[01:42:13] Great guy. Monster on crab. Why doesn't that guy work anymore? He's a good actor. Good actor. Bomb voyage. I believe Brad Bird actually did the voice. But I can't remember. Really? I think so. You want my guess? I'm going to be a real Pixar dick here.

[01:42:27] I think it was Teddy Newton. I think it was Pixar story artist Teddy Newton. We're both wrong. It was some guy called Dominique Lewis. OK, well then fuck me. Yeah. Anyway, I'm in fights. I'm on the chain and he goes, you won't kill somebody.

[01:42:40] And he goes, no, but I don't have to save you. And he flies away and then kisses Rachel. There's a scene I really like lots of nice tying up. But and then there's the early moment that's nice when Batman ties the thug to the spotlight.

[01:42:51] So they kind of get the idea for the next thing. Oh, it's Falcon himself with his raggedy jacket. Now that's right. That looks like a bet swings. That coat. Sorry. The scene I think Bale's best scene in the movie is when he realizes Racheal goes playing.

[01:43:06] He's got to get everyone out of his mansion immediately. He tends to do the drunk speech. Yeah. And it's like he's playing four things at the same time. He's really good. It's funny. It's funny speech. I feel like we sick of fans.

[01:43:18] I feel like we nailed all of the major stuff. Right? Yeah, we just kind of front loaded. Yeah, I got opera man. Yeah, we got opera man. Swear to me. Yeah, we got, you know, Tom Wilkinson. We got Rachel. Oh, we forgot the most important thing. The memo.

[01:43:37] Didn't you get the memo? Earl wants to fold applied sciences into their archives and fire box Lucius. Then you get the memo. And at the end of the movie, after Batman saved the day, Earl gets fired. We're going to Freedmen's now the boss and he goes,

[01:43:51] didn't you get the memo? Yeah, but also Bruce bought the company when it went public. He bought all the shares. He has that again, the repeated line. He loves that shit words. He's like, it's a lot of shell corporations or whatever. You wouldn't understand very complicated.

[01:44:07] They burn his mansion down to the ground. I love the tease at the end where he's like, look, maybe we could do some renovations. Yeah, to the East Wing, which I feel like the other two movies don't pay off. He never gets a proper back cave again.

[01:44:23] I like that in this movie, he's like in a cave with trips and fucking stalagmite. It's not like where he goes in and there's like a computer that's like, hello, Mr. Wayne, like hi Batman. It felt like that's what they were setting up was he was

[01:44:35] going to have like a whole huge proper back cave. And then in like in Dark Knight and Batman begins to he is just like in an apartment and then underneath the apartment, he's got like a garage that's kind of minimalist.

[01:44:46] They never fully rebuild Wayne Manor until Dark Knight rises in Dark Knight. In Dark Knight, Wayne Manor has been burned down, which is what happens in this movie. Right. And in Batman, right. Yeah. Anyway, anyway, anyway, anyway, anyway, Rachel has this file speech with him where she talks

[01:45:00] about the masks he wears and says, this is the real mask. Batman is now who you are. That sort of become him. Right. She's basically saying like, I'm not going to date you unless you're not Batman anymore. It's only really important for Dark Knight because it's

[01:45:13] sort of part of his motivation, which is great because Katie Holmes doesn't get to play any of that ever again. She's fine in this movie. Yeah. I think she became an unfortunate target. But yeah, this was the same summer as War of the World.

[01:45:23] So it was like, ah, there are publicity. David almost spilled a drink five times. I was spilling on myself and then I almost spilled it on my laptop. I remember people even making the joke when the Batman begins poster, they had this real kind of amazing,

[01:45:34] like universal monsters poster that was. Him dissolving into a bunch of bats. Correct. Yes. No, that was Batman holding like Rachel Dawes' body where he looked kind of monstrous. People were like, oh God, it's weird. Batman looks like Tom Cruise now.

[01:45:47] Like now that you know Katie Holmes, I remember people making jokes like that. Well, those are those people are silly. We should do like the scene where he summons all the bats with his bat shoe. Oh, I love that.

[01:45:57] And then he jumps down the hallway and he gets a little hero shot of him like inflating his cape. Yeah. While the bats like circle around him. It's nice. A lot of bats in this movie. I think that was the DVD cover was him like. Yeah, he doesn't.

[01:46:09] He doesn't use the bats as much in the later movies. No, this one is really into bats. Right. And you know, another thing I love is that like when they and I don't think the movies, the sequels totally paid off on this.

[01:46:22] But the idea that like they opened all the doors at Arkham Asylum. So these are going to be all the future villains are these Arkham escapies. Yeah. You know, but then the final scene of course, he meets Gordon up on the rooftop after the bat

[01:46:35] signal has been activated. Right. And Gordon gives this great speech summing up the plans for the franchise. Yeah. Says, you know, escalation, you know, you you wear Kevlar, they buy armor piercing rounds. You, you know, goes through the whole thing as you go,

[01:46:50] you know, you walk around wearing a costume and it's like, OK, here we go. All these Arkham guys are out in the streets. Batman's wearing a crazy costume. They're all going to take personas. Now we got a franchise and then probably the best sequel to tease in history.

