Rather than waste people’s time I figured I’d explain a lot of it in the title.
I don’t know why it bothers me, mostly, I guess, because I like his acting and any other random character dying I’d go “meh”… But he acted it so well I’m curious if they kinda intended him to have been badly hurt then scared by the smoke grenade or if he just dies anyway.
There’s no definite answer in the movie, although I wouldn’t be surprised if the mob whacked him anyway for failing to stop the Joker from getting away.
Well there was no explosion in the bank as the joker pulled away which i believed there would have been if we were supposed to think hes dead. Then again hes never shown again so who knows. I liked his very small part in the movie also, i wish there had been more of him.
Nice spoiler in the thread title. :dubious:
It’s the first scene in the movie. I think you can cut him some slack.
As for the question - I can’t be sure. One the one hand, he didn’t die, but on the other, since when does the Joker let people live?
Well, it’s never given explicitly but it does remind me of the Joker’s nerve gas that he uses in the comic books. And even if the gas given off isn’t anything, it is in Joker’s style to scare the crap out of someone for no apparent reason.
It’s a joke grenade which instead of exploding just sprouts out some harmless gas. Probably all of the grenades they gave to the people in the bank were like that. I figure the Joker probably wouldn’t want to get fragged during a routine bank robbery just because some scared-to-all-hell civilian’s hand slipped and a live grenade went off.
Fichtner’s character did get shot, though, so he could’ve died from his wounds, or like Linty Fresh suggested the mob might’ve whacked him as a penalty for his failure. It doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things as he is a minor, nameless character.
I figured the thing the Joker shoved in his mouth was a canister of laughing gas, since he is the Joker. But, then again, the Joker is willing to kill anyone (including his own henchmen during that heist so he could have all the money for himself), so perhaps the contents of the canister were fatal. In the end, it doesn’t really matter- the bank manager is an insignificant character with no bearing to the plot, as the real point of the scene is to introduce the Joker and show how willing he is to kill anyone (even his allies) if he thinks he can get something out of it, be it to create fear or, as it is in this case, to get a bigger share of money.
The grenade he stuff into William Fichtner’s mouth is not the same type of grenade. The grenades he puts into people’s hands (and the ones hanging in his jacket in a later scene) are fragmentation grenades, the kind that go bang and kill you. The one he puts into Fichtner’s mouth is cylindrical, which is consistent with many types of grenades, including smoke grenades.
That said, if it was a smoke grenade it was a dud. Real smoke grenades absolutely spew smoke out. They’re quite impressive, but would be very dangerous to have in someone’s mouth - they have a flame that burns the stuff to make the smoke, and can set something on fire if you’re not careful. I should know, because one set my clothes on fire once (I wasn’t hurt, luckily) so they couldn’t use a real smoke grenade, but that was probably what it represented. Whether it was any special kind of gas, I doubt, to be honest. The Joker in “The Dark Knight” is not like the ones from the previous movie or the TV series, really big on laughter and sick jokes and with lots of highly technical goodies. He’s a psychopathic murderer and an anarchist who likes knives and bombs. As he himself says, he has simple tastes. Laughing gas isn’t his thing.
However, to answer the OP; Fichtner did not die on camera. Therefore, by movie logic, he’s alive, and may make a future appearance.
I took it that it didn’t matter if the grenades were real. It would have meant the cops called in the Bomb Squad regardless, and bought him more time. Also, it’s quite possible the Joker didn’t expect a non-security gunman in the bank or that there would be anyone alive by then, and so just ran out of grenades. I wonder what Fitchner’s official bank title was? And I heard a rumor that his nameplate said Edward Nigma, which would have been odd but fun.
I don’t think he killed them for the money. I think he killed them because he thought it would be funny - especially as he himself didn’t kill any of them (except for the bus driver, of course). Convincing a bunch of hardened criminals to kill each other for his amusement is just thekind of thing he does.
I noticed that Maggie Gylenhaowdoyaspellit’s character didn’t die on camera, so I wonder the same thing about her. The big difference is that I’d like to see Fichtner on screen again. Maggie? Not so much.
The Joker left him alive so he would tell the mob bosses who robbed them.
They probably killed him themselves.
I concur, primarily because he later makes a point of saying he’s not in it for the money, and proving it by burning the money the syndicate are paying him to take out the Bat.
That’s a good point- I was thinking about that too. Although he probably didn’t keep it for himself, he was probably trying to deny the henchmen any share of the heist when he made them kill each other, though- although indeed the main reason he made them kill each other is because he’s a sick bastard who’s entertained by such things.
I think it very possible the mob wouldn’t wack him.
Sure movie mafias are easy to address failure with murder and a random thug’s life is worth very little. Still, they also understand that good work is hard to find.
Fichtner’s character was skilled labor- and skilled labor capable of badassery when called upon. Not as easy to replace as would be a random thug. Unless he was suspected of being complicit in the robbery, I don’t think he’d be killed. His wounds would show that he defended the bank.
Possible he got wacked, but also very possible he did not get wacked.
I kinda think he wouldn’t have.
Never heard any reference to the Edward Nigma name tag. That would be interesting indeed. Still, a revelation as big as that would have exploded on the internet I think. Would love to see a cite with a still from the film.
I’m curious, though - was Fichtner’s character a mob soldier who was put in charge of a bank, or was he a bank manager who could handle a shotgun? Either way, there’s got to be some interesting backstory there.
Oh, I definitely thought he was mob, someone well respected and trusted by the bosses.
Sure he was mob, but was he also a licensed CPA? And if so, was he the smart kid the dons sent to business school, or was he an ordinary middle class college graduate who decided to expand his resume by joining organized crime? Inquiring minds need to know!
Just for some idle speculation…
What if Fichtners character was there just to set up a plotline in a future film? You know the kind;
“Hey, thats the bank manager from the the dark knight, wow, he’s actually …, who knew?”
So since I dont know anything about the Batman history, who could he possibly be?