Batman: The Lost Legend

Batman: The Lost Legend Oct 17, 2008 14:02:49 GMT -5

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Post by Dale on Oct 17, 2008 14:02:49 GMT -5

Batman: The Lost Legend

Throughout Gotham City’s recent history, The Dark Knight has fought against injustice, malice, and insanity. But what the city’s citizens don’t know is that the Gotham Police had on record reports of six cases deemed to sensitive and disturbing for the general public. They were put in a file named “Legends of the Knight” and locked away in the most secret vault in the precinct.

But in an attack led by Gotham’s Clown Prince, The Joker, this safe was broken into and looted. Only one of the stories remains: one that a brave member of the men in blue died to protect.

This is it. The Last Legend of the Knight.

FADE IN:

EXT. GOTHAM CITY SKYLINE. NIGHT

The camera sweeps through the city and towards a tall building. Hugh Jackman’s voice narrates.

BATMAN: (voice over)
He was once forgiving, even merciful.

CUT TO:

INT. WAYNE MANOR. NIGHT

Alfred walks in the front door.

ALFRED:
Bruce? Are your home?

He finds a note taped to the back of the door. He reads it, obviously astonished.

ALFRED:
Oh, my God!

CUT TO:

EXT. GOTHAM CITY SKYLINE. NIGHT

Cut back to sweeping shot of the city, still heading towards the same building.

BATMAN: (voice over)
But now, they’ve pushed him too far. He’s going to do something they won’t soon forget.

CUT TO:

INT. LARGE PARTY ROOM. DAY

A large group of guests is gathered. ALEXANDER DRAKE stands on a stage giving a speech.

DRAKE:
I would like to thank you all for helping me get re-elected as mayor of Gotham!

CUT TO:

EXT. GOTHAM CITY SKYLINE. NIGHT

The camera sweeps over the tall building it has been approaching, and standing on it we see Batman. He holds out his arms and his wings appear. His hands light up from two flares he is holding. He sees the Bat-Signal shining in the sky. He turns his back to it and drops off the edge of the building and glides across the busy street below.

BATMAN: (voice over)
Tonight, one of their leaders may very well die or be spared… I haven’t yet decided which.

Batman crashes through a window on the other side of the street. He tumbles into a lavish penthouse apartment, waking an old man in his bed. It’s Drake. He’s horrified to see Batman carrying the two blinding lights.

BATMAN:
You know me, don’t you?

DRAKE:
Oh, God! Yes I do! What are you doing here?

Suddenly two guards enter the room.

GUARD #1:
What’s going on?

GUARD #2:
We heard a noise!

Suddenly they see Batman, and they pull their guns on him. Batman quickly drops the flares, pulls out a grapple gun, and shoots it at one of the guards’ face. The hook hits him dead in the skull, knocking him to the ground.

BATMAN:
Not exactly what it was designed for, but it did the job.

The other guard starts shooting, but Batman flips to the side, and jumps forward, snapping the guard’s neck with his hands. He carries the two guards into an elevator (which is the only entrance to the suite) and drops them in. He finds a shower curtain rod in the bathroom and uses it to hold the elevator doors open as he lowers the elevator down one floor. He attaches a bomb to the elevator cables and walks back toward Drake’s bed.

BATMAN:
Where did you hire those guys? They’re almost as useless as the Gotham Police Department.

The bomb explodes, sending the elevator carriage plummeting down the shaft and crashing at the bottom.

CUT TO:

INT. HOTEL LOBBY

Through the windows, the red and blue flashing of police car lights can be seen. A SWAT team, followed by Lt. Gordon, enters the building. He talks to a hotel employee.

GORDON:
Where is the mayor’s suite?

EMPLOYEE:
Top floor, sir. But the elevator is out of order, and that’s the only way up there.

GORDON:
And witnesses say they saw Batman fly in through the window up there shortly before the explosion?

EMPLOYEE:
Yes, and not just people in the street! Someone staying in the room directly under Drake’s saw him too.

GORDON: (to himself)
What the hell are you doing, Batman?

CUT TO:

INT. PENTHOUSE SUITE

Batman has Drake tied to a chair.

DRAKE:
Why are you doing this?

BATMAN:
First wouldn’t you like to know what I’m doing? … You know very well why I’m doing this.

DRAKE:
Well let’s pretend I don’t. Why are you after me?

BATMAN:
You’re a politician. I can’t stand politicians.

DRAKE:
Do you plan on crashing through the windows and killing the guards of every politician in Gotham?

