Batman battles Bane in The Dark Knight Rises

As Chris Nolan and Co. edge toward the finish line of shooting The Dark Knight Rises, were starting to see less of the paparazzi set videos and photos that have leaked onto the Web, and more official promotional images and tidbits being offered up by the cast, crew and studio.

Today brings us a new image of Tom Hardy as Bane, gracing the cover of Empire magazine (if you missed it, check out these other Batman/Bane covers images). Along with the latest Bane cover image come new details about the third chapter in Chris Nolan's Batman trilogy - details that fans are going to find mighty interesting, indeed.

While these plot details are not really SPOILERS, anybody hoping to remain as uninformed as possible about what The Dark Knight Rises is all about should probably avoid reading any further.

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Below you'll find a quick bullet point breakdown about the plot details of TDKR that are revealed in the Empire article:

  • The Dark Knight Rises picks up eight years after the events of The Dark Knight! This means that we will be seeing a much more mature Batman than we saw in the previous two films.
  • The Dark Knight Rises IMAX prologue attached to Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol will, according to Nolan, cover "basically the first six, seven minutes of the film. It's the introduction to Bane and a taste of the rest of the film. With Bane we are looking to give Batman a physical challenge that he hasn't had before." Those who were critical of the lack of physical action in just about every Batman movie there's ever been - looks like you're about to get your wish.
  • Costume designer Lindy Hemming revealed some details of Bane's mask: "He was injured early in his story. He's suffering from pain and he needs gas to survive. He Cannot survive the pain without the mask. The pipes from the mask go back along his jawline and feed into the thing at the back where there are two canisters of what ever it is... the anesthetic." This sounds like a variation on the "venom" steroid that the comic book version of Bane uses to pump up his physical strength to greater levels. In all likelihood, the onscreen version of Bane will have a similar ability - though it sounds like instead of making his muscles big, the gas will make him impervious to pain. It's also an interesting twist that will make Bane a more complex and somewhat tragic villain (the idea of a guy who only knows pain, and therefore has little compassion when it comes to inflicting pain on others).  Good to know that costume is function as much as it is fashion.

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Finally, check out the cover of Empire, which features Hardy looking particularly menacing as Bane:

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tom hardy as bane in the dark knight rises empire magazine cover

There are some pretty good images from The Dark Knight Rises in the magazine - including one image-in-an-image of a character from earlier installments of the franchise that we thought we wouldn't be seeing in this new film. Want to know who it is? Then be sure to pick up the latest issue of Empire.

What do you think about the plot points revealed above?

The Dark Knight Rises in theaters on July 20, 2012.

Source: Empire via Coming Soon