As cool as "I'm the hero Gotham deserves, but not the one it needs right now" is, it never really made any sense to me. Why does Gotham deserve Batman as a hero? Because it's fundamentally good? Just because no one wanted to personally blow up the other ferry doesn't mean those people are good. I mean, they voted to blow the other ferry up! That makes them immoral cowards, not good people.

The people of Gotham elect a governmental infrastructure that is at its core corrupt and ineffective. They are willing to vote away the lives of "innocent" people to save their own. Many tried to kill a completely innocent person (Reese) for selfish reasons. Rachel Dawes says in the first movie that there are good people in Gotham. Really? Who? The only good people left are Gordon and Fox. Everyone else are either corrupt, incompetent, criminal or dead. The fact that being DA is practically a death sentence shows how sick the city is.

Maybe this makes Batman the ultimate tragic figure. He's possessed by trying to save an unsavable city. An equilibrium is reached where Batman constantly puts villains in Arkham, only for the corrupt city officials to allow them to escape or to set them free. Maybe The League of Shadows are right and the whole city should have been razed to the ground. Were Ra'as Al Guhl and the Joker right all along?

I'm on and off with this dialogue myself. My interpretation is that Batman is a hero who will always fight for them regardless of whether or not they need him. At this particular point in time, Gotham didn't need a hero, they needed a scapegoat, so he's "Not the hero it needs right now" So, Batman allows himself to be villainized. Gotham is ridden by scum and curruption and you're right, besides for two or three good people there, I wouldn't they deserved Batman's help but he is, indeed

tokkaandrahzar wrote:possessed by trying to save an unsavable city.

I like what you said about this, very true
I've always thought that this is a huge departure from other superhero films seeing as Gordon's coming out and saying that Batman's role isn't a hero and he's never been hero. He's an instrument in the restoration of Gotham and he'll go to any means to achive this (Lao; international kidnapping ). So no, Gotham doesn't deserve Batman but it does need him, just not as a hero

You forgot about that little kid in Begins, Gordan and his family, Harvey, the Mayor, Rachel's friend/lawyer in Begins...

but ya the city is obviously corrupt, but there's good people in it. There's also a lot of mass hysteria and fear in the public which can lead them to do bad things as well. One solution is to jut blow it all up (League of Shadow / Joker), and maybe that would be better in the end. Batman goes by a higher moral code though, whether futile or not. He's willing to fight for the small amount of good or at least the prospect of any good even if it's losing battle.

tokkaandrahzar wrote: The people of Gotham elect a governmental infrastructure that is at its core corrupt and ineffective. They are willing to vote away the lives of "innocent" people to save their own. Many tried to kill a completely innocent person (Reese) for selfish reasons. Rachel Dawes says in the first movie that there are good people in Gotham. Really? Who? The only good people left are Gordon and Fox. Everyone else are either corrupt, incompetent, criminal or dead. The fact that being DA is practically a death sentence shows how sick the city is.

I agree with the fact that Gotham doesn't really deserve Batman but I disagree with the fact that the only good people left are Gordon and Fox. You don't know all Gotham citizens so you can't deduce that. About the ferry scene they were willing to vote away to the lives of innocent people to save their own, but did they do it in the end? Did someone pushed the button? No, which showed that eventhough they were fighting with themselves these people still had moral values.

It's like everywhere or almost, the one who control the city are corrupted, some citizen who want more power or who are afraid are corrupted too, but some people are still there to resist and disagree with what is happening eventhough we might not see them. And for these people, yes, Gotham is worth saving.

Blow up all the city to start something better is like saying that some people eventhough they are good don't deserve to live. It's like trying an experiment of a new medication on some babies to save a lot of other babies in the future. No one can choose who should live or die in my opinion, that's why I disagree completely with the League of Shadows or the Joker.