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An Old The Dark Knight Rises Rumor Confirmed By Heath Ledger's Family

Do you want to see a magic trick?

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When The Dark Knight first hit theaters in 2008, fans were immediately taken with Heath Ledger's The Joker. The now-iconic portrayal of Batman's biggest villain overshadowed just about anything else in the movie.

Unfortunately, the one thing it didn't overshadow was Ledger's untimely death months before the film's release. While it was never confirmed, many fans believed the original plan was to feature Ledger once again in Christopher Nolan's third Batman movie. After all, at the end of The Dark Knight, The Joker is left dangling from a building.

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Now, Ledger's intentions to wear The Joker's face paint for the director once again are becoming more clear. In 2016, Kate Ledger--the actor's sister--spoke with Australian press outlet news.com.au about a documentary on her brother's life. While the interview is nearly a year old, it's definitely new to some and provides some very interesting insight into Ledger's mind after production wrapped on the film.

"He was so proud of what he had done in Batman. And I know he had plans for another Batman," she says. "He loved working with Chris Nolan and Christian Bale and Gary Oldman. He just had the best time ever doing that film. When he came home at Christmas, he couldn't wait to tell us all about it, and he was doing the voice and laughing, showing me all the rushes. We had a great time."

Regardless of the circumstances of his death, to his family, Ledger was quite pleased with the character he was able to create and was eager to revisit it. Unfortunately, any plans he had never came to pass.

In the aftermath of Ledger's death, Nolan instead cast Tom Hardy to play the antagonist Bane in 2012's The Dark Knight Rises. Sadly, that leaves the world with no idea about what a second movie featuring Ledger as The Joker would be like. There's still The Dark Knight, though, which the actor posthumously won an Oscar for.

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Chizaqui

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I miss Heath :/

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Joecarole

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Easily the best villain in any comic book movie ever.

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deactivated-5eecdca5bab06

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I think this was obvious that The Joker was going to be within TDKR, due to that fact that scarecrow made an appearance. Two face died, but The joker did not. Still the movie did work out well, though TDK is the best within the three. Better three solid movies than a whole line of continuous never ending Marvel crap.

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CashPrizes

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@nickyparmar92: The Dark Knight Rises is terrible... you trolling? I mean if you enjoyed it good for you, but then to take a swipe at Marvel when you are already on shaky ground, seems ridiculous.

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deactivated-5eecdca5bab06

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@CashPrizes: Marvel movies have no meaning other then to continue to extend the franchise to death by adding every single superhero and villain they can think off. With the Nolan trilogy, at least there is an actual start middle and ending with a selection of characters within the DC universe that had an actual ending to the Batman story. The Sam Rami Spider Man movies should have done this but that third movie ended in a cliff hanger type of way after which Toby was axed. But these modern Marvel movies will never end, in the same way The Walking Dead will never end. It's just a soul less cash grab franchise. The movies are mediocre, nothing special about them. The first Iron Man movie was special, and maybe the first Avengers movie, but the constant continuation year after year is cheap.

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DEVILTAZ35

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@CashPrizes: It wasn't the best movie and never would have done as well as it did had things worked out differently.

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mercurydude

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@CashPrizes: It's become popular among a certain crowd to portray TDKR as one of the worst superhero movies ever made, but the fact of the matter is things are nitpicked to hell about that movie that Begins and TDK also did but are given a free pass on. I think there are two reasons for the complaining 1) Heath Ledger wasn't in it and everyone wanted Joker back and 2) people were wanting it to fail so they could push the old cliche that the third movie of a trilogy always sucks. When critics and the audience alike applauded it (its RT rating speaks for itself), I think there was a lot of doubling down and insisting that it was trash, but just because folks keep saying it doesn't make it so.

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CashPrizes

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Edited By CashPrizes

@mercurydude: I walked out of the theater super dissapointed, I don't know anything about a crowd coming along and agreeing to bash the movie. It's not one of the worst ever as there are a ton of bad superhero movies, but I would definitely say it is skirting the bottom half.

RT score means nothing, if it got a ton of 6/10 scores or 2 and a half stars it looks like a 90% on RT. The movies production is decent so the average reviewer didn't smear it with like a 1 star review, doesn't make it good.

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DEVILTAZ35

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Edited By DEVILTAZ35

@mercurydude: Definitely not the worst just not the best

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mcnichoj

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@mercurydude: TDKR was a good movie but a bad Batman movie and it was littered with so many plot holes.

"HEY, LETS SEND ALL THE POLICE!"

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mercurydude

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Edited By mercurydude

@mcnichoj: ...as opposed to the Joker being a demigod who has plans within plans within plans, and they always work out perfectly until it's time for Batman to beat him? The way Gordon faking his death was handled? Batman falling on a car with his cape half-open as a pseudo parachute, and he AND Rachel walk away completely unscathed? Dent survives a car flipping with half of his skull exposed + no medical treatment, but Maroni dies?

In Batman Begins, the microwave is powerful enough to vaporize all of the water in the general area, but does nothing to people, including the ones standing right beside the thing while it's active.

Like I said, all three of the Nolan movies do this, which is fine for me, because they're comic book movies so I cut them some slack, but when people single out TDKR for this nitpicking and act like it's so much worse than the other two, that's how I know they either weren't paying attention to the other two, or have a beef with this movie that isn't solely related to the criticisms they are voicing.

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DEVILTAZ35

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@mcnichoj: lol it was laughably bad in some regards. It was also far too long as there really was little content.

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gameboy8877

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@CashPrizes: I couldn't believe how bad it was. I had been so psyched for it...

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patriotplayer90

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@gameboy8877: I honestly wish they would have ended with The Dark Knight. TDKR was such an anticlimactic and disappointing way to end what should have been a legendary trilogy.

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Bread_or_Decide

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@patriotplayer90: Nolan seemed done at that point. Mentally moved on. TDKR has many dumb moments. The jaill cell with an exit. Teleporting to gotham. Killing people with hope? Lol ok bane. Retired bruce? Instant miracle recovery. Obvious twists and throwaway robin. It has a few inspired moments but not enough to save it.

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everson_rm

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Edited By everson_rm

Daaaaam. Would love to wacth other Batman with him as a joker.

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AustinP

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He killed it as the Joker and it would have been a blast to see him do it again.

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Rufus_the_rat

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@austinp: So when he chose to abuse drugs, he didn't just betray his God and his family, but his fans as well.

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AustinP

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@Rufus_the_rat: what does that have to do with what I said? Abuse drugs? He toke sleeping pills even I take them when I have trouble sleeping.

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RestatBonfire

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The Dark Knight easily one of my favorite movies of all time.

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DEVILTAZ35

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@restatbonfire: You should get out more , Batman Begins is a far better movie

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immortaltech6

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@deviltaz35: So your argument for saying that his fav movie isn't all that because your movie is better is because you get out more. *tiny ?*

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Bread_or_Decide

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@deviltaz35: You both should get out more. Watch more than comic book movies.

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