20 Things You Somehow Missed In The Dark Knight Rises
Did you spot the Joker tribute hiding in plain sight during The Dark Knight Rises?
Signing off one of the most successful and influential trilogies in the history of cinema with an almighty bang, Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight Rises saw his legendary version of The Caped Crusader ride off into the sunset a whopping ten years ago.
Time, like a certain iconic winged mammal, doesn't half fly, right?
So, with 2022 marking a whole decade since Christian Bale last donned the cape and cowl in his efforts to overcome the indomitable Bane, Talia al Ghul, and the League of Shadows on the big screen, now feels like as good a time as ever to dive back into a crumbling Gotham and dig into some of those subtle secrets and Easter eggs you may have overlooked in your many viewings of the Dark Knight series-ender in the time since its 2012 release.
From visual tributes to one of the most iconic antagonists ever to grace a cinema screen, to cameos that may have more meaning than you initially assumed, these are those Bat-beats that have often slipped into the darkness, but will no doubt blind you with their brilliance upon discovery.
20. Commissioner Gets Batman's Last Word Once More
Throughout Nolan's epic series of Bat-flicks, Bruce Wayne/Batman's relationship with Gary Oldman's Jim Gordon very much acts as one of the key foundations for much of the emotionally charged and routinely mesmerising set-pieces unfolding on the streets of Gotham.
And in a rather subtle nod to the bond the Commissioner shares with The Caped Crusader in each of the gripping tales, Nolan actually went out of his way to have Gordon be the last person The Bat converses with before each of his films reaches its conclusion.
In Batman Begins said conversation comes in the form of discussing the arrival of a certain iconic villain who also has "a taste for the theatrical".
The Dark Knight sees Batman convince his old ally to help forge the lie that will ensure Harvey Dent remains Gotham's White Knight.
And, sure enough, The Dark Knight Rises depicts the masked vigilante's final words under the cowl of "a hero can be anyone..." being uttered to Gordon as the Bruce Wayne penny finally drops.