WARNING: Spoilers for those who haven’t seen the film. If you’re one of those people, go watch this film right now. It’s amazing!

The Dark Knight is the second film in Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy. It is widely considered to be not just the best of the trilogy, but the best superhero movie of all time.

The Dark Knight takes place after the events in Batman Begins, with the introduction of Gotham City’s newest villain: The Joker. Joker is played by Heath Ledger in this film, and he kills it as the iconic Batman villain. He deserves a whole paragraph to himself, so more on him soon. Pretty much everyone reprises their roles from Batman Begins, but there was a recast on the character of Rachel Dawes. Usually, I don’t understand recasts, especially if I enjoyed the original actor/actress, but I actually think Maggie Gyllenhaal was better than Katie Holmes. This film also focused more on that character than its predecessor, so when Rachel ended up dying, it was more emotionally complex.

Heath Ledger as the Joker is without a doubt the best part of the film. He is truly the best villain I’ve seen in a comic book movie, and brought a new type of terror to the city of Gotham. Unlike Jack Nicholson’s Joker in the 1989 Batman, this Joker is much more focused on his goals and isn’t as silly and comedic as Nicholson’s. Villains should be seriously motivated, and not by parading around an art museum blasting Prince from a boombox. Not that Nicholson’s portrayal is bad or anything, Ledger’s is leagues better.

Also, the film does a great job of juggling the complexity between Joker and another villain, Two-Face, who is played by Aaron Eckhart. In the film, Harvey Dent has a key role in the stopping of Joker, and works with Batman and Jim Gordon to stop him. Over the course of the film, he begins to show more and more signs of becoming evil, and after he and Rachel are captured (the latter being killed), he falls on the right side of his face into a puddle of lighter fluid. After being rescued, his face catches fire and burns, becoming a turning point in his journey. But Joker manipulates him into seeking vengeance, and Dent becomes a true threat. Two-Face is actually not the villain for a very long time, being killed by Batman at the end of the film. But he’s given enough time to prove himself as a worthy foe, not just to Batman, but to the citizens of Gotham as well.

I had no problems with this movie, and love it dearly. I’m going to give it an A+. Stay tuned for my The Dark Knight Rises review soon!

The Dark Knight stars Chrsitian Bale, Michael Caine, Heath Ledger, Gary Oldman, Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Morgan Freeman. Directed by Christopher Nolan.