Trivia / The Dark Knight Rises

Trivia Tropes

• Acting in the Dark:
  • For the scene near the end, John Blake's real name 'Robin' was dubbed in afterwards to hide it from everyone - including Joseph Gordon-Levitt.
  • A somewhat self-imposed one by Cillian Murphy who only read the parts of the script that he was in so he could enjoy the movie on his own.
• Adored by the Network: HBO Zone and TNT both heavily air this film often, in the case of HBO Zone, three times a week! It helps that HBO, TNT, and Warner Bros. are all owned by the same company, Warner Bros. Discovery.
• Approval of God:
  • In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Christopher Nolan said he saw The Lion King (1994) parody of The Dark Knight Rises trailer and thought it was epic.
  • Tom Hardy also had good things to say about his parodies. "I have seen some brilliant stuff online about [my mumbling] 'Mmmm ... Batman doesn't beat up retards!"
• Awesome, Dear Boy: Tom Hardy accepted the role of Bane without even reading the script.
• California Doubling: During Batman and Selina Kyle's fight on the roof with Bane's mercenaries, when Bane watches the Bat fly away, the Los Angeles skyline is clearly visible, including the U.S. Bank Tower and One Wilshire. In the chase following the Stock Exchange heist, you can see that it starts in New York City (the exchange exterior) but it continues in the streets of downtown LA, which is most noticeable if you are paying attention to the design of the traffic lights. Also, a shot of Selina Kyle driving the Batpod through empty streets on the morning prior to the final battle is filmed in downtown LA.
• Career Resurrection: Tom Hardy had previously suffered a downturn in the early 2000's when Star Trek: Nemesis crashed and burned upon its release, but was slowly rebuilding his career with his critically hailed performance in Bronson and his supporting role in Nolan's previous hit film Inception. His performance as Bane, which garnered similar praise for his bodybuilding work in Bronson (see Dyeing for Your Art), while also pushing him to the fore of the film as its Big Bad compared to his minor presence in Inception, helped truly revitalize his career for good.
• Creator Backlash: Aidan Gillen later admitted to regretting taking part in this movie because he felt his performance wasn't up to snuff. The Baneposting memes apparently mocking him didn't help either.
• Deleted Scene: A scene that was cut from the movie would have revealed that Scarecrow making people walk across a frozen bay as a "trial" was a statement on the "Dent Act", which took away the rights of the accused to appeals and the like.
• Died During Production: The Joker was originally intended to appear in this film in a major way; Heath Ledger's death, and Christopher Nolan's absolute insistence on Joker not being recast and thus written out, did result in some significant changes to the original plan for the film. Exactly how much was changed, or what a final film with Ledger would have looked like, remains a point of speculation and debate to this day.
• Distanced from Current Events: Of course we cannot talk about this movie without mentioning this one infamous moment where on the film's North American opening day (July 20, 2012), a gunman stormed a midnight show in Aurora, Colorado. 12 people were killed, and dozens more were injured. The shooting had the most casualties - combined injuries and deaths - of any shooting in the United States up to that point! In the wake of this, the following things were done.
  • The French, Japanese and Mexican red-carpet premieres were canceled.
  • Warner Bros. did not publish daily updates on the film's opening weekend (Friday through Sunday) grosses until the following Monday.
  • Gangster Squad underwent a rewrite and reshooting of its final act, which originally involved gangsters shooting up a movie theater from behind the screen.
  • AMC Theaters now prohibit any cosplay attendant within the vicinity of their theaters that looks too scary and/or carries weapons.
• Dyeing for Your Art:
  • Tom Hardy gained thirty pounds of muscle to play Bane. Anne Hathaway also worked out five days a week to be able to fit into her Spy Catsuit.
  • Christian Bale, in addition to his usual bulking up, had his hair dyed to make Bruce look older.
• Enforced Method Acting: According to an interview with a Pittsburgh news station, Hines Ward was unaware of what it'd be like when the football field was destroyed around him. When Heinz Field, his home turf, was exploding loudly behind him, he actually was running for his life.
  Hines Ward: Usually, I'm smiling when I'm running, but that day I was actually screaming.
