Dark Knight's Dilemma

Dark Knight has joined a small exclusive community of movies such as Transformers, Might Ducks 1, and the Goofy Movie. It is one of my favorites.

I choose my favorites based on what I feel while I'm watching the movie and what I can take away from the experience. I won't go into what I got from the other movies, but there was something that very much stood out for me in Dark Knight, which was the title.

Don't get me wrong, Heath Ledger as Joker MADE the movie. His amazing performance made the movie absolutely unforgettable, and the character of Joker itself was a mix of psychopathic psychologist and criminal mastermind that burns its place in my mind. However, the little kicker for me was the ending of the movie, where Batman takes the blame for Harvey Dent's death to preserve Dent's heroic image and to preserve the public's confidence in itself. It wasn't the best portrayed moment of the movie, nor was it the most audibly pleasing statement that I've ever heard. However, it made the point clear that what made the Dark Knight a hero was that he didn't need the title. He knew what Gotham needed and would make it happen, even if he loses his reputation and support in doing it.

That is a dilemma that people often come across in their lives. It can come in an infinite set of forms that is viewed differently by different people. For example, imagine that you are a person who is close friends with your ex. Your ex starts dating someone new. In their relationship, your name keeps coming up in arguments, even though you've felt that you haven't done anything wrong. What would you do in this case? For the Dark Knight, he would remove himself from the relationship, even if that meant that he could no longer maintain the close friendship with his ex-girlfriend because for him, giving the new couple room to develop the relationship is the best way for him to do his part to ensure his ex-girlfriend's happiness.

Another example could be in a long-term project that you've invested yourself in. Imagine that you spent a long time investing in creating a new company or a new organization. After awhile, you leave to pursue other interests and you leave on good terms. After awhile, you start hearing that you are being blamed for some of the problems that the company/organization is currently experiencing. You hear this through the grapevine and no one has asked you to come back to help them understand or resolve the issue. What do you do? For the Dark Knight, he would stay out of it. If the blame for whatever problem it is needs to go somewhere, he can take it, even if that damages his reputation and trivializes the time and effort that he put into that group. For him, it is more important that the organization succeeds because that was why he put his time into it in the first place.

This Dark Knight personality is a self-sacrificing one. Never looking for credit, and just doing the work to get it done. Doing what's right even in the face of people who look at him and tell him that he's wrong. It is a stubborn one, and one that believes it's own moral code is better than any other that it has encountered.

I don't think many people have this personality type. It is people's nature to preserve themselves, physically and emotionally. For some, their legacy is even more important than anything else (you know, it's that question that more insecure types tend to ask: How will I be remembered?). Could the Dark Knight personality be partly motivated by his own quest for a legacy? It's possible, but it is also possible that the Dark Knight personality is simply motivated by his own sense of morality, guided by what he sees as necessary, instead of what is convenient.

DISCLAIMER: I use "he" and "his" a lot, but that is because a lot of these references go back to Batman's character. I also use it in the general sense, but that is not intended to leave women out of this personality type at all. Women, just as much as men, can be the Dark Knight.