[01:47:03] Right. So smart. I mean, it's like this and back to the future. Are the two best like sequel lob ups where he's just like someone's been robbing some banks keeps leaving a calling card. It's got a taste for the theatrical like you likes a good laugh.

[01:47:16] And I just remember when that line happens, everyone that you could feel a chill in the theater because it feels like, OK, Nolan starting over the senses that these things are sacred. They can't redo the same characters they've done before. Or can they?

[01:47:27] And then when he flips over the card, it was just like fucking spooge in all over the place. And then of course that becomes the narrative of the sequel is like who will play Joker? Like that was like a year long like internet narrative.

[01:47:38] A month after the movie came out, they were like Steve Carell, Steve Buscemi, Michael Keaton. Like I remember every fucking name in the world was thrown around. Adrian Brody, Olivia Dehaveland. I'm hungry. I am too. Let's go get food. The movie is called Batman Begins. I love it.

[01:47:57] It's Batman. I'm going to elevate him to being one of my best movie friends. Excuse me. There's a little game we have. I'm not saying we're done with the episode. I'm saying we're not an intimidation game, neither. OK, and then I have a game to play with.

[01:48:08] Oh, OK. OK. Pulling out his phone. Batman Begins opens June 17th, 2005. It opens number one at the box office, 48 million dollars. It eventually was a five day weekend open on Wednesday. So I think I'm making like 70 by the time that Sunday we're all around. Maybe you're right.

[01:48:30] Well, anyway, that's what I'm getting here. OK. You're right. It opened on the 15th. Actually, no, you're here. And it eventually grosses 205 million dollars domestic, three seventy four worldwide just to think like a Batman movie doing badly worldwide.

[01:48:48] Yeah. Rather than now, that would be the play would be like, well, we'll make tons of money. It's crazy. I mean, this movie made 200 in total and Batman Dark Knight opens to one fifty plus. Yeah. Like this movie comes within, you know, close range

[01:49:03] of outgrossing the entire predecessor and its opening weekend. OK. So opening weekend 2005. Fox, I'm thinking like May releases from 2005. Yes. So it opens number one. Number two is an action picture that had opened the week before that was a box office sensation and tabloid sensation.

[01:49:23] Mr. Mrs. Smith. That's right. But I just I wanted to do the thing where I pivoted. He pivoted the microphone over to Ben and gave him a look at Ben. It was like looking at his phone. Yeah. Ben was not interested in me.

[01:49:35] Mr. Mrs. Smith, which has now made ninety six mil in two weeks was a big hit. Yeah. OK. Number three. Animated movie Madagascar. Correct. Those are the easiest for him to guess. Yep. Folks, which is made one forty six in a month. A disturbingly big hit.

[01:49:57] Number four is a film we've talked about on this. Oh, by the way, you know, in some previous episode, I talked about how weirdly fragmented the Madagascar franchises in terms of separate timelines and then right. Someone I think maybe will gas got confirmation

[01:50:11] for someone who worked on the Madagascar TV show that I was correct. The OK between the film series and congrats. You're right. Show there are three different timelines. Great. OK. Now is not the time to brag. No, no, it's fine.

[01:50:24] But number four is a movie we have discussed in this podcast many times. Many times. Plenty of time. Have we covered it or we just discovered it? We've covered it. Yes. We're the world's a legend, Mr. Wayne. No, we're the world's comes out later.

[01:50:38] I think I was a July release. Yeah. It's not Elizabeth Towne. It's not a camera in five weeks. It has made three hundred and forty eight million dollars. Well, now, well, Nellie indeed. Say it. Wait, wait, wait. Two thousand five.

[01:50:55] It's made three hundred and forty eight million dollars. So it had to be the highest-grossing film of 2005. That's a good question. It was with three eighty total. Why am I blinking on the number? The top five of 2005 are this movie. Number two is Narnia.

[01:51:10] Number three is Goblet of Fire. Number four is War of the Worlds. Number five is King Kong. And it's a director we've covered. Yes. So it's not a shaman long. No. And it's not. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, I'm a fucking dummy. Dumbass.

[01:51:27] It's called Phantom Menace Revenge of the Sith. Correct. That was its title. Yeah. Yeah. Star Wars Episode three has made lots of money. Star Wars Episode three with a budget about fifty million dollars lower than Batman begins this budget. If you can imagine it.

[01:51:43] Number five is a comedy. It's a remake. Longest year. Yes. OK. Holy shit. I want food. Now here's the game I'm going to play with you. No, excuse me. I'm going to say some of the other titles. Oh, OK. Adventures of Sharkboy and Lava Girl in 3D.

[01:51:57] Great film. With Taylor Lautner. Who's the girl? I don't think she really worked. Cinderella Man. Weird movie. Ron Howard. Very weird movie. Ron Howard shooting last on Han Solo. That's right. Number eight, The Perfect Man. Let's not forget the Hilary Duff and Heather Lockley.