• Fake American: The CIA agent at the beginning, Scarecrow, Stryver, Batman, and Commissioner Gordon are played by an Irishman, another Irishman, an (American-born) Englishman, a Welsh-born Englishman, and another Englishman respectively. John Daggett is also played by Australian Ben Mendelsohn.
• Fake Nationality:
  • Barsad, who judging by his accent (and name) is supposed to be English, is played by American Josh Stewart.
  • Wherever Bane is supposed to be from, he probably isn't English like Tom Hardy is.
• Fake Russian:
  • Dr. Pavel is Russian, but his actor Alon Aboutboul is actually an Israeli of Algerian/Egyptian extraction.
  • In-universe, Barsad is posing as a Russian soldier in the beginning when delivering Dr. Pavel and the three "captured" prisoners to the CIA interrogator; after Gotham falls to Bane, he threatens the National Guard with a netural English accent.
• Inspiration for the Work: The film borrowed inspiration from the 1993 Knightfall storyline, The Dark Knight Returns, and Batman: No Man's Land. It was also inspired by Dicken's A Tale of Two Cities, with Gordon's eulogy taken directly from the novel.
• Looping Lines: Bane's dialogue had to be looped twice, as feedback from an earlier version of the film found that his voice was too muffled. Compare the original to the final version.
• Lying Creator:
  • When asked, Christopher Nolan declared that Talia al-Ghul would not appear in the film. Marion Cotillard plays her.
  • Back in the Batman Begins days, both Nolan and Bale were questioned about whether Batman's famous Kid Sidekick would show up, and both claimed he would not. Meanwhile, this film has Joseph Gordon-Levitt as GCPD Officer John Blake, who works alongside Batman, is skilled enough at "Bat Deduction" to figure out Batman's real identity, is the recipient of the Batcave, and never uses his Embarrassing First Name "Robin".
• One for the Money; One for the Art: Christopher Nolan agreed to make the film if the studio would fund Inception.
• Playing Against Type: Anne Hathaway's casting as Selina Kyle was met with much raised eyebrows, as she had mainly been famous as wholesome good girls (Rachel Getting Married aside). She won lots of praise for such a different turn.
• Playing with Character Type: Aidan Gillen plays one of the good guys this time around, not that he's any less assholish than Littlefinger was.
• Real-Life Relative: Christopher Nolan's cousin Miranda cameos as the maid gossiping about Bruce Wayne in the opening. Her father John reprises his role as Wayne Enterprises board member Douglas Fredericks.
• Scully Box: In the comics, Bane towers over Batman. But Tom Hardy is shorter than Christian Bale, so he had to wear high heeled boots and camera tricks were also used so that Bane would be equal on height with Batman during scenes where they are both on-camera. This similarly had to be employed with the "Do you feel in charge?" scene with Bane towering over John Daggett, as Ben Mendelsohn is also taller than Tom Hardy.
• Teasing Creator: Promotional pictures of Selina Kyle in costume with high-tech goggles, but without Catwoman's signature ears, caused a shitstorm. Even Kevin Smith was somewhat displeased. And then the film reveals that her goggles flip up to the headband and resemble cat ears.
• Throw It In!:
  • Bruce's last line as he leaves Selina Kyle's apartment.
  • Two instances with Tom Hardy as Bane: Subtly placing his hand on Daggett's shoulder after his Bullying a Dragon rant, and his line when listening to the national anthem at the stadium: "That's a lovely, lovely voice." In addition, his habit of grasping his clothes by the lapels is Tom Hardy trying to get some air under his mask.
• Torch the Franchise and Run: Christopher Nolan was very reluctant to make a follow-up to The Dark Knight, especially after Ledger's death upset his original plans. He finally agreed when he realized that he could use it to tell Batman's final adventure and give the character an ending. As such, he repurposed plots from the first film, resolved Bruce Wayne's issues with Rachel Dawes, and ended the story on such a way that DC had to pretty much reboot as soon as he stopped, noting that the conclusion made it impossible to tell further Batman stories or superhero stories in the same continuity.
• Translation Correction: A variant. As having Two First Names is an extremely rare phenomenon for Russian names, Dr. Leonid Pavel was given the more realistic surname "Pavlov" in the Russian dub (although, as it turns out, Russian people with the surname "Pavel" actually exist). Due to the existence of a certain Dr. Pavlov in Real Life, this might have made it sound like Hollywood resorted to the Famous-Named Foreigner trope once again.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Jessica Biel, Eva Green and Kate Mara were the final contenders for the role of Selina Kyle before Anne Hathaway was cast.
