Page - 98 - in JRFM - Journal Religion Film Media, Volume 03/01

98 | Simon Philipp Born www.jrfm.eu 2017, 3/1, 75–104 sion of duality and of being at one with himself, he now leaves all life and death decisions to chance, his new god of justice: “The only morality in a cruel world is chance. Unbiased. Unprejudiced. Fair.”49 harvey’s lapse provides the back- bone of the film’s narrative. Evil has won. The Joker brought down the best and turned him into an insane cop killer. But the good must not lose, heroic stories are supposed to have a happy ending. so the result is marked: Batman takes on responsibility for two-face’s crimes and is hunted by the police, while harvey Dent died a hero’s death and becomes the legend that Batman always wanted to be. Gotham’s peace is restored, but on the basis of a lie: “sometimes the truth is not good enough. sometimes people deserve more.”50 this outcome is a clear reference to John ford’s late Western The Man Who Shot Liberty Val- ance (Us 1962), in which the forged legend of a town’s hero becomes a consti- tutive social truth. for Vincent M. Gaine, this compromise “problematizes the ‘natural, unquestionable justice’ favored by superhero narratives”.51 the ending of The Dark Knight (2008) evidently demonstrates that good and evil have no individual ontological status but are reciprocally constructed and conceptual- ized via storytelling. Thus Batman really is a floating signifier, for he can take on any role the city needs him to fulfill, enabled by the public: “Batman can convincingly play the dark knight only because his role was perceived as (poten- tially) evil from the outset – at least by a few. While Batman is the one who the- atrically produces signs, those few represent the constitutive counterpart.”52 shADOWs Of the BAt the dual cosmology of Manichaeism, which underlines the superhero narrative of the hero’s fight against the villain, eventually serves as an explanation for the origin and essence of evil itself. Mani’s belief system is based on the fundamen- tal question, “Why does evil exist?”53 in his view, evil does not exist as a lack of good, but as a real, powerful force that actively intervenes with the world. Evil opposes and negates everything that is good and pure; it seduces man to commit sin. Although corresponding with the notion of satan in Christianity, Mani’s binary belief contradicts the Christian dictates of monotheism, as the existence of an equally powerful counterforce denies the omnipotence of God. Nevertheless, the ideas of Manichaeism have influenced Western thinking until today. the image of a metaphysical evil as the ultimate adversary, as the devil who has to be fought with all means, can be found, for example, in the rhetoric 49 The Dark Knight (2008), 02:12:30–02:12:40. 50 The Dark Knight (2008), 02:17:03–02:17:09. 51 Gaine 2011, 128. 52 schlegel/habermann 2011, 35. 53 see Coyle 2009, xiv.