Selina delivers Bruce’s fingerprints to Dagget (unnecessary character #3 AKA plot device) who’s working with Bane. He’s planning to set up Bruce to lose his wealth later on in the movie in an attempt to take over Wayne Enterprises. However, Catwoman gets double-crossed and doesn’t get what she wants in return which is the macguffin device known as “StartYourLifeOver”. No, that’s not it. I think it was called “LifeEraser”. No…it’ll come to me later. Anyway this ridiculous little device is supposed to wipe out your entire criminal history from the computers (Daggett spells this out to the audience almost as if he had the instruction manual for this device right there in his hands). However, if authorities have a paper file on you that’s two inches thick with your history and photos that little device isn’t going to help much. Anyhow, Catwoman tricks Dagget’s thugs into calling the cops who show up right away. She plays victim and screams her head off as they tear up the place. She escapes.
During the melee the action somehow goes into the sewer with Gordon being caught and taken to Bane and his little army. I can’t remember how because I was a bit bored by then and ruffling my popcorn trying to find the ones with butter. Bane isn’t happy that his goons brought Gordon to his pad so he starts breaking the necks of his troops like Darth Vader…except without the Force. Gordon is like *beep* this and rolls into the sewer where the clairvoyant John Blake (unnecessary character #4 who steals Batman’s movie) arrives just in time to find him coming out.
Speaking of the clairvoyant John Blake he stops by Bruce’s place to clue him in that he knows he’s Batman. How? Because they’re both orphans and Blake could read his face. No, I’m not kidding. That’s the reason lol. I chortled in the theater when he said it. Blake tells Bruce that Batman is needed once again.
To speed this story along. Bruce tracks down Selina at Miranda Tate’s party. They dance and chat it up and Bruce takes his mom’s pearls back. To return the favor she steals his car and goes on a joyride. Bruce also visits Fox at Wayne enterprises to talk about the new macguffin device that can be turned into a nuclear weapon which plays a role later in the film. While Bruce is there he gets a look at some new toys that have been in development. Most notably “The Bat” which as we find out later in the film any person can apparently drive and operate with no training whatsoever. Even Lucius has taken it for a spin on occasion when traffic is just too heavy.
Bruce goes back to the bat cave and tries to figure things out. Luckily ex-CIA operative Alfred conveniently knows the scoop on Bane’s history and of course spoonfeeds the audience of his origin. What, you really thought Alfred was just a butler? Cmon lol. This guy can get the info and motivations about anyone just by snapping his fingers. I wouldn’t be surprised at this point if Alfred knew who killed Kennedy.
Back to Bane. He and his goons attack the stock exchange in an attempt to bankrupt Bruce Wayne (using his fingerprints) and they succeed. During their escape they use hostages strapped to their motorbikes to get away. The cops are chasing them and one of the cops actually says shoot the tires LOL. I’m laughing about that because if they shoot the tires and the bike falls I’m pretty sure the hostages strapped to the front and back of those bikes are going to incur some major head damage when they wipe out since their arms are tied and they can’t protect themselves lol. The chase leads to a tunnel which suddenly starts going dark and you guessed it!! Batman is back and comes out of the darkness on his cool Batpod. The senior cop tells his little young, flunky partner “BOY, you’re in for a show tonight!!”. Actually, no. Not much of a show at all. Batman rides his batpod and really does nothing. Ambitious weasel Foley who was chasing Bane at first suddenly turns his attention to the bigger fish Batman and wants to take him down even more than Bane to make Gordon look bad. So the whole police force chases Batman. Batman drives down a dark alley and the cops conveniently stop their pursuit (why? I don’t know) and think they have Bats surrounded. Suddenly we see “The Bat” rise from the alley where it was conveniently placed (and not a single person in the city saw it fly there and noticed it was parked). That thing must have stealth. Batman escapes of course and the “show” is over.
Back to the Wayne residence where Bruce is getting cocky and underestimating Bane. Alfred in one last ditch effort to stop Bruce admits he destroyed Rachel’s letter and that she chose Dent over him. Bruce says low blow man and Alfred once again pours on the monologue and waterworks like we haven’t heard this enough times already. By now I’m getting annoyed with the crying and just want Bruce to kindly tell Alfred to STFU. Bruce says nothing damaging but Alfred leaves for good voluntarily and Bruce is on his own. Good riddance I say.
To make matters worse Fox informs Bruce that he’s broke now and they make plans for unknown Miranda Tate to take over Wayne Enterprises just to stick it to Dagget. However, they must inform Tate about the macguffin nuclear device sitting in the basement and that it’s not a toy to be played with. If it was that dangerous they could have just saved time and dismantled the thing but that would have been too logical. A little while later Tate goes to visit Bruce at his home for some reason. The lights go out since Bruce has no money to pay his electricity bill. She starts the fireplace up and yeah Stevie Wonder could see where this is headed. Bruce and Ms. Tate get it on and that’s that.
Bruce is feeling spry after gettin’ some and sets out to meet Catwoman to track down Bane. However, before he does that Nolan tells him to dress up as Batman and climb onto something really high so the Batman fanboys can get their obligatory shot of him looking over the city with his cape flapping in the wind. Batman stares out for awhile and then says “Good enough?”. Nolan nods approvingly. The very next scene has Batman in the sewer meeting with Catwoman asking her to take him to Bane. A short stroll 20 seconds later and they’re in Bane’s lair. Catwoman locks Batman in the UFC cage with Bane (one of the few cool parts of the movie) and he proceeds to thrash Batman while talking trash in his old man, high brow, raspy Darth Vader voice the whole time. Batman uses all the tricks at his disposal but Bane has seen all of this crap before since he was also trained by Ra’s. He beats Batman like he stole something and breaks his back over his knee. Catwoman looks on with the guilty conscience.
