Hi, I'm Eric Voss, and every time a new
superhero movie comes out that we really
like, inevitably the discussion always
turns to... well it was good, but it
obviously wasn't as good as the Dark
Knight. Like Wonder Woman: best DC movie...
since the Dark Knight. Or even if you
thought Logan was better than the Dark
Knight, the Dark Knight is still the
gold standard that you compare it to. So
why is that? In the past nine years since
the movie came out, we've heard countless
love letters on why the Dark Knight is
amazing. Will we ever consider any new
superhero movie to be better than The
Dark Knight? Is it even possible? Yes, I
think it is. It's just going to be really
hard. So I'm going to give us some deeper
reasons why exactly The Dark Knight
holds this near unreachable status. And
as I see it, once we look past all the
normal great qualities about the movie,
there are four big reasons why people
still look up to it as the best
superhero movie. The first is that the
Dark Knight is not a superhero movie.
This is pretty annoying, I know. Like you
may have read this as some clever think
piece headline online and thought - shut
up, of course it's a superhero movie, it's
got Batman in the Joker in it. Like, what
else do you need? And yes, you're right,
but when you analyze the genre of The Dark
Knight, it has way less in common with
movies like the Spider-man and X-men
films that preceded it in the 2000s, and the
first Ironman, which came out the same
summer, than it does with modern crime
dramas like Michael Mann's Heat. In fact,
Christopher Nolan mentioned Heat as a
major influence. Both movies open with
explosive heist sequences and build-up
to intense first encounters between the
hero and villain at the midpoint,
debating morality as they sit across the
table from each other. Now compare this
to the superhero movie sub-genre as
defined so well by Marvel Studios: fun,
mostly light-hearted movies built around
amazing visual effects and action
set-pieces, Nowadays, actually DC movies
have pivoted to fit into that overall
genre more and more. So when we compare
all these subsequent superhero movies to
the Dark Knight, we're comparing apples
to oranges. Or comparing apples to other
apples that are shot through an orange
lens, that taste a lot like oranges. And
just because it tastes like oranges
doesn't necessarily mean it's better. I
actually love the superhero movie as a
genre. That said, the genre of crime drama
allows the filmmaker to explore themes
like moral code
in the criminal mind, themes that most
people think make a film more resonant
and meaningful in the long run. Now to be
fair, Christopher Nolan was only able to
take Batman in that direction because
the character was already pretty far
along in its cinematic evolution.
Remember before Nolan, so many versions
of Batman had been established on the
big screen: the films of Tim Burton and
Joel Schumacher, and long before that, the
Adam West take on the character.
(r.i.p Adam West). Basically, there was
already a standard for Nolan to respond
to and to reinvent. Meanwhil,e Marvel is
still way younger in its characters'
evolution. There's only been one Ironman,
one Captain America, one guardians of the
galaxy. Marvel isn't reinventing yet,
they're still inventing, expanding the
successful business model with more
heroes that could all plausibly be in a
movie together at some point. So I think
it's gonna be really hard for us to look
at a new Thor movie and praise it as a
radical reinvention of the genre like
The Dark Knight was. It's just not a fair
comparison. Now some people have said
that Deadpool is an exception to this
trend. Like it was a reinvention of a
previous version of the character and
its tone and sense of humor were way
more subversive than we're used to
seeing in the superhero movie. But
despite its parody elements the genre of
Deadpool is still all superhero. There's
an origin story, a super-powered villain,
a damsel in distress
and a fireworks finale. And the fact that
we bought into this and cared so much
about these story beats makes Deadpool
part of this superhero genre. Really, I
think the recent exception to this trend
is Logan. Unlike all the X-men movies
that preceded it, Logan is a pure Western.