[01:52:16] I think Chris Knoth plays the titular Perfect Man. Believe you're correct. She pretends to be a guy. So her mom feels less lonely. Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants is in there. Good film, good franchise. Yeah, I agree. The honeymooners, the Cedric the Entertainer, Mike Epps. The imagining?

[01:52:33] Yeah, not a hit. A dark gritty reboot. You know what you don't remember that one? Crash is hanging around in the top 20. You got Monster and Law. Yeah. OK. I want to play a building game with you because I think Nolan's building is always really interesting.

[01:52:47] And I want to set this up for future episodes. Can you guess the billing who's above the title? This credit block. It's on this one, it is six names. Christian Bale. Correct. Is number one. Correct. Michael Cain. Correct. Yes. OK. All right.

[01:53:04] That was that was the scariest one. Number three, Gary Oldman. No. Katie Holmes. No. Liam Neeson. Correct. Right. Right. Sorry. Right. And then Katie. Yes. Then Gary. Yeah, which is weird that Gary's that deep. Yeah, but Katie was yeah, she was a big play.

[01:53:23] And then so have I named one, two, three, four of them now? You have named five now. Oh, so and Morgan Freeman. Correct. Right. And then if you go down to the credit block underneath. Yes. It's Christian Bale above the title. Then Michael Cain, Liam Neeson,

[01:53:39] Katie Holmes, Gary Oldman. Then you add in Kilmerfe. Then Rucker Hauer. Tom Wilkinson. Oh, of course. Right. Sorry. Then Rucker. Then Rucker Hauer. Then Watson Abbey. Then Ken Watpor Ken. And then and Morgan Freeman. And Morgan Freeman. No way. Yeah. Well, Cain's you're obvious with.

[01:53:56] But they give him second bill. But he obviously negotiated big enough salary or whatever that they put him second bill. I just want to set that up because I think the billing gets interesting on the next two. Yes it does. Love Billing. Love Billing. Love Batman.

[01:54:08] Hey, he fights crime? Yeah. In the city of Gotham. Billing begins. Well, everyone, this has been our episode on Barfman Begarts. Yep. I hope you liked it. We need to get food right now because our brains are clearly melting.

[01:54:21] Well, we gave you a nice two hours of batting. Yeah. Yeah. You got nothing to complain about. Shut the fuck up. Batting man. He is the batting of the men and tune in next week for our episode on the prestige. The prestige.

[01:54:38] Right. Which is like a little blank check. That's like he's coming off a blockbuster and he gets... This is now Nolan's game is I make you a Batman. You let me make what I want, right? Yeah. And so after Batman began solid hit,

[01:54:52] he makes a little magic movie. What if Wolverine and Batman were magicians? After Dark Knight, huge hit, he gets to make his dream police movie. What if the Caprior was a dream thief? And then after Dark Knight rises, it's a huge hit even though it's bad.

[01:55:08] He gets to make a space movie. I don't know about it. Okay. Anyway, hi everyone. Goodbye. Thank you for listening. Please remember to rate, review and subscribe. Big thanks to Andrew for Guto for running our social media accounts. Yes. And Pat Reynolds for doing our artwork

[01:55:21] playing Montgomery for the theme song. Yes. Go to our Reddit for some dorky shit that people are arguing over all the time. Pleased it. And as always. Yes. And as always. Swear to me. Crap. Fuck. Batman. Fuck you. Started recording guys. And whenever you want to jump in.

[01:55:45] Love this movie. Yeah, I love this movie. Good movie. OK. It's a good, yeah. It's good. Are you excited for Jurassic World? Forbidden Kingdom. That's the fucking title. Jurassic World. Colon. Forbidden Kingdom. Wait, what made it Forbidden? For Jurassic World too. It's Forbidden. You can't go. No, no.

[01:56:11] That new birth movie's death, Down with a Lewis account, which is really good. I don't know if you've been following that. I have not been following that. He tweeted like, hey, I just made your job simpler for you and took the poster and it was Jurassic. Crossed out.

[01:56:21] Crossed out Kingdom. Yeah. Sure. I think the only problem with that is like, you know, where do you end? It's like Jurassic Universe. Yeah, that's where you end it. Just keep going. Yeah. Jurassic Galaxy. Yeah. Are you called Jurassic Land or are you called Jurassic? You know?

[01:56:37] Land is smaller than world and bigger than park. They should have gone park land world. Are there dinosaurs? No, there aren't dinosaurs in this one. That's the twist. No dinosaurs. It's just about like urban planning. Yeah. The whole movie's them trying to pick out a new location.

[01:56:51] Yeah, right. It's just bureaucracy and like plans. It stars Richard Jenkins. He's got to deal with like the zoning board. Something has been negotiated. They're like dinosaurs, I don't know. And he's like, it's fine. It starts Richard Jenkins. I don't look in place.

[01:57:14] All right, put that all at the end of the episode. Yeah, put it at the end. You're recording all that, right? Yeah. That was great stuff. That was great stuff. Then that was great stuff. All right, all right. Come on. OK, where's the thing I'm looking for?

[01:57:25] Cut out the part where I said it was great stuff. No, keep it in. Double it.