BATMAN:
Maybe. Maybe I decided I’d start with the worst one of all: one who supplies the mafia with money and guns in return for a re-election. Now if you’ll excuse me…

He picks up a telephone.

BATMAN:
…I think I’ll call room service.

CUT TO:

INT. HOTEL LOBBY

The telephone at the main desk rings. The receptionist answers it.

RECEPTIONIST:
Hello, this is the main desk.

BATMAN: (over the phone)
Can Gordon come to the phone?

CUT TO:

INT. PENTHOUSE SUITE

Batman is standing in front of the window, holding the phone in his hand, looking down.

BATMAN:
I assume he’s down there with you.

CUT TO:

INT. HOTEL LOBBY

Gordon take the phone from the receptionist.

BATMAN: (over the phone)
I have Drake hostage.

GORDON:
Batman, listen to me! What you’re doing is crazy! Release the mayor now!

BATMAN: (over the phone)
Very well. Maybe I’ll send him down the shaft and listen to the crunch of bone as he hits the bottom.

GORDON:
We can make some sort of deal! Maybe you can even get out with your reputation somewhat intact.

BATMAN: (over the phone)
Here’s the deal. Check the mayor’s bank statements, and if he hasn’t given large sums of money to mafia groups, you can take this bastard and throw me in jail.

CUT TO:

INT. VAN

A man (known simply as The Stalker) is sitting alone in the van talking into a tape recorder.

STALKER:
I’ve been watching for Batman the past three days. He left the manor at nightfall. It was like hell trying to keep up with him. He clearly knows his way around the city. He’s in the hotel now, and I think I’m going in. The radio says he’s holding Mayor Drake hostage.

He holds the recorder close to the car speakers and turns up the radio.

RADIO:
… negotiations with the Batman continue as Gotham city wonders what caused this sudden change in his behavior…

He turns the radio back down.

STALKER:
That’s what I’m wondering too. Like I said, I’m going in. If I don’t come back for this tape and someone finds it, I just want everyone to know one thing: I went in there to save Batman.

CUT TO:

INT. HOTEL LOBBY

Gordon is giving orders to his men.

GORDON:
We need to get in the building across the street and aim some snipers at that window, but no one takes a shot at him without my orders.

CUT TO:

EXT. STREET IN FRONT OF HOTEL

There’s a large group of people standing outside, watching the standoff. The police have large spotlights aimed at the windows on the top floor. Alfred is one of the people in the crowd. We cut to the Stalker character crossing the street and making his way towards a service entrance to the hotel. He’s wearing a hat and a bandanna over his face to conceal his identity.

He opens the service entrance and is met by a cop.

COP:
Hey, freeze! We aren’t letting anyone in here, much less some weirdo in a bandanna! I’m taking you in for questioning!

The stalker thrusts out his arm revealing that he has a taser weapon hidden up his coat sleeve. The policeman fires, but the man slumps to the side against the wall just in time, and he hits the cop with the taser. The cop is knocked out, and the man hides his body behind a dumpster in the alley.

CUT TO:

INT. PENTHOUSE SUITE

Batman still has the politician tied to the chair.

BATMAN:
I think I have a proposition we can both agree to. You can return to your life, or what’s left of it, if and only if you make a full and public confession. Right here, right now, standing on the rooftop in your nightclothes. The great Alex Drake revealed for what he really is, a murderer.

DRAKE:
Go to hell!

BATMAN:
Just for the record, I think the devil would side with me.

Just then, police choppers rise up outside the bashed in window outside, shining lights in at Batman and Drake. Batman spins the chair around towards the choppers and holds one of his metal bat symbol-shaped boomerangs to Drake’s neck. A voice comes over a loudspeaker on one of the helicopters.

VOICE:
Attention Batman! We intend to take you in for the kidnapping of Mayor Drake and the murder of two police officers! The entire building is surrounded! Your only way out is with us!

BATMAN:
And the only way for you to go is down!

He pulls an electronic device out of his pocket and pushes a button on it. Suddenly two bombs attached to the side of the building explode, and the choppers are damaged and lose control. They both begin to spiral towards the ground.

CUT TO:

EXT. STREET

The crowd of people see the explosion, and flee as the choppers start to fall. We see Alfred escaping with the other bystanders. The two choppers hit the ground and explode.

CUT TO:

INT. HOTEL ROOM

The stalker character breaks into an empty hotel room and runs to the window. Outside the window is a window washer’s platform. The man steps out onto the platform and looks down at the wreckage.

STALKER:
You have a lot to answer to, Batman.

He turns on a mechanical winch that raises the platform, and he begins to ascend to the top floor.