It's an off type genre that uses
superheroes like The Dark Knight does,
but it's still at Western. Logan is light
on spectacle and visual effects, it gets
very little joy out of its characters
using their powers, and it's finale is
not at all simple or clean. The movie is
about the physical and emotional toll
that being a hero takes on the
individual. And sure, even though Hugh
Jackman has been the only actor to play
Wolverine, his movies have gone through a
similar evolution on screen as Batman,
sometimes coming off as a joke and
bordering on exhaustion. So a
transformation into a new genre feels
earned. So the arguments that Logan might
be the first film about a superhero to
be as good as the Dark Knight might be
justified. But there are still a few
other key reasons that the Dark Knight
is just going to be really hard to top. The
second reason I see is the setting.
Now this often gets overlooked, but
Nolan's Dark Knight movies are really
about one central character, the city of
Gotham. Yes, I'm using the term character
loosely here, obviously Bruce Wayne and
Alfred and Gordon and Rachel Dawes are
all key characters. But at the end of the
day, each of these three movies and
mostly the Dark Knight are about saving
the soul of Gotham. For example, the
finale of The Dark Knight isn't so much
a fistfight between Batman and the Joker;
it's the debate of ideals between the
figures over whether the people of
Gotham will, when given the option, prove
themselves to be heroes or cowards. In
this way, Nolan was able to use Gotham
as a microcosm for Humanity, where
instead of a battle for human lives and
safety, it became more of a specific
battle for human decency, a different
take on humanity. And Nolan reinforces
the importance of this environment by
showing us so many interesting angles of
Gotham City. It starts with the shiny
vertical skyscrapers, but it also shows
the pedestrian street level and then
going even deeper, the seedy criminal
underbelly. Now Nolan didn't invent this
idea of Gotham as a symbol. Batman
actually has a long history in the
comics of a relationship with his home
streets, but the fact is not many other
superheroes that we see in the movies
share this kind of thematic connection
with their setting. Now, I guess
Spiderman is very much a New York
superhero, which was definitely a part of
the fun of those first two movies. And
then on the Marvel / Netflix side of
things, Daredevil's roots in Hell's
kitchen is absolutely a big part of that
series. But recently, really other than
the Avengers battling to save New York, I
can't think of another superhero movie
where the environment was so crucial to
the story. Now not that super movies
always have to have that, but it's one
device used in the Dark Knight to help
elevate it over the rest. Now another key
reason for the Dark Knight's status which
you cannot avoid when you're talking
about the Dark Knight, is the villain -
Heath Ledger's The Joker. Now Nolan
dared to allow this villain to overtake
the story at the risk of outshining the
hero and risking the overall franchise.
The Joker is the driving force of this
whole narrative. He completely hijacks
the story, sweeping up Harvey Dent into
his campaign of Anarchy, using him as his
ace in a hole in the third act. Now this
was a ballsy move by Nolan. Two-face is
definitely one of the more well-known
villains of the Batman universe, but
rather than saving him for a future film,
like leaving a scarred Harvey Dent in a
hospital bed,
who wakes up and tears off his gauze
in a post-credits scene, Nolan instead
just left it all out there for this
movie, keeping Dent a smaller character
within the Joker's story. And the
ultimate effect of that is it makes
Joker an even more lethal threat, with
his lawlessness persisting as a sort of
pandemic throughout the world, even when
he's still in captivity. Now, it's been
said that other superhero movies suffer
from a lack of a compelling villain, at
least in the way that the Joker was, and
I guess you could say this because most
superhero movies these days are
structured as lower stakes chapters
within a cinematic universe leading up
to one later larger event, but really, I
think it's just because it's very very
challenging in screenwriting to create
an engaging villain who doesn't become
more likeable than the hero, which of
course could ruin the story, because then
we don't care if the hero succeeds. Now I
would say the Dark Knight pulled off
this balance and really only a handful
of other movies in cinematic history
have done the same. But let's revisit
Logan for a second. Villains Donald
Pierce and Xander Rice are functional to
the story, but they don't present nearly
as big of a threat to Logan as the main
villain of the story, himself. His own
body and powers are failing him, and then
by the end of the movie - brief spoiler
alert if you haven't seen Logan - this
conflict is literalized when he has to
fight a clone version of himself, x24.