    • Natalie Portman, Charlize Theron, Gemma Arterton, Keira Knightley, Vera Farmiga, Abbie Cornish, Olivia Wilde, Emily Blunt and Blake Lively read for the part of Catwoman as well before the casting of Hathaway.
  • Leonardo DiCaprio, Ryan Gosling, Shia LaBeouf and Mark Ruffalo were considered for the role of John Blake before the casting of Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Interestingly, DiCaprio was previously offered the role of Robin in Batman Forever, which is who Blake is eventually alluded to be.
  • Kate Winslet, Rachel Weisz and Naomi Watts were considered for the part of Talia al Ghul before Marion Cotillard was cast.
  • Jennifer Lawrence and Chloë Grace Moretz auditioned for the role of Jen before the casting of Juno Temple.
  • During early production stages, Warner Bros. expressed interest in using the Riddler as the main antagonist, with Leonardo DiCaprio, Johnny Depp, Eddie Murphy or David Tennant in mind for the part. However, Christopher Nolan was able to convince them to use Bane due to the character having a physical presence that the previous villains lacked.
  • About a year before its release, Christopher Nolan mentioned he was considering using a mixture of CGI and deleted scenes from The Dark Knight to have the Joker appear briefly. He ultimately decided it was disrespectful to Heath Ledger.
  • Bane's voice was originally much more distorted. Many of his lines had to be re-recorded for the final cut because it was nigh-impossible to understand what he was saying.
  • Similarly, had Heath lived, David S. Goyer's (but not necessarily Nolan's) plans for the third movie would have involved the Joker going on trial while Two-Face (who would have turned out to be Only Mostly Dead) went on a rampage across Gotham. There was also talk that Crane's role as the Kangaroo Court judge would have gone to the Joker had Ledger still been alive.
  • In a more general sense, the Joker's ending in The Dark Knight was clearly a setup for Ledger to return as the Joker in the next film. It's safe to say that if Ledger had been around to reprise his role, then the third Dark Knight film would have been quite different from what we actually got.
  • Part of the film involves the destruction of a football stadium by Bane. At earlier points it was considered this event would be at either a hockey or basketball game to go along with the demolition of Pittsburgh's now-vacant Civic Arena. Unfortunately the city of Pittsburgh had difficulties and a court case in deciding the fate of the arena that by the time demolition began, filming was finished.
  • Nolan quite specifically ended the franchise with this film and did not plan to follow up on its Sequel Hook, which is all the more disappointing for those who were excited to see the adventures of Joseph Gordon Levitt as Batman / Robin / Nightwing.
  • Interestingly enough, Warner Bros. execs did want the trilogy to be part of the DC Extended Universe with either Christian Bale reprising his role or Joseph Gordon-Levitt showing up as John Blake, who would've become either the new Batman or possibly Nightwing, thus Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice would've served as a continuation to said trilogy. Though interested at first, Zack Snyder wanted to cast Levitt as Bruce Wayne instead of reprising his role as Blake as well as cast Bale as a different character just to hammer home that the new movie was not connected to the trilogy. The idea never materialised due to Bale declining offers to reprise his role as well as Nolan insisting that the trilogy must remain standalone along with Snyder opting to go with Ben Affleck as Batman instead.
• Why Fandom Can't Have Nice Things: Rotten Tomatoes had to shut down the commenting feature for critic reviews after those who placed a negative review on this movie ended up getting met with death threats on said comment boards.
• Word of Saint Paul: In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Christian Bale confirmed that the end of the movie was not a dream.
• Working Title: The movie as filmed in Pittsburgh under the title Magnus Rex.

Miscellaneous Trivia

• The last film Wally Pfister did as a cinematographer before moving into directing. Hoyte van Hoytema would take over shooting Nolan's films with Interstellar.
• The famous memetic prologue was personally considered by Christopher Nolan to be the scene he's most proud of making in his entire filmmaking career because of the technical achievements behind it.

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