Which is meaningless. We are talking about the character.
It wasn't the tone, their next GL went laughably in the other direction and was a complete flop.
It's there was no connective tissue I'm talking about. It was different universes with zero foundation in it.
The set up was even built into the end of the movie:
Lucius Fox's "I just need to know what I could have done" ending scene, instead of reviewing the Batwing's software patch, discovering the Batwing auto-pilot was already "fixed" ...
Surprise! he survived!
(FYI an absolutely not dark in tone happy comic book ending.)
Should have been Licious alone, over and over, solemnly reviewing the Batwing's on-board vid-feed tapes, . .... suddenly playing them back, then he sees it ... a flash of light and and blue and red streak.
Cut to Alfred seeing Bruce in Paris. Same scene.
As the post credit scene. ...Universe built.
Of course they(WB had deep pockets) would have had to throw everything at Bale to return, or signed him from the go.
But like I said, they did not have the foresight or the vision.
While Marvel blew past them at theaters.
This thread has everything completley wrong, to much Batman wasn't the problem, it was the lack of building off him.
And the missed opportunity was using
that Batman's supposed "real" wold POV as the audience surrogate to an incredible new Universe.