And yes, that is a thoughtful, interesting
way to manifest
Logan's obstacles in the movie.
Unfortunately, this type of villainy
doesn't have a transcendent face set and
identity that is seared into our
collective memories the way the Joker is. I
think you can also look at Wonder Woman
this way. Now Wonder Woman is a fine
film that drew inspiration from another
superhero classic that people look at as
a gold standard, Richard Donner's Superman
in 1978. Wonder woman even makes a lot of
the same moves The Dark Knight made - it
explores the characters relationships
and humanity as a whole, and it totally
embraces its period piece genre. But
when it comes to the villain, or villains
I should say, they aren't really game
changers when it comes to challenging
the hero in any meaningful way. Now on
the other hand, you could argue that
movies like Wonder Woman and Logan don't
need to be about their villains, and the
real reason that people like these
movies is because, like The Dark Knight,
they're actually part of a larger
narrative. And that brings me to my final
reason that I think the Dark Knight is
considered a gold standard. The movie's
existence and success
is itself seen as heroic. Like I
mentioned earlier, when Nolan took over
the Batman franchise, the character had
become kind of a joke in the movies. Like
seriously, Batman and Robin was so bad
that Joel Schumacher recently apologized
for it. So when Nolan reimagined the
character as a darker, more thoughtful,
morally complex hero in the style the
comics like Frank Miller's The Dark
Knight Returns, Nolan was praised as a
hero who saved the franchise. See in this
case, Batman needed that gritty turn
because the movies needed it, and it was
true to who the character is in the
comics. The same can be said for James
Mangold with Logan. After early successes
with the first two x-men movies, the
Last Stand and X-Men Origins weren't
exactly steps forward for Wolverine as a
character, until he too eventually turned
into a bit of a joke. But then James
Mangold arrived and proved that he could
take the character to interesting places
with the Wolverine, and then his
follow-up film Logan was the perfect
expression of what he wanted to do with
the character. And not only was that
gritty turn something fans wanted, like
Batman, it's true to the character in the
comics. In fact, the Old Man Logan comic
that Logan was inspired by is way more
violent than what we saw in the movie.
This is a big reason why it feels a
little weird when Studios make a
superhero dark and gritty just for the
sake of making him or her dark or gritty.
I think they're learning the wrong
lessons from The Dark Knight. Nolan went
dark because that's who Batman is and
it's what the franchise needed at that
time. it was the darkness we deserved, and
the darkness we needed.  Now Wonder Woman
wasn't particularly violent or gritty,
but like Logan in the Dark Knight, the
movie itself has this heroic nature. Like
after decades without wonder woman on
the big screen, and the property going
through development hell, Patty
Jenkins finally delivered a really good
film that satisfied fans. Other superhero
movies may have had better structured
films with better action and better
jokes, but unless you walk out of the
movie feeling like the movie fulfilled
some desire or fixed some nagging
frustration with the franchise, we're not
going to hold it up as the best
superhero movie of all time. Look, I don't
know if I personally will ever be able
to see any superhero film as better than
the Dark Knight, it came out during my
formative years. Like, I feel like the
first of these flesh whiskers popped
out during the Joker's magic trick scene
with the pencil, and I think for a lot of
us, nostalgia just tends to glorify films
that we grew up with over new films that
come along. But I think films like Logan
have shown that if you follow the Dark
Knight's footsteps in the right way,
you can at least be part of the
conversation. After that, it's just a
matter of amazing action, a great script,
a great director, a perfect cast, and one
of the best villains of all time, but
really is the number one spot that
important? Do you think any superhero
movie has topped The Dark Knight?
If so, which one? Or it's not topped, has any
super movie gotten close in your eyes?
And what about the Dark Knight do you
think makes it the exceptional case
where when we talk about superhero
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Kell. Alright, I'm leaving now, because I'm
the host you deserve, new rockstars, but
not the one you need right now. Dun - dun
dun dun dun dun dun dun... this tunnel's long!
