The Batman vs. The Dark Knight

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19 comments

I think as a Batman movie, The Batman is the better than The Dark Knight. It is the best Batman movie for my opinion. But as a normal movie The Dark Knight wins i guess. They both are incredible though.

Not sure what makes The Batman a better "Batman" movie. All the costume designs for the main Batman characters look vastly different to that of the comics. The Penguin and Riddler are almost totally new characters altogether. Pattinson's Batsuit has to be the worst I've seen in the movies. The Batman is more in line to what Nolan was doing with his trilogy, grounded in reality and moving away from the comics. So, of these two realistic movie adaptations, The Dark Knight is the better executed thriller. The set pieces are better (like the scene where the truck flips over, or the exploding of a hospital, or the opening bank robbery), as are the performances (Colin Farrell and Paul Dano are excellent but neither can compete with Heath Ledger's Joker), and while Christian Bale's Batman voice is over the top and farcical, his performance as Bruce Wayne is far more layered than Pattinson's which felt one-note. I liked The Batman but The Dark Knight is the much better film.

JRM
JRM

I still think The Dark Knight is much better, but The Batman is a valiant effort .

This is a close race. They're certainly very different and each have outstanding qualities - but I think I like The Batman

The Batman was alright okay, but the dark knight is still better

I still say Dark Knight

As a movie I still prefer Dark Knight mainly because of Ledger's portrayal of Joker and the set pieces being really well done. I like both movies a lot though.

Dark Knight definitely

The Batman is spectacular, but The Dark Knight still comes out on top.

I quite liked The Batman personally, but it was a little too long for me, and the last half hour honestly kinda lost me; had they trimmed the last act a bit, I might have agreed with the people claiming it's better than the Nolan trilogy, but as it stands, I think I still prefer TDK by a hair.

The Batman is the best thing to happen to comic book movies since Joker, but The Dark Knight will forever be a classic

I'll go with The Dark Knight simply because of its higher entertainment factor. I enjoyed both of these movies a lot, and they're honestly near-equal to me

ear
ear

Two great movies with the edge to Dark Knight.

Rewatched both movies, and I still think The Dark Knight takes this. It isn't quite as simple as I originally believed it to be, though. The Batman does certain things better like cinematography, lighting, and even shot composition. It humanizes its main protagonist and allows the audience to truly empathize with said main protagonist in a way that Nolan's masterpiece just can't do. One is a truly personal and even claustrophobic experience, and the other is a crime drama where everyone is a part of the plot. The Batman also asks interesting interesting questions about identity and the masks that people use in society. Are masks ways for people to act their most authentic selves, or are they just methods to escape accountability, or are those the same thing? The film doesn't directly answer the question, and only gives one possible viewpoint of it from Riddler. That being said, I do think The Dark Knight is a far more engaging film that is introspective and philosophical. It, much like The Batman, asks questions about the nature of humanity and the nature of morality as a whole. Can a person truly commit such atrocities if pushed hard enough? These are questions it brings up while giving conflicting viewpoints which don't have nor need a resolution. I think I personally like The Dark Knight's method of using its themes and questions better simply because it uses them more. The Batman uses a lot of visual storytelling where you have to infer things off what you see and less on actual storylines or dialogue. While this is a good thing normally, it also leaves less buildup for the film's themes, while The Dark Knight uses this morality card for basically the whole movie. But yeah, it's very close between these two honestly.

I loved TDK when it first came out, and by itself it might still be slightly better than The Batman, but I don't think I'll ever be able to disassociate it from the imo disappointing sequel... Might not be fair, but them's the breaks. I'm also just gonna come out and say it: I prefer Robert Pattinson's Batman to Christian Bale's. Sorry, I guess...

I think the comparison between the two movies is a little strange. The Dark Knight is a crime thriller which evolves into an archetypal battle of order and chaos while also bringing in other things like questions on human nature, social commentary, dialogue on the symbolism of Batman, etc. The Batman, on the other hand, is a morally ambiguous and complex investigation about uncovering the web of corruption buried within Gotham's foundations, along with making many social commentaries and questions about identity and the masks we choose to wear in front of society, about the type of person you want to be. I think both movies have aspects that they do over each other. The Batman is a better shot and has a better visual style than The Dark Knight, and the story is arguably even more gripping than The Dark Knight. It's villain, while not quite as well written as Joker in TDK, is easily a far scarier and nearly as effective of a villain for Batman. I think TDK wins simply because of how much more iconic and memorable it is. I feel it'll stand the test of time more, but maybe I'm wrong. I suppose we'll just have to see

I thought The Batman surpassed it for a while after initial release, but after having some time to sit on it and rewatch the two, The Dark Knight still easily takes the cake for the ultimate Batman film. It's a case of The Batman being less than the sum of it's parts. Or maybe not even necessarily that, but just The Dark Knight being such a high level of lightning in a bottle that The Batman could never even compete. It's hard to even compare the two because The Dark Knight strives for heightened reality, but The Batman strives for just plain reality, so everything is much smaller scale in The Batman. I think on paper, I like The Batman more as a concept, but in execution, The Dark Knight changed cinema, and I still remember just how blown away everyone was by it when it came out, and The Batman doesn't come close to that. Even comparing the two today, I felt that TDK had a much stronger and more emotional story. That being said, TDK is the second feature in that series, and The Batman is only the first, and I do think that The Batman is a better introductory film than Batman Begins, so the sequel to The Batman has the potential to blow us away the same way TDK did. It just needs to expand it's scope, and I hope it replaces Giacchino. I think Giacchino is a composer who occasionally makes greatness, but also frequently makes bad music. His Spiderman is awful, Rogue One was pretty bad, and while some of The Batman was beautiful, a lot of it was whack. He is not a good composer.

Both are good but i preffer The Dark Knight.

TDK is better but The Batman is nonetheless amazing and I wouldn't put it beyond Matt Reeves to make a superior sequel that will give TDK a run for its money.

The Batman's first two hours beat literally ever comic book movie out there. The multilayered and complex story, the well defined characters, the honest and in-tone dialogue, the subtle integration of its themes of identity and class through subtext, the phenomenal cast, and the amazing direction and editing put this movie head and shoulders above every other comic book movie. Unfortunately, the last hour of the movie, while certainly still great, is much weaker than its first two hours. The actions scenes aren't as good, the themes become less subtle, and the pacing gets a little messed up by the end. It's really those issues that put The Dark Knight above The Batman, but those first two hours were out of this world. Still, I have to give it to The Dark Knight

I love The Batman but it’s definitely not better than The Dark Knight

I really agree with all the people who talked about this clash. Unfortunately, I don't like the film The Batman at all because of Robert Pattinson