CUT TO:

INT. PENTHOUSE SUITE.

Batman has moved Drake to the suite’s small kitchen area, away from the window.

DRAKE:
Oh, so who’s the real murderer now, Mr. Bat?

BATMAN:
There’s no need to call me that, you know who I am.

DRAKE:
So you want a confession from me, is that it? Fine, I might as well rehearse it for you! I haven’t been completely truthful about where I acquired my campaign money (who has?). I bet you won’t find one politician who ran for public office in this city in the last century who was completely truthful about where he got his campaign money.

BATMAN:
Keep going!

DRAKE:
I got the money from selling weapons and other supplies to the mafia. So what? If the Gotham police did their jobs instead of depending on some masked apparition to fight crime for them the mob wouldn’t be so powerful. Speaking of which, why don’t you take that stupid mask off? I find it distracting.

BATMAN:
KEEP GOING!

DRAKE:
What, is there more?

BATMAN:
Don’t play stupid with me! I know about you and my parents, I know what you did to them! Murderer!

DRAKE:
Very cute. You blame me for what happened to your parents? I wasn’t the one who loaded the gun and fired it! I had nothing to do with your parents’ situation. Was it my fault they owed me more money than they could afford to pay? Was it my fault they were dirt-poor?

Just then the stalker steps out of the window washer’s platform, through the bashed in window. Cutting back to Batman and Drake, we see that Batman has heard something. Drake goes on taunting him.

DRAKE:
You loser! You’re a son of filth! I do what I do to rid the city of scum like you. You’re no better than your parents, and yet you parade around like you’re some sort of hero!

The stalker character hears Drake, and he pulls out his gun. Cut back to Batman, who punches Drake, knocking him unconscious.

The stalker moves around the corner with his gun, only to be met by Batman, holding one of his sharp bat boomerangs, ready to throw.

STALKER:
Alright, man, the game is up. I got a gun and you got a piece of metal.

BATMAN:
Come on! Don’t you know this costume is bullet-proof? And of course this is more than a piece of metal, it’s razor sharp and it can cut right through your neck, killing you instantly. Of course you know all this already. You made them, didn’t you? Bruce Wayne.

The stalker takes off the bandanna concealing his face, and the man dressed as Batman takes off his mask.

NOTE: From this point forward, The Stalker will be referred to as Bruce Wayne, and the character previously known as Batman will simply be referred to as The Man.

BRUCE:
Yep, that’s my name. And you’re an imposter, so if you’ll kindly hand over the items that belong to me, I’ll be happy to hand you over to the police.

Just then a bright light shines through the broken window. A large aircraft is hovering outside. It turns to the side, and it is then recognizable as the Bat-Wing. The door to the craft opens and Alfred walks into the hotel suite.

ALFRED:
Master Bruce, what on earth has gotten into you?

He then sees Bruce and the other man dressed up as Batman.

ALFRED:
What’s going on?

BRUCE:
I’ll be happy to answer that. This man has worked for several months at my factory here in Gotham. Somehow he learned of my secret identity as Batman.

MAN:
It wasn’t that difficult. I stole some security passwords and broke into your office. I only expected to find some scandalizing evidence that I could sell to the tabloids, you know, make a buck or two. But instead I found this.

He holds up the bat-shaped boomerang.

BRUCE:
Then I started receiving letters from him. He asked for large sums of money to keep him from revealing my secret. One day he came to my house. At gunpoint, he forced me to show him where all the Batman equipment is kept.

ALFRED:
My God! You didn’t show him the Bat Cave?

Bruce nods.

BRUCE:
Then he threw me out of my own house and changed the security system passwords so I couldn’t get in.

Cut to Drake in the other room. He’s managed to grab a steak knife off the counter, and he’s beginning to free himself. Cut back to the standoff in the other room.

MAN:
I didn’t steal it.

BRUCE:
What?

MAN:
I didn’t steal your identity. Just borrowed it for three days. I had every intention of returning it when I was done here.

ALFRED:
When you were done soiling it! Now people think Batman is a murderer!

MAN:
Oh, so you think what I did was murder? You don’t know the meaning of the word. Only I know what this man, this stinking politician is responsible for! Even back when he was only an entrepreneur he was the biggest criminal in Gotham. My parents were having some bad financial times and they needed help. Who better to ask than an old friend of my father's? A Gotham man who everyone trusted? Well he helped them alright. He helped them all the way to their graves. The price he asked in return for the help he gave them was too much … I don’t even want to tell you what he asked of my mother when we couldn’t pay.

