Is Bush Batman?

I finally got a chance to see “Dark Knight” over the weekend and I thought it was above average. The movie was not the “end all” everyone kept telling me. But it’s been out awhile and I hadn’t heard anyone talk about what I took away from the movie.

The repeated theme was that a hero can live long enough to become the villain. And the word “terrorism” was used to describe the Joker’s evil. The Joker himself said his actions weren’t planned, rather a grand dose of chaos. He wanted society to be kept wondering and to force good men to do bad things. The unknown kept citizens in fear.

I don’t know if writer/director Christopher Nolan, or any of the actors, are pro-War on Terror or even Bush fans. However, the message was resoundingly loud and extremely clear to me. Bush was our hero in reaction to 9/11, just as Batman was a hero when he cleaned up the streets from organized crime. But as the War dragged on and innocents were being hurt, it became Bush, I mean, Batman’s fault.

Batman himself regretted the fact that to defeat terror he sometimes had to sacrifice. And it was a disappointing fact that he would have to take on the image of villain to succeed in his role as crusader.

The hero served long enough to become the villain.