It all started on whysoserious.com. Web surfers were asked to submit their e-mail addresses to reveal one pixel in a much larger image. This turned out to reveal the initial picture of The Joker. I was less then pleased with it to be quite honest. I knew that Nolan was going to go for something different with his Joker but that wasn't what I had in mind. Honestly, I'm still not quite sure. People on the set rave about his performance, and I hope they're right.
I would love for Ledger's performance to be a dead on perfect portrayal that makes me giddy with geek joy the way that Neeson's Ra's al Ghul did. However, at the same time, one has to consider the fact that there is no other response. What is the cast supposed to say? How is Ledger's performance as Joker? Psssh he stinks PU, bad. As you can see it doesn't work. I'm giving Ledger some wiggle room; I can't picture him in the role but I am rather curious to see how it plays out.
Back to the viral marketing. Some time passed and whysoserious became a flash animation of a jack-o-lantern with a candle burning inside. Over time it became clear that the candle was melting down. Speculation ran rampant as to what this burning candle was counting down to. Burning candle, led way to a wilting pumpkin akin to the cover of The Long Halloween. Many were thinking that this was going to be the reveal of Two-Face, gladly it wasn't. What we got was another Joker pic. It was disappointing at the time, but I'm glad. Two-Face should be something that we don't see until the movie itself, the end of the movie to be exact.
It seemed the Joker wanted to play a game with us viewers and he sent people on a scavenger hunt to take pictures at various locations across the country. At each location was something shaped like a letter. When put together, a message was formed, The only sensible way to live in this world is without rules. From here, Joker told us to take pictures in Joker make up and submit them, promising a reward in return. I was digging the viral campaign up to this point, but this was turning into homework. Given the fact that the carrot being hung in front of us was likely to be another picture it didn't seem worth it. Pics are nice, don't get me wrong, but if fans are going to go through all this trouble there needs to be some sort of enticement.
I'd heard of 7 minutes of footage that showed at..wizardcon or worldcon...one of the big comic/movie conventions. I hoped that this was the reward. I'm sure this is the preview that will be shown before I Am Legend, but if I could see it beforehand I would be happy. The Dark Knight made its presence known at Comic-con through dollar bills that were "vandalized" with a joker smile that was taped on to George Washington's face. It made sense to follow it up at the other big conventions.
Within the past couple of days, not one, not three, not five, but seven new sites have popped up. I haven't had a chance to check them all yet. I skimmed two of them, the first being a copy of The Gotham Times that gives us some articles about Gotham post fear gas attack. If you want to check it out go to www.thegothamtimes.com. Be warned though, the print is tiny. You'll probably have to lean in close to your screen and there are 4 pages of stuff. If you got the endurance for it, from what I've read it's some well written stuff.
Up next is The Ha Ha Ha times at www.thehahahatimes.com. It's the same newspaper done a la The Joker. Again, the print is tiny but the "edited" headlines are quite amusing. "Batman Saves Money on Car Insurance" and "Cry Baby Bruce Wayne Cant' Stop Being A Wuss" are only a couple of the greats on there.
The third site is www.wearetheanswer.com. Here, Harvey Dent asks Gothamites for a call to arms to put an end to police corruption. The campaign is alluded to in the fine print of The Gotham Times but from what I saw there was no link. This site actually lets you submit tips (though I'm not sure exactly we can do to save a fictional city). There are some Harvey Dent quotes and letters of support from the city's citizens who are glad that someone, besides a loon in a bat costume and a hardcore vigilante cult leader, is doing something to save Gotham from itself.
Site number four is an ad for Gotham National bank (www.gothamnationalbank.com these site names are so complicated aren't they?) It's pretty straight forward. It has some location listings and a link regarding fraud prevention. Evidently, the bank is not FDIC insured.
www.rememberinggina.org is a memoriam for an innocent casualty in the mob war since Carmine Falcone's fall from power. Mentioned in The Gotham Times, her death is one of the things that Harvey Dent's campaign mentions in the hope of lighting a fire under Gotham to rally the citizens.
Ever thought about being a cop? Gotham's looking. Go to www.gothampolice.com. You'll also find a list of your rights and discover that Gotham teens have a curfew.
For the more charitable, you can adopt a bus stop at www.gothamcityrail.com. Just so you know, you won't be able to as construction is getting in the way.
It's all simple stuff but it keeps the buzz going. Heck, all they had to do was release that "I believe in Harvey Dent" poster to get Two-Face fans salivating. I love it. Nolan's doing a great job at keeping the big stuff under wraps while still teasing us with pictures and sound bytes. I also like the fact that the events of Begins haven't been forgotten. Almost every site makes some mention of the Narrows attack or the fear gas incident. Even though Ra's al Ghul is dead (though I wouldn't be surprised if he either returned or Talia showed up to avenge him; more-so the latter since Nolan apparently got ticked off when he found out that the Justice League movie planned to use her) his impact on Batman's story is far from over.
All of these articles are surprisingly in depth given that they're just based on a movie. If this doesn't keep us busy until I Am Legend, or even until TDK's actual release, then quite frankly, nothing will.
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