He breaks down crying.

MAN:
My parents ended up poorer than before. When they threatened to go public about what he did to them, he had someone take them out. (he starts yelling) Is this the man you want to save?! Let me coax a confession out of him, then Batman’s reputation won’t be hurt at all! I can save the city from men like this better than you can. I’m the real Batman now!

Just then the tip of a knife sticks through the man’s throat, and he falls to the ground. Alexander Drake is standing behind him. He looks at Bruce and Alfred, confused.

DRAKE:
Bruce Wayne? And your butler, I remember him from that party at your house. What are you doing here?

ALFRED:
That’s not important. That man told us everything, before you murdered him.

BRUCE:
I came here to rescue you, but this changes things. I’m handing you over to the police.

DRAKE:
All right. I guess you got me then.

But he smiles. Suddenly he crouches down and picks up one of Batman’s explosives from the dead imposter. Before Bruce has time to raise his weapon, the old man has the grenade in his hand and another standoff has begun.

DRAKE:
I’m not afraid to die! How about you, Bruce?

He begins to circle around Bruce and Alfred, and he heads towards the destroyed window, to the Bat-Wing.

BRUCE:
Are you crazy? You can’t escape in that! Only Batman knows how to fly it!

DRAKE:
He wasn’t that smart, so how hard can it be?

He climbs inside the door and it begins to close.

BRUCE:
No!

He runs towards the closing door. Drake throws the grenade at the last minute, but a scream is heard as the door finally closes. Bruce and Alfred dive behind the bed as the bomb explodes.

CUT TO:

INT. BAT-WING

Drake has been shot in the shoulder, and he can’t control the plane. Somehow he’s managed to get the craft moving, though.

CUT TO:

EXT. STREET

The police officers below open fire on the escaping Bat-Wing.

GORDON:
Cease fire! We don’t know if Batman has the mayor with him!

The Bat-Wing veers from side to side, barely missing several buildings. It finally begins to lose altitude, crashes into a bridge, and explodes.

CUT TO:

INT. PENTHOUSE SUITE

Everything is destroyed now, but Bruce and Alfred dig themselves out of the rubble.

ALFRED:
How do we get down?

BRUCE:
The same way I got up: a window washer’s platform.

They climb out the window.

FADE TO:

Close up shot of a TV on. A news anchor sits at his desk.

NEWS ANCHOR:
Ladies and gentlemen, last night a dangerous criminal kidnapped our mayor and held him hostage. It is in times like these when we usually look to the Dark Knight to save the day. But this time things were different, because the criminal was none other than Batman. Last night’s unexpected standoff between police and the Batman ended in disaster. A bomb exploded inside Mayor Drake’s apartment, leaving nothing but debris and a dead body, dressed in what appears to be Batman’s costume. But that leaves the question of who was controlling Batman’s aircraft when it crashed into a bridge about a mile away. Police have yet to find Mayor Drake’s body. Only complicating the story, police have received a message from someone claiming to be Batman this morning, claiming that the man who died was an imposter. We cannot be sure of this claim until the next time the city needs help, and the Dark Knight returns…

CUT TO:

INT. WAYNE MANOR. DAY

Bruce and Alfred are talking in Bruce’s study. Bruce is holding the tape recorder from the previous night.

ALFRED:
Well, now the bat-suit and Bat-Wing are in the hands of the police. We have back up bat-suits, but unfortunately the Bat-Wing will have to be rebuilt.

BRUCE:
I suppose that means you should get in touch with Fox.

ALFRED:
Yes, sir.

BRUCE:
Good. It certainly was a strange night. I can’t say that it was a victory or a defeat. On one hand, I did what I said I would do. I won back my alter ego. I saved Batman. But on the other hand, that man – that imposter – kept his promise as well. Mayor Drake is dead.

ALFRED:
But was he worth saving at all? Perhaps we’ll never know. Good night, sir.

He leaves the room. Bruce stands up and takes the tape out of the tape recorder. His thoughts provide the narration.

BRUCE: (voice over)
Was Alexander Drake worth saving? This one question, provided by my faithful butler as comfort, is the one thing that’s been burning in my mind ever since it happened. The truth is I don’t know. I just don’t know.

He drops the tape on the floor and crushes it with his foot.

CUT TO BLACK

Movie Reels

Batman: The Lost Legend

Post by Dale on Oct 17, 2008 14:02:10 GMT -5

Post by Dale on Oct 17, 2008 14:02:49 GMT -5

Post by Dale on Oct 17, 2008 14:03:13 GMT -5