A Dark Night Has Risen

I'm just now waking up from a marathon showing of all three Nolan Batman films.  My friends and regular visitor's to this site know how much I love Christopher Nolan.  I knew my love for this third and last of his Batman trilogy would not be an exception.  I wanted to start by saying that I didn't know how to start, how conflicted I was.  I wanted to say how amazing and satisfying it all ended up being, but that it wasn't The Dark Knight, and somehow that didn't matter.  On this morning, I find myself still conflicted, but it's for a darker reason entirely.  I have woken to a string of news reports of a mass shooting at a theater in Colorado for a midnight showing of The Dark Knight Rises that have left about 15 dead and up to 50 wounded.

I'm conflicted about what this might mean for future midnight showings, I'm conflicted about how this might affect how we feel about this film.  Will this make it infamous?  Despised?  I am so sad for the victims, sad for their families.  These people didn't have to die.  Among the victims were teenagers and children, people that did no crime.  I try to imagine these people and I end up imagining myself.  These people had their life cut short against their will, they will never enjoy another movie again.

I find myself asking the usual questions.  Why did this have to happen?  What made the perpetrator so troubled?  Tragadies of this magnitude are so acute because these questions have no answer and therefore they can never be understood.  It's so natural to feel the need for vengeance but our frustration seems aimless.  We can't fathom the tragedy because the perpetrator is so far less than the crime that surrounds him.

I'm going to be honest.  My sadness and anger come from the fact that The Dark Knight Rises was truly a great movie.  It was just about everything I wanted this last Batman film to be.  Myself and a friend of mine had a fantastic time watching the entire trilogy in succession.  It was great to be part of all of that, brought together with fellow fans who shared a love for this film franchise.  All of this seems ruined.  All my pleasure that I have felt from these movies, the sense of community felt, gone.  It can never compare to the sense of loss that comes from learning that your son, daughter or friend has been killed, and I wouldn't want it to.  I am just expressing myself, expressing my sadness.

What has happened can't be undone.  My hope is that the victims and family's of victims can find the strength to move on.  If not now, then soon.  If not soon, then eventually.  I pray that justice will bring closure, and that this can make us all stronger.  And it this is what makes it so interesting because the most prominent themes of the films were of justice, revenge, closure and the humanity and faith in humanity we can lose when dealing with injustice.  Few are the times that we are confronted so earnestly with events of life by themes that we have just witnessed from art.

May our thoughts and prayers be with the victims.