Gotham looks set to crumble in The Dark Knight Rises

361 days is generally a long time to wait for majority of life’s big days. Your wedding, your birthday, your graduation even. At this stage people wouldn’t tend to ponder over their next big champagne moment. Unless you’re Rupert Murdoch and you’ve survived another year without stepping foot into a prison cell. But for fans of the Caped Crusader, known to some as the multi-millionaire playboy Bruce Wayne, others more familiar with his vigilante crime fighter Batman, The Dark Knight Rises is on many a calendar penned in for 20^th July 2012. The final part of Christopher Nolan’s epic Batman trilogy is by far my most hotly anticipated movie since his last piece of true craftsmanship in the mind bending and mind blowing Inception.  

This week we have all been treated to the first teaser trailer to TDKR and in true Chris Nolan fashion very little is revealed bar a short convo with a bed ridden Gary Oldman (reprising his role as Commissioner Gordon) and Bruce Wayne discussing the current evil rising and of the need for the Batman to return. Wrapping the 95 second promo up are a few sneaky shots of Tom Hardy’s masked brute, Bane facing-off with Christian Bale’s Bat. I couldn’t have expected anymore from the opening trailer to the already fascinating Viral Marketing campaign to next Summer’s big’un which has already seen an image of  the muscular villain, Bane, the film’s official site with the chant “The Fire Rises” playing and the first official poster which looks all the more Inception-y with the towering Gotham falling outlining the Bat symbol.

An official plot is yet to be revealed but one can only speculate that the Batman is pulled out of hiding (when we last saw the Caped Crusader in The Dark Knight, he was fleeing from Gotham PD after taking the blame for the death of DA Harvey Dent/Two-Face) to take on new foe Bane and Anne Hathaway’s Selina Kyle aka Catwoman. It will be fascinating to see how the players tackle their roles particularly the main heroes and villains as in the DC comics the Bat and the Cat, in the end form a partnership and at one stage Bane actually kills off Batman by snapping his back in two so it’ll be a toughie to predict what could occur. But you’d have to be someone with a total lack of brain power to even think of second guessing the great man that is Christopher Nolan. Just look over his lean back catalogue of small independent movies and big budget Summer blockbusters, and I assure you all he is the man for the job. Typically he is keeping a tight lid on set not allowing anything to be exposed or revealed prematurely. Even Tom Hardy was not budging when probed about TDKR and his character during a recent MTV interview where he declared, ""I can't [talk about it], so let's have another question. Have you got time for another question?"

No doubt he will go out with an almighty bang and I will not be surprised if the director keeps everything on lockdown and bring back a certain Liam Neeson to make a shock comeback as Ra’s al Ghul. There have been rumours that the Irishman has been spotted on set in St Johns, London in recent weeks and has a voiceover in the beginning of the trailer. Hmm Nolan does have a talent at deceiving the mind and this would be a definite curveball thrown at audiences and at Christian Bale’s Batman if he were to make a shock return from the dead following his supposed demise in Batman Begins.

Websites, forums and other blogs have been giving their own reaction following the first glimpse of The Dark Knight Rises. When the trailer was shown at screenings of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2, fans were going hysterical; clapping, cheering, high fiving. I wouldn’t go to that extent but I’ll still be waiting … 361 days, 8664 hours, 519, 840 minutes and counting.

Do watch this space for further Bat/Bane/Cat/Gordon/Nolan/General TDKR developments to no doubt fill your mind with intrigue and interest.

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Written by Michael Cunneen