Detailed Summary of The Dark Knight

The movie opens with an ongoing bank robbery at a mob-owned bank by a gang wearing joker masks in Gotham city. The Joker tricks them into eliminating each other before he finishes off the last one himself just before escaping with the mob money in a bus. That night, a meeting between mobsters and Scarecrow is interrupted by a trio of phony Batman. The real Batman arrives at the scene and apprehends the criminals as well as the imposters but gets injured in the process due to dog bites. It leads to his improvising his Bat suit, making it lighter for better maneuverability. Batman and Lieutenant James Gordon consider whether they should include new district attorney Harvey Dent in their efforts to eliminate the mob. He could be the white knight, the public face of Batman.

Rachel Dawes and Dent go on a date where they happen to meet Bruce Wayne and they end up having dinner together. Wayne likes Dent and he decides to host a fund raiser for him. In another part of the city, mob bosses meet to discuss the Batman, Dent, Gorden when a Chinese accountant Lau informs them about Gorden’s conspiracy to seize the mob money. He then announces that he has already taken care of their money by hiding it and escaped to Hong Kong, out of Dent’s jurisdiction. He also informs them that one of their deposits worth $68 million has been stolen by the Joker. Every one is taken by surprise when Joker arrives at the scene and offers to take out Batman in lieu of half of mob money. His offer is promptly turned down.

At the night of fund raiser, Dent proposes Rachel who puts off answering it. Just then Wayne comes from behind and hits Dent on the head making him unconscious and locks him up in a closet in an attempt to save him from Joker. The fund raiser is interrupted by Joker and his men who are looking for Dent. Joker and his macabre sense of humor leave everyone terrified. He takes Rachel hostage to persuade Dent to come forward. Batman arrives on the scene and asks Joker to let Rachel go. He drops her from the window but Batman manages to save her.

After Batman abducts Lau and brings him to Gotham city, mob agrees to hire Joker to eliminate Batman. Joker shocks everyone by sending body of a dead Batman impersonator with mask en all and announces that everyday people would until Batman reveals his identity publicly and turn himself in to the police. He sends clues in the form of DNA fingerprints of his intended victims. Despite their best efforts, police and administration fails to save Commissioner Gillian B. Loeb and the judge presiding over the mob trails. Commissioner is poisoned and the judge is blown off in a car bomb. His next intended victim is the Mayor of the city. Notwithstanding the best arrangements, Mayor is attacked during a public meeting by Joker in the guise of a soldier and in his attempt to save him, Gorden is shot dead. Joker names Rachel as his next victim. She goes to Wayne’s penthouse, as she considers it to be the safest place in Gotham city. Wayne makes up his mind to reveal his identity as Batman in a press conference. he reaches the press conference but before he can execute his plan, Dent announces that he is the Batman, and is immediately taken into police custody as part of the plan to draw Joker out in the open. Rachel gets upset with Wayne’s silence and Dent’s arrest and leaves penthouse after giving a letter for Wayne to Alfred, his butler.
Joker tries to ambush the police convoy along with his goons but his plan is thawed by the double attack by Batman and Gorden, who was only pretending to be dead. Joker is arrested and taken to police station for interrogation. For his valor and in recognition of his timely action, Gorden is promoted to be the police commissioner.

Later that night, it is found that Dent and Rachel both have disappeared. Gorden allows Batman to interrogate Joker, who is in the custody, to find the whereabouts of both. Joker discloses the fact that they have been abducted by the corrupt policemen and kept in warehouses rigged with explosives, at the two opposite ends of the city. Batman can save only one of them as they are very far from each other. Batman rushes to save Rachel while Gorden along with police force leaves to save Dent. Joker overpowers the policeman on duty inside the interrogation cell and insists that he should be allowed to make a phone call. With that call, he detonates the bomb he had planted inside the police station and escapes with Lau. All along, it was Joker’s plan to get arrested so that he could reach mob money through Lau.

Joker manages to deceive Batman by giving him reverse addresses. So Batman reaches warehouse where Dent is kept, just in time to save his life. But Rachel turns out not so lucky and is blown to death before Gorden and his force could save her. One side of Dent’s face is badly burnt. The death of Rachel drives Dent mad. Extend of Joker’s insanity is revealed when he burns Lau atop the pile of mob money. He then pays Dent a visit in the hospital and incites him to take revenge from corrupt policemen and mob for Rachel’s death. He also holds Gorden and Batman responsible for her death and urges Dent not to spare them.

Driven to insanity by grief, Dent turns into a disfigured, murderous vigilante on a personal vendetta. He tackles corrupt cops and gangster one after the other, deciding their fate by the flip of a coin. Joker makes public announcement that anyone left in the city after the night fall will be subject to his rule. The bridges and tunnels leading to city are already closed due to bomb threat by Joker. Left with no other option, police starts evacuating city by ferrying people. To spread anarchy and terror, Joker rigs two ferries with explosives. One ferry is full of convicts and the other with civilians. He declares that the only way they could save themselves is to detonate the explosives on the other ferry. Otherwise, he would blow both ferries off at midnight.

Meanwhile, Batman finds Joker and restrains him. Joker’s nefarious designs to destroy ferries come to a naught when people on both ferries refuse to kill each other in order to save their lives. Joker concedes that Batman is truly incorruptible and points out that Dent is not so. He reveals that Dent has already unleashed vengeance on the city. Leaving Joker for the SWAT team, Batman goes in search of Dent. In the ruins of the building where Rachel had breathed her last, Batman comes across Dent holding Gorden and his family at gun point. He flips coin to judge innocence of Batman, Gorden’s son and his own. Just when he is about to kill the young boy, Batman tackles him and throws him over the side of the building. Dent dies but, both Gorden and Batman realize that revelation of Dent’s crimes would knock down the morale of the city. Batman persuades Gorden not to tarnish Dent’s image by disclosing that he was the vigilante murderer. He accepts the blame of the murders. A manhunt is launched to nab Batman.