Narm / The Dark Knight Trilogy

SWEAR TO ME!!!

"Holy mother of unintentional comedy!"

—Mike Nelson upon seeing Two-Face for the first time.

Batman Begins

• When Rachel slaps Bruce after he shows her the gun he was going to use to kill Joe Chill, she clearly makes contact but clearly hits him very weakly. Also, something about the sound effect is off. It makes Rachel seem extremely physically weak.
• Sometimes this happens when Ducard is lecturing Wayne during his training, especially when he's setting up for a Call-Back later in the film. For example, at one point, he rushes in while rapidly shouting "you must become an IDEA!"
• Some considered Scarecrow's costume to be this, as it's little more than a paper bag over the head.
• Batman gets gassed with fear toxins and is subsequently seen going into spastic hallucinations. However, because of how stiff his costume is, Bale's drug-induced shuffling ends up looking awkward. For fans of YTMND and Youtube Poop, it might even resemble the "Retarded Batman" clip.
• There is a scene in which a fear-toxin-poisoned Rachel is rushed to Batman's cave, about to die from fright... And a still-masked Batman sits next to her, repeatedly growling at her. Real helpful, Batman.
  • If you go frame-by-frame when he shouts "RACHEL!!" just prior to entering the bat-cave, he makes the most hilarious face.

The Dark Knight

• Batman's voice, with Christian Bale taking a far deeper and raspier tone than he did back in Batman Begins, made it difficult to take Batman seriously. The RiffTrax product blurb accurately describes it as sounding like "a grizzled combination of Tom Waits and The Cookie Monster."

  "WHERE ARE THEYYY!!!"

  "YOU'RE PEANUT BUTTER JELLO FOREVER!"

  • "BLRRGRGHAR THROAT CANCER!"
  • He sounds awfully like Patty and Selma, Marge's chain-smoking twin older sisters, on The Simpsons. Or like an asthmatic doing a bad Steven Seagal impression.
  • Even if you grant that he's obviously trying to disguise his real voice, it gets super funny when you notice that he still puts on the voice when talking with Lucius Fox and Rachel in private, who already know who he is.
• At points, Batman sounds just drunk, especially in the important final scene with Jim Gordon and Two-Face. Being Batman is something you have to do sober.
• Aaron Eckhart, in what was otherwise a fantastic performance, shouts "Say it!" at Gordon, and screams "Rachel!" There's a guy who cannot pull off Say My Name.

  "RAY-CHUuUuUL!!"

• Also, Harvey Dent saying "it's not about what I want, it's about what's FAIR!" They turned freaking Two-Face into Anakin Skywalker!!!
• Nurse Joker's Paper-Thin Disguise keeping Harvey from recognizing him until he takes off the surgeon mask.

The Dark Knight Rises

• Batman inexplicably spends a huge amount of his scenes with his mouth hanging open, to the point of completely distracting from otherwise-okay dialogue scenes.
• Bane's voice. Deep, menacing, artificial... yet also probably hilarious for many people.
  • With his voice and mannerisms, especially near the beginning and during his speeches, some movie reviewers refer to him as The Lord Humungus for a reason.
  • It sounds almost exactly like a Sontaran's. Crossed with Sean Connery. We're treated to some prime Ham-to-Ham Combat whenever he and Batman are in the same room.
  • Spaniards might have a hard time buying into Bane's menace at all, as his build and voice make him look unfortunately like comedian Paco Collado playing his famous Aberroncho character, only wearing a gas mask.
• The prologue is filled with awkward dialogue delivered with the utmost seriousness. There's a reason why it's a Fountain of Memes.
• The ham-handed scene of the National Anthem being sung caused eye-rolls in some places.
• The scene of the football player (Hines Ward of the Steelers) outrunning the collapsing stadium and dropping the ball in shock elicited some laughs. You'd think he'd have heard all those explosions not ten feet behind him. (The ball drop doesn't appear in the film, though.)
  • It's especially funny if you are (or know) a fan of the Steelers, who will insist that Hines Ward would not be returning a kickoff, and that there's no way in Hell that he'd actually be able to run the ball back like that.
• The fights between Batman and Bane can be hilarious due to the lazy, almost minimalist way they are choreographed and shot. Most of the time, they just stay in front of each other and exchange shoddy arm punches, all while the camera only shows them from their chests up in order to hide they aren't actually doing anything resembling a martial arts move. This might be meant to show that Nolan prefers to focus on the emotional struggle or something rather than doing a kung fu flick, but it has the side effect to make Batman and Bane look like two drunkards who have not trained a day of their lives.
  • Bonus points because when the camera finally zooms away in their first duel, they are still mostly throwing incredibly amateurish haymakers, with Bane throwing the rare fake-looking kick at the end.
  • Batman's suddenly striking a traditional boxing guard in the catwalk above the water, as if doing a Bring It on Bane. He is so visibly tired and worn that it makes him comical, like a drunkard acting tough, in an unappropriate moment.
• If you happen to know Moroccan Arabic, the pit's chant is this. Not only did they get the wrong words ("deshi basara" does not mean "to rise", as it's often claimed, but "coming soon"), it's mispronounced.
• The attempts of Bruce and the earlier prisoner to jump the gap leading out of the prison, and failing, coupled with the mention that only one person has ever escaped, is hard to take seriously when the gap isn't that big, and the pitiful leaps the two take to get across.
• Bane's and Batman's opening banter at the rematch consists of the former asking if the latter has come back to die, to which Batman replies, "No. I came back to stop you." At which point the music swells and they begin fighting, as though the dialogue wasn't pathetically anti-climactic.
  • Of particular note is the moment where Batman punches Bane repeatedly while demanding to know where the detonator for the nuke is, over and over again. Dude, give the guy a chance to respond.
    "WHEWS DAH TRIGGAH!?!?! WHERAESET!?!?! YOU'D NEVAH GIVE IT TO AN OWDINAY CAWWTIZEN!!!!"
  • This also provides what could be one of the most narmtastic Ironic Echoes of all time when he says "THEN YOU HAVE MY PERMISHION TO DIIIE".
• The death of Talia Al-Ghul (assuming it was indeed a death, since it's left ambiguous), due to her rather hammy Evil Gloating and expressions.
• A slight case with the otherwise wonderful scene of Batman revealing to Gordon who he is—"putting a coat around a young boy's shoulders..." To some, Gordon's perplexed expression translates as "Dude, that doesn't help. I've been a cop for thirty years. I've probably done that for a HUNDRED kids."
• The dramatic ending where Batman seemingly sacrifices himself to prevent a nuke from leveling the city becomes unintentionally hilarious once you make a certain connection: "Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb!"

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