10 Things DC Comics Wants You To Forget About Bane

10. Batman & Robin's Bane

Tom Hardy's essaying in the role of Bane was a further surprise to audiences, who were expecting this more "physical threat" to the Dark Knight to be nothing more than a lumbering hulk. Instead he was a lumbering hulk who occasionally gave eloquent speeches about pits of flames in a plummy British accent. You could be forgiven for thinking otherwise, since 1. Hardy proper bulked up for the role (seriously, he's terrifying in Bronson, and he's about half the size in that) and 2. The last time Bane appeared on screen he was dumber than a bag full of bat guano. Which is to say: pretty dumb. For Joel Schumacher's Batman & Robin from 1997 - not counted amongst the best Caped Crusader films, and part of the reason that it took so long for Nolan to get on board and reboot the franchise - the part was played not by a noted, up-and-coming actor, but by a former professional wrestler. We can't lay the blame for the film's portrayal of Bane entirely with Robert Swenson (especially because he died not long after it was released), but clearly they were going in a different direction by casting him. Batman & Robin's Bane is a total moron, barely able to string a sentence together and used only as muscle for the movie's main villains, Mr Freeze and Poison Ivy. He just sort of repeats his name a bunch and hits things. Like a Pokemon. A Pokemon dressed like a Mexican wrestler. Anyway, that's nothing like any version of Bane we've seen before, and thankfully we haven't since. It did sort of affect the way people viewed the character, mind.