Christopher Nolan Hates Happiness (aka I Just Have All These Feelings)

[effex]

I hate Christopher Nolan’s Batman franchise. Loathe it. It’s not really rational - there are plenty of movies that fail worse than it does (although it fails a *lot*) - but it hits some kind of magic nerd!rage + sexism!rage + racism!rage combo that shorts out my logic circuits.

...that's a terrible opener, but I figure everyone should know my biases up front. Anyway, I haven't seen a collection of the franchise's various problems and I want something to link people to later (as an alternative to ranting at them), so I'm putting this here. Let me know if I've missed anything!

NOTE: I am not trying to say that you shouldn’t like the Batmovies - there’s plenty to like! Heath Ledger was a fucking awesome Joker, Bruce/Jim is a fun 'ship and the explosions were all very satisfactory! - or that being excited for the new one makes you a bad person. My button issues are not your button issues, etc.

Moving on, the issues include:

* The whitewashing of Ra's Al Ghul (This one’s tricky, given how badly Nolan would have handled an Arabic Ra's Al Ghul + how much the ‘muslim terrorist’ trope sucks in general).

* The fridging of Rachel Dawes.

'I've been informed in the comments that Rachel Dawes was NOT in the comics and that her movie character was not based on any recognizable pre-existing Batman character. So Nolan created a woman and introduced her into the Batman universe solely for the purpose of killing her off. Not only does her death provide angst for Bruce Wayne, it turns Harvey Dent evil and Jim Gordon borderline-suicidal. Wow, screw fridging, that's like a deep freeze!'

* The erasure of Barbara Gordon

Instead, Barbara was shunted off to the side in favor of a son, because Nolan had no faith in the demonstrably popular and meaningful relationship Barbara Gordon has with her father. You see, little girls aren't important, and their fathers don't love them. And little girls don't grow up to be heroes.

* The erasure of Renee Montoya

NOLAN: Yeah, she’s [Detective Ramirez] not Renee Montoya. We did look at using her but we wanted to change the character from the way she is in the comics, so we changed the name of the character.

Renee Montoya, ex-detective on the Gotham Police Force, used to date Batwoman and had a crush on Wonder Woman. She was one of the very few people -- the shortlist including Batman -- who saw Harvey Dent inside Two-Face, and risked her life to bring it back. She also, when it went too far, stopped putting up with his shit and took her life back from him hand over fist. When her career tanked trying to save Crispus Allen, she and the Question teamed up to mumble mumble I haven't read comics in two years but I'm pretty sure it was awesome. She's now the new Question. She's a woman of strength, justice, and sense. She's a heroine.

Detective Ramirez, who appeared for a possible ten minutes of total screentime (in a movie that long, I overestimate), was a bit character who sold out her city for medical insurance. She's a bad guy treated without nuance in a movie that celebrates its villains significantly more than it celebrates its heroes, and her defining shot is having her life come down to the flip of Two-Face's coin. And her existence has made more or less impossible the insertion of Montoya into any further movie -- they've already had their Latina detective, what if people got confused? That would be terrible. She's a faceless (hah) victim.

Nolan's fine with making up police roles for his favorite white dude actors to play (and I like JGL too), but god forbid we include the canon kickass queer latina cop.

* The whitewashing of Bane (and possibly Selina)

As far as I can figure, the film will either erase Bane's Latino+Caribbean heritage or have Tom Hardy pretend to be someone with that heritage. I can't decide which option is worse.

~*~

It looks like Batman's getting a reboot* after The Dark Knight Rises, though, so at least this'll be the end of it.

Except Nolan will be producing the reboot.

* Oh, Hollywood. I think I'm finally ready to quit you.

Comments

[crossedwires]

And her existence has made more or less impossible the insertion of Montoya into any further movie -- they've already had their Latina detective, what if people got confused? That would be terrible

WHAT. But what if I get confused by all the white men??

[effex]

Don't be silly, white men are special and easily identifiable snowflakes! It's those token characters you can only have one of, what would you do with two Latina cops?

[happydork]

Thanks for the links -- I knew some of this, but not all. Have you seen this summary of Christopher Nolan's films?

[effex]

LOL. I had not, thank you!