Final 'Dark Knight Rises' trailer is beyond words

Posted Tuesday, May 1, 2012 at 10:56 AM Central
Last updated Tuesday, May 1, 2012 at 10:56 AM Central

by John Couture

I literally sat here at my desk for a good 15 minutes trying to find the perfect adjective for my headline. It just didn't seem like the English language has created a word yet to succinctly capture all of the amazing awesomeness that is the final trailer for The Dark Knight Rises.

Alas, I was left wanting, so I simply appended what was true about the trailer. That it is so good, that it is literally beyond explanation. It definitely has to be experienced to be understood.

However, despite all of these wonderful accolades, there's still a moment in the trailer that makes me pause and remember this little piece I wrote a few weeks back about the potential for The Dark Knight Rises' failure. While a case can still be made about the relativity of its performance in regards to failure, I really don't think it will fail on the scale that The Five-Year Engagement did this past weekend.

And yet, the last moments of the trailer still make me shudder about the direction of The Dark Knight Rises. For comparison's sake, I'm posting the final trailers for both Batman Begins and The Dark Knight below.

While yes the trailer for The Dark Knight does end on a lighter tone, it's a quip from Alfred the token person tapped for comic relief in Christopher Nolan's Batman universe. Throughout the entire span of this set of movies, Nolan has resisted the urge to pop trite one-liners into Batman's mouth.

That is until now.

The trailer ends with such a cheesy one-liner that I had to check and make sure that Warner Bros. didn't swap out Christopher Nolan for Tim Burton at the last minute. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed Burton's run with the Caped Crusader, but that was then. Now, Nolan has opted to present Batman as a tortured soul that has no use for humor in his life.

Now, granted in the comic book, sure Batman (and especially Robin) were known for their cheesy rapport, but Nolan has taken a more gritty, realistic approach to Gotham and Batman. So, this little bit cheesy back-and-forth between Batman and Catwoman sort of sticks out like a sore thumb from the rest of Nolan's work.

I'm hopeful that it is only a bad editing choice for a trailer and not indicative of what we will find in The Dark Knight Rises. If not, then perhaps The Dark Knight Rises will indeed truly fail. And if that happens, many of us will be sad.

Check out the final trailer below and let us know what you think. The Dark Knight Rises hits theaters on July 20.