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I know some people are Fans to the end and are going to unabashedly side with the Bat movie doing well on it's own merrits, but honestly the first one didn't do all that great box office wise, and no one really was talking about this movie until Ledger died. At most I fgure without the death this movie would've done Hulk numbers. Going from the moderate success of the first one there wasn't that big of a following for the movie, as opposed to the first Spiderman that did close to a 100 mil it's first week? You knew then that when they released the sequels they would also do amazing numbers. So is this movie really that good?

I think it is doing so well because it's well written and directed, it's Batman and because Ledger did a ****ing fantastic job of it.

I think it slightly helps because it is Ledgers last big movie.

No.

It was going to be huge anyway.

Let's get something straight: People love the heck out of Batman Begins.

Pointing to it's 205 mil take only goes to show how good it was to overcome poor marketing and consumer wariness due to Batman and Robin. It only opened with 48 mil. It was good buzz/word of mouth and great reviews that caused Begins to pick up steam and get that much cash. People fell in love with it and saw that it was not only a great batman film and a new way of doing the universe, but a good movie on its own.

It became one of the hugest DVD's EVER. (set a few records, if I recall)

Those who didn't see Begins in theatres caught it at home and were very impressed.

Knowledge of the sequel was high, as were expectations, and the first trailer in Dec ("Good evening commissioner"/"why so serious?" was almost a full 2 months before Heath's death and had people going nuts.

I agree that his death probably played some role, but I expected this to be the best film of the summer anyway, based on Nolan and Bale and all involved. (see: the Prestige, 3:10 to yuma)

I'd put Heath's death down for about 15-20% of the success.

His performance on the other hand (one of many good ones) I would say is a bigger part.

Some people came to the movies just to see Heath's last role.......but this is not the major reason why it did so well.

this movie learned from the marketing mistakes of Batman Begins, and advertised the crap out of Dark Knight via Viral, etc.

i didnt think it did well cuz Heath Ledger died. It was a great movie, Heath did an amazing job as the Joker. It wasnt big cuz it was Heath's last movie, my friend hasnt even seen any heath ledger movies. Ive only seen enough of the movies he's in to know that it was like watching Depp in Secret Window, then watching him in Pirates of the Carribean, very different, and unbelievable

I imagine Ledger's death built up some of the anticipation, but the viral marketing and ARG work did the most. Not to mention a trailer that rivaled Sin City's, in my opinion. As for the reviews, well...

Originally posted by Devil King
I think it is doing so well because it's well written and directed, it's Batman and because Ledger did a ****ing fantastic job of it.
Yeah. And it's not just a comic book film, it's a legit crime saga.

Heath's death helped but people were going to this long before he died. They will continue to see this

This movie was going to do way better than Begins regardless of whether Heath lived or died. They already had a better marketing campain, and people were already excited for this scary version of Joker. Most importantly, Batman Begins started off bad because people came to think of Batman movies as crud due to Schumaucker (sp?). Begins had to have word of mouth to get people to start seeing it. Since people liked Begins, they anticipated a good movie with DK.

Did Heath dying help ticket sells? Sure, probably quite a bit. But this movie would have done better than Begins anyway.

This one is more darker then begins and joker is the main vilan of batman . wait till the dvd comes out then you will see it flying off the shelf

Its the curse of the joker that did the trick ! well thats what they say

I was looking forward to this movie for three reasons.

1. I love batman

2. I love the Joker

3. I love Heath Ledger.

So if maybe there were people out there who liked all three just like me. Who actually wanted to watch another great, well written and directed Batman Movie. Then this was always going to do well. But I do feel that because Heath died, it gave it the film a bigger edge.

I wasn't even thinking about Ledger's death when I was watching the movie. His performance was spectacular, nothing can take away or add to that.

I was not a Ledger fan when I went to see the movie. Hell, I'm still probably not a Heath Ledger fan. I'm not gonna go watch his other movies just because he died. They dont appeal to me. I went to watch TDK because I am a Batman fan. Ledger's performance as the joker was soo larger than life it was amazing. It was like...every time he showed up on screen I was like "OmGz its the Joker!"

Hell, I don't even know or remember if I watched any other movies with Heath in it besides DK.

I'm not going to ignore that as a factor because after anyone remotely famous dies, they become even more known afterwards.

But honestly, this movie is getting rave reviews from critics and word of mouth from fans and Ledger's performance is genuinely amazing.

I saw A Knights Tale in school a long time ago. It was decent, but Heath's performance in that was not eye catching at all.

to be honest, Heath's performance is one of the greatest performances I have ever seen in my life, he is up there with Brando.

Originally posted by Micheal_Myers
I saw A Knights Tale in school a long time ago. It was decent, but Heath's performance in that was not eye catching at all.

Oh yeah!! I saw that one.....WOOT!