Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight saw Batman (Christian Bale) coming across two villains, one of them Harvey Dent (Aaron Eckhart), who ended up becoming the famous villain Two-Face, and a theory gives his villain nickname another meaning while also changing how the audience sees Harvey Dent. Batman Begins explored the origin story of Nolan’s version of Batman, and after facing Ra’s al Ghul (Liam Neeson) and Jonathan Crane/Scarecrow (Cillian Murphy), Batman was ready for bigger and more dangerous villains, and in the sequel, The Dark Knight, the Caped Crusader had to face Harvey Dent and the Joker (Heath Ledger), the latter responsible for Dent’s villainous transformation.
The Dark Knight saw the chaos created by the Joker upon his arrival at Gotham City, while Batman, police Lieutenant Jim Gordon (Gary Oldman), and district attorney Harvey Dent ed forces to dismantle organized crime in Gotham City, as it was beginning to get out of control. Dent’s transformation into Two-Face was a big obstacle in their plans against corruption and crime in Gotham, and it was a big shake-up given Dent’s reputation as district attorney, but a theory suggests he wasn’t all that innocent, and he was “Two-Face” before his face was burned.
Theory: Harvey Dent Let The Witness In With A Gun
Batman Begins saw the downfall of Carmine Falcone (Tom Wilkinson) thanks to Scarecrow and his Fear Toxin, so by the time of the events of The Dark Knight, Sal Maroni was the most notorious mob boss in Gotham City, and Harvey Dent wasted no time in trying to bring him down. Dent’s first scene is actually the trial of Sal Maroni, with Dent arriving late, much to Rachel Dawes’ (now played by Maggie Gyllenhaal) annoyance. Dent took out his father’s lucky coin to see who would present first, and of course, he won, explaining that he “makes his own luck”. The core of the case was the testimony of a member of the mob, through which Dent accused Maroni of taking over Gotham’s organized crime after Falcone’s fall, but the trial took a turn when the witness contradicted his earlier statements and claimed that Maroni was just the fall guy and he was the real leader.
Although that got a laugh from everyone in the room, the trial took yet another turn when the witness pulled out a handgun and pointed it directly at Dent, right after Dent asked to treat him as hostile. Dent reacted immediately and grabbed the gun with one hand while he punched the witness with the other, and proceeded to describe the details of the gun, telling Maroni that if he wanted to kill a public servant, he should buy American weapons, not a Chinese one. Dent got the applause of the attendees, and the scene was key in establishing Dent as an ally who was genuinely concerned for the good of Gotham, but a Reddit theory suggests it wasn’t like that, and Dent actually planned it all. The author explains that Dent let the witness enter with the gun, but he had an officer sabotage it so it wouldn’t fire. This way, he would end up as the hero who stopped a murder attempt, and this theory also explains why he was so calm when the witness pointed at him with the gun and why he knew so much about the gun as soon as he grabbed it.
Harvey Dent “Made His Own Luck” At Any Cost
Dent made a lot of emphasis on being a man who made his own luck, and this usually came up every time he flipped his special coin, which always benefited him, and this theory takes this a step further by showing that Dent would make his own luck at any cost. As mentioned above, Dent wasted no time after becoming District Attorney to go after Gotham’s mob, and in order to gain more public , he needed to show that he could handle the mob and thus was able to bring it down. The whole scene with the witness and the gun surely earned him some popularity and trust points with Gotham’s citizens, boosting his political career and possibly allowing him to go after Falcone at some point. Of course, Dent never told Rachel about this plan, as he also wanted to impress her, though that part of the plan didn’t go as expected.
How This Theory Changes The Dark Knight’s Two-Face
The Dark Knight’s Harvey Dent presented himself as a very confident man with clear goals, and his whole “make my own luck” idea further showed how sure of himself and his skills he was, but this theory completely changes Gotham’s so-called White Knight. Surely, Dent was confident, professional, and smart, but this theory shows that he was already a two-faced man way before he was disfigured and literally became Two-Face. The theory also shows that Dent would have become a villain at some point without the Joker’s presence and without having half of his face burned, as he was already manipulating situations to his benefit, and though he did so for the good of Gotham, there’s no guarantee that Dent’s intentions wouldn’t be corrupted at some point. Harvey Dent definitely wasn’t a saint, but this The Dark Knight theory makes his character more complex, more interesting, and an inevitable villain.
