SupaChupacabra

Instead of questioning Capitalism, Communism, Taoism or Existentialism... and challenging the audience... it is about corruption and surrendering to corruption like surrendering to jaded teen boredom. Fueled by the claustrophobic helplessness due to terrorism, and the merciless acceptance of hipster nihilism, TDK is a cold unrealistic mechanical set-up sold over and over again by it's proponents as "ultra-realistic". That is the most frightening thing about the obsessive if not immoral blatherings of TDK fans is the Emperor's New Clothes insistence that the film represents "realism". From the Joker's precision timing to drive a school bus into a line of school buses, with one space left for him... to Dent's facial damage due to 5 seconds of burning gasoline... the film is rife with movie fakeness sold like Ad (or ADD) pitchmen for "Nolan's formulaic realism", which is actually just him stealing from "The Long Halloween".

A meaningless Rube Goldberg contraption, Nolan takes the audience on an endless set of fake-out twists and turns to deliver very little but loud moments. As calculated and obsessive as The Joker is, and to the degree he plans about 5 separate "back up plans" that come to fruition, he enters the level of anal retentive... yet somehow we are to believe he is some "agent of chaos". Which, means cool. Chaos = cool, get it? There's nothing cool or chaotic about this drugged out riffing Joker, and as fun as Ledger makes him, he overshadows what should have been the center of the story: Harvey Dent. But it's Batman so, business as usual... problem child villain acts up, makes a mess, BatDad shows up to clean up the mess. Crowd applauds.

Unfortunately what the film creates is a subtext of a NeoCon wetdream with "by any means necessary" militarism, where the Batman uses unethical means to "detect" the Joker, and we are to assume this fall from grace makes him heroic because he is banished and falsely accused (for 1 minute of nagging by the Joker, turning Dent evil for yet another film coincidence) of driving Dent from white to dark knight... so Batman takes the blame and is the dark knight cuz he's just a Christ figure. So our sacrificial Justice League hero is supposed to be a sympathetic figure of crossing moral boundaries to save society... George Bush must have loved this puppy. Not sure half the tween tards watching this caught that bit of hooey, but as much as the poster art evokes Fight Club, this film is about as far from punk anarchy as you can get. Maybe they should all be sent to military school if this is their idea of rebellion.

But I got sick of what I deemed this show to be from the beginning.... suspense porn. Every commercial break needs a "dun dun daaaaaah" sound effect. Season 1 was somewhat interesting as the Island's supernatural mysteries, mixed with slow revelations of back story, kept the primitive survivalist state of the character's fresh and raw... Season 2 and the stupid machine got tedious and the second survivors all annoyed me. Now Season 3 with the Others just feels way too M. Night Shyamalan "Village" contrived... and I know more little broad stroke metaphors are in the works... so I get plot reductions from co-workers, I've decided to pretty much only pay attention to Season openers and finales since they sum up the complete season's story lines neatly then anyway. Very overrated show, and I think people just like it for it's simplicity.

Let me qualify... I voted for Al Gore, usually vote (but don't consider myself) Democrat, and believe that global warming, as well as energy conservation/alternate energy, are probably the top issue(s) we all need to concern ourselves with... and not just for "save the whales/world" way, but for divorcing ourselves from the middle east economy in general, as well as basic practical pragmatic cost concerns. That said, this movie is the most cloying, sappy, poorly edited, and painful movie I've seen this year. My whole beef with Al Gore is that he sounds like the Minister from the Simpsons, and is as tedious and preachy as that character. And ironically, Al's lecture on global warming begins with a Simpson's parody of a fake 1950's global warming educational film. Add in unneeded footage of him losing the election (suggesting he would have stopped global warming had he won), and Bush winning (yes we get it, Bush certainly is A if not THE problem in regards to energy problems today), the film it comes off as a not-so-subtle biopic, about a candidate reeling from a defeat after being considered having no backbone or mission, artificially coming up with "his mission": traveling back to the Tennessee riverbanks, going to Antarctica, touring college campuses. And edited in a way to be more of an infomercial for his cause, than about the subject in earnest. And instead of offering solutions (which is done in an infomercial way at the end, mixed into the credits) he pushes "separating truth from fiction"... somewhat antithetical to a movie smearing together dubious personal anecdotes and real scientific data. I've seen about 10 far more interesting, terrifying, and mind awakening docs on PBS regarding global warming than this... I would have rather watched them again. This came off, the way Kerry and Gore have in their election runs, as "talking down" to the lowest common denominator, instead of standing up for what they say they believe in. I really looked forward to seeing this, I wanted to be awestruck, and was just oozed over with smarmy sloganeering and cheesy presentation.