Batman: 5 reasons the Dark Knight trilogy is the gold standard

It Helped Make Comic Book Movies Mainstream

Piggy-backing on what was said earlier about why big marquee name Hollywood actors rarely take part in them, comic books movies were once a niche art form. Before moviegoers of all shapes and sizes made it clear – whether they were familiar with the source material or not – that they wanted to see superhero movies, they were viewed as something for a specific audience.

The only way to prove otherwise was with numbers and looking at box office numbers, aside from once every other decade we see the success of 1978’s Superman or 1989’s Batman, superhero movies and comic book adaptations rarely exceeded expectations at the box office. And when they did, they were never game-changing box office smash hits. As a result, it took a lot of bargaining to convince studios to invest into making one superhero movie.

Then, The Dark Knight made a billion dollars and it changed the game. Suddenly, we started seeing a wide array of studios – outside of Marvel, of course, who had already just started Phase One of the MCU the same year Dark Knight hit theaters – were releasing multiple superhero movies a year. Not to mention, more and more big name Hollywood actors were interested in appearing in such movies.

This started the official shift into the acceptance of superhero movies as a major genre in and of itself – one that was finally taken seriously by the mainstream public.