The 165-Year-Old Novel That Helped Inspire ‘The Dark Knight Rises’

If The Dark Knight felt like a relentless crime thriller inspired by the cinema of Michael Mann, The Dark Knight Rises explored the spiritual and emotional journey of Christian Bale’s version of Bruce Wayne. By connecting to the storyline involving the League of Shadows first introduced in Batman Begins, Nolan and his brother Jonathan Nolan were able to bring their interpretation of the caped crusader to a satisfying conclusion. Although the film satisfied story beats that they had established at the beginning of the trilogy, The Dark Knight Rises drew inspiration from Charles Dickens’ classic novel A Tale of Two Cities.

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Dickens’ novel examined how it could be possible for one city to have two classes of citizens with completely different experiences. A Tale of Two Cities focuses on the experiences of both a wealthy family and an English barrister in the years leading up to the Reign of Terror, in which revolutionaries stormed Paris and executed members of the upper class. Jonathan Nolan cited the sociopolitical themes of A Tale of Two Cities as a primary influence on The Dark Knight Rises. He stated that when looking for “good literature for inspiration,” he found that A Tale of Two Cities was a “harrowing portrait of a relatable, recognizable civilization that completely folded to pieces with the terrors.” Similar to the French revolutionaries who were infuriated by the wealth gap, the prisoners Bane frees in The Dark Knight Rises have a justified reason for their anger; it is revealed to them that Dent’s crimes were covered up, and that his entire legacy is itself a lie.