Movies

'Dark Knight' Origins: Sound Design, Bane's Voice & Concept Images, Inspiration For Heath Ledger's Joker

By Germain Lussier/

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Chances are we're all pretty familiar with the The Dark Knight Rises from the outside view. Now it's time to pop the hood. Much as rumors cropped up before production, spy photos poured out during production, speculation raged approaching release and debate stirred at release, behind the scenes tidbits are now coming online at a great rate. Many of them just stealthy sneak into Superhero Bits (like a huge gallery of images earlier today) but we've grabbed a few of the better ones and put them all right here.

After the jump you can find out about the following:

  • The Soundworks Collection has posted a video discussing the sound design and score of the film.
  • A video proves that Bane's voice was changed from the initial release of the prologue up to the final release.
  • Check out some early concept images of Bane's look and design.
  • An old, but worthwhile, video showing Heath Ledger's possible inspiration for The Joker.
  • See what Bane looked like without his mask.

    • Here's the great edition of the Soundworks Collection featuring composer Hans Zimmer and supervising sound editor and sound designer Richard King.

    Next up, you probably saw this in Superhero Bits a few days ago but, if not, it's proof that Christopher Nolan took the complaints of Bane's voice to heart during the release of the prologue.

    Next up, Comic Book Movie posted this below scan from Behind the Scenes with Batman: The Making of the Dark Knight Trilogy which shows a bunch of different variations that were toyed with for Bane's mask.

    But what happens when that mask comes off? Today's Superhero Bits had a joking sketch but ScreenCrush found the below image of Tom Hardy walking around without the mask, something we haven't really seen. And spoiler, he looks like Tom Hardy.

    Last but not least, the below video has been floating around for a while now (as it happened in 1979) but it popped back up again so we figured it was worth putting up. It's Tom Waits on The Don Lane Show in Australia acting, well, like Heath Ledger did in The Dark Knight.

    Thanks to Kottke.org for the reminder.

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