25 Interesting Facts From Nolan’s Dark Knight Trilogy

Christian Bale revealed in interviews, in 2009, that in his first scene in Batman Begins with Sir Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman (one involving Bale waking up in bed to find them waiting there), he fell asleep after getting ready for the scene. Bale described waking up to find Sir Michael Caine poking him in the ribs, saying "Look at that! He's bloody fallen asleep."

2. In Dark Knight Rises, Bruce Wayne's doctor visit, in which the doctor lists off all the degenerative injuries to his body (lack of cartilage, scar tissue, etc ) and the use of a mechanical knee brace, are reminiscent of Mark Waid's Justice League novel Kingdom Come (set in a hypothetical future), where an older Bruce Wayne requires the use of an exoskeleton to move, due to years of physical wear and tear on his body.

3. In the Dark Knight, during the hospital scene, when The Joker is dressed as a nurse, his name tag reads Matilda, after Heath Ledger's daughter.

4. In Batman Begins, the gun Bruce Wayne tosses in the river is a Brazilian six-shot Taurus.

5. In Batman Begins, the Scarecrow's (Cillian Murphy's) and Batman's (Christian Bale's) first encounter is more like Batman: The Animated Series: Nothing to Fear (1992) than the comics. Both titles featured Batman trying to foil The Scarecrow's arson attempt, failing and being drugged by the villain's fear toxin.

In the Dark Knight Rises, during the motorcycle chase scene, Bane is wearing a red helmet with black visor, as well as a brown motorcycle jacket. This is the original costume Jason Todd took under his Red Hood persona, which is a callback to The Joker's original criminal identity.

7. In the Dark Knight, when Harvey holds The Joker at gunpoint in the hospital scene, you can see that The Joker is actually holding the revolver's hammer with his finger, thus preventing the shot in case Harvey's coin lands on "bad" side.

8. In Batman Begins, Batman rescues Rachel Dawes and is evading the police with the Batmobile/Tumbler on I-17 in Gotham City. The city and highway fictitiously exist on the eastern seaboard of the United States. The real I-17 is one hundred forty-six miles long, and exists entirely in the state of Arizona, linking Phoenix to Flagstaff.

9. Dr. Jonathan Crane a.k.a. The Scarecrow (Cillian Murphy) is the only villain to appear in all three of The Dark Knight movies.

10. In the Dark Knight, the bus crashing backward into the bank in the opening sequence was much harder to pull off than was anticipated. The bus had to be taken apart and reassembled inside the building (a disused post office), concealed behind a large false wall, and then propelled backward with an air cannon.

In Dark Knight Rises, during Bane's first encounter with Batman, Bane can be heard producing loud, heavy thuds while walking, while Batman's footsteps make very little sound at all on the steel grating of the walkways. This was intentionally done by the sound effects team to further contrast Bane’s “brute” style from Batman’s “stealth” method of combat.

12. In Batman Begins, a pair of Batman pajama bottoms can be seen hanging from the line in the scene where Batman talks to the little boy in the Narrows.

13. In Dark Knight Rises, Bane's theme is a chant which features the term "deshi basara", which is Moroccan for the word "rise."

14. In Batman Begins, when Christian Bale and Liam Neeson were fighting on the frozen lake, they could hear the ice cracking beneath their feet. The next day, the lake had completely melted.

15. In The Dark Knight Rises, the plane which was used by the CIA operative to transport Dr. Pavel crashed in real life almost a year after this movie was released. The aircraft, an Embraer EMB-110 Bandeirante registered ZS-NVB, crashed on June 29, 2013, in Botswana. The pilot and co-pilot died in the crash.

In Dark Knight, Bruce Wayne drives a Lamborghini Murcielago. The Spanish word for “bat” is “murciélago.”

17. The scene where Bruce Wayne test drives the Tumbler in a huge white room, was shot in the interior of the Excel Exhibition Centre in East London. The separating walls had been pulled back to allow the Tumbler to drive around, but you can still see the hall numbers as they drive by them (N4, N5, et cetera).

18. In The Dark Knight, during the chase scene, when The Joker takes over driving the semi after his driver is killed, the bullet holes on the windshield form a smiley face.

19. The Bat symbol at the beginning of each movie in the trilogy foreshadows something that happens later. In the Dark Knight Rises, the Bat Symbol is made up of cracking ice, and it symbolizes people falling through the icy river as they are forced to walk across it.

20. In The Dark Knight, during the hospital scene Aaron Eckhart spoke about a unique experience he had with Heath Ledger. He said that before lines were exchanged, Ledger would just walk around, in character, mumbling to himself in an odd manner. All Eckhart could do at the time was just watch him while still in character. This went on for several minutes, until Ledger got close to him. Eckhart felt compelled at this point to fiercely raise his hand up. Immediately, Ledger grabbed Eckhart's raised hand in an equally matched fierce manner. When the scene was over, Ledger, now out of character, told Eckhart “That's what acting's all about.”

In Batman Begins, the homeless man that gets Bruce's coat was Rade Serbedzija. He is the same actor that played the father out for revenge in Taken 2 (2012), also featuring Liam Neeson.

22. In The Dark Knight Rises, when Selina Kyle (Catwoman) disappears from a rooftop, Batman's remark "So that's what that feels like" is lifted directly from the DC graphic novel "Kingdom Come". Even the circumstance is similar, except it was with Superman.

23. In Batman Begins, during the filming of the scene where Batman is being towed by a train through the streets of Gotham, so much steam was used that it would "rain" on the cast and crew for several minutes after each take.

24. In The Dark Knight Rises, in the football stadium sequence, the cast and extras are all wearing heavy winter clothing, though the scenes were shot during a massive heat wave across the East Coast during the summer of 2011.

25. In the Dark Knight, Christian Bale stood on top of the Sears Tower in Chicago, over one hundred stories high. They were originally going to use a stunt double, but Bale insisted he does it himself.