7. "No, I Came Back To Stop You!"
Say what you want about Kevin Smith, but the actor/writer/director/critic hater knows his comic books, and presumably knows a good deal about comic book movies. When his friend Ben Affleck was revealed as the next Batman, the Clerks creator somewhat predictably weighed in on the debate to state that he was overjoyed at the casting, and that it was the right direction to go in. Friendship obviously never came into his thoughts. Smith rightly pointed out that Christian Bale's Batman voice was worthy of criticism, and suggests a way to improve it for future films, but his more pertinent point, for the sake of this article, is his dissection of Bale's overall performance as Batman. He stated that Affleck could do a better job with some of the lines that Bale had made something of a mess of, and in particular the response he gives to Bane's challenge of "So you've come back to die with your city?" In response, Batman says, "No, I came back to stop you!" which Smith says is "one of the worst lines in cinema history." It's not just the writing that is off, but the performance itself. By now, Bale has become a parody of his own performance, and the line, which is presumably designed to be hard-hitting is delivered without so much as a morsel of emotion. A line that should define the entire final act of the film lands on the floor with a soft, wet thud, and sets in motion the most underwhelming final battle between good and evil seen in comic book movies.