The Dark Knight Rises

The concluding chapter in Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trailer trilogy is here, bringing with it a sense of closure to the characters that we have come to know over the course of the past two previews. In conclusion, they're all pretty miserable—save Tom Hardy's Bane, whose daring plane escapes, bridge-and-stadium-destroying escapades, and declarations that he is "Gotham's reckoning" speak to an abundance of confidence, or Anne Hathaway's Selina Kyle/Catwoman, who's all sly smiles and quips. But Christian Bale's sadness beard suggests Bruce Wayne broken even before Bane tosses away a shredded Batman mask or strings him up for torturing, and poor Michael Caine still seems pretty adamant that he'd like him not to die, please.

Gary Oldman and Morgan Freeman look similarly overwhelmed, while Joseph Gordon-Levitt's still-mysterious cop character pines for Batman like a sailor's wife on her widow's walk. That Gordon-Levitt's cop and Catwoman all seem to be part of the same circle of Bat-friends is something new we gleaned from this last early look, as are the shots of Batman finally getting into some Bat-action—most notably in his flying Batmobile. Which, if you've got one of those, things can't be all bad, right?