APPLICATION: Batman: The Dark Knight (Movie) - Harvey Dent
PLAYER INFO
NAME: Kates
LOCATION/TIME ZONE: CST for the summer, EST for the rest of the year.
CURRENT CHARACTERS, if any: The Fourth Doctor/Key
CHARACTER INFO
CHARACTER NAME: Harvey Dent / Two-Face
SERIES: The Dark Knight
RESERVED: N
WISHLIST: N
PERSONALITY: The first thing people notice about Harvey is that
half his face is mangled and scarred by acid. Please don’t bring it
up. He’s still very bitter about the incident that gave him those
scars, and still saddened that Rachel died. Of course, 'saddened' for
Harvey also means that he’s a time bomb ready to blow up at those who
mention her death, Gordon, or Batman. He has obvious survivor's guilt
that he was the one chosen and saved, not Rachel. Talking about Rachel
is Not A Good Idea. And don’t get him started on the Joker. Harvey
HATES that man. He blames the Joker for Rachel’s death and will gladly
kill him if he gets the opportunity. Though really, the Joker isn't
the main target of Harvey's ire. Even more than the Joker, he hates
organized crime. The mob was what ruined Gotham, the mob was what let
Joker do what he needed, it was all the mob's fault. Naturally, this
means that Harvey wanted to kill all mob members.
The second thing that people notice about Harvey is his obsession with
chance. Harvey will make life-threatening decisions, such as killing
somebody, by a flip of a coin. He rationalizes that chance is the only
fair method of choosing who lives and who dies. This is also ingrained
in him because of the chances of his accident: he had a 50/50 chance
of living, so should everybody else. He has a special coin that he
carries around with him at all times: a two-headed coin, with one half
seared by acid. Before Rachel's death, he would create his own luck,
flipping the coin so that he always got what he wanted. That sort of
idealistic, happy, top-of-the world attitude died when Rachel died.
Though, old habits die hard. After she died, he still used the coin.
Even with his memory lost, I think that he'll feel compelled to find a
coin and occasionally flip it. It won't be his coin, but it'll
be close enough.
Harvey is very brash and headstrong. If he wants something, he’ll go
straight forward and get it, by any means necessary. This means that
Harvey can be fairly aggressive. He gets angry easily, and will go to
slightly extreme measures to get what he wants-like threatening to
shoot one of the Joker's goons (and this was before his accident!).
Before his accident, his angry side was fairly well repressed.
However, it occasionally showed, giving him the nickname “Harvey
Two-Face” by the police force. His headstrong personality was
super-charged by Rachel's death, adding to his insanity. Instead of
just threatening to kill the mob or wanting to get rid of them
legally, Harvey was so determined, so headstrong, so ready to get rid
of the mob that he was willing to take the law into his own hands,
going against everything he stood for in the process.
His determination shows itself in various ways, one of which being no
social life and limited people skills. Before the accident, Harvey
felt uncomfortable in large groups. He felt natural behind his desk or
in a courtroom. He could easily talk to the media, but not to rich
people at a party. Now, the limited people skills are super-charged by
the fact that Harvey's missing half a face. He will probably not know
what to do if people start being nice to him or want to talk to him.
Instead, he'll respond with a bitter, angry, abrupt comeback.
He's quick to adapt. It's obvious that Harvey is in insane pain,
thanks to his facial scars. And yet, he either manages to block out
the pain or just get past it in order to do what he needs to do. Also,
despite it being just a few days after his accident, after he escapes
the hospital, Harvey downs a shot like a pro, without any of the
liquid falling out of his cheek hole. It's assumed that he managed to
find a way to drink and either practiced it enough or just was good at
it so that the drink didn't dribble down his shirt.
It’s also worth noticing who Harvey used to be. He used to be a
determined, charismatic attorney. Harvey used to be Gotham’s main hope
for a better future, leading some to call him a “White Knight”. He
used to be a people person, witty and knowing his way around the
press. Harvey used to be a crusader for justice. All that’s changed.
The psychological scars of listening to Rachel die snapped his mind.
Granted, he still wants justice-however, he wants justice against
Gordon for letting Rachel die, justice against the Joker and the mob
for setting this up, and justice against Batman for saving him and not
her.
A note about Two-Face: in other incarnations of Batman (TAS, comics,
etc.), Harvey has DID. There are two personalities: Harvey Dent (the
nice guy crusading for justice) and Two-Face (the maniac, more
stereotypical supervillain). The Dark Knight doesn't give us any
reason to suspect that Harvey has two different personalities or that
the accident created a splinter personality. There aren't any
tell-tale signs like there were in the comics (voice changes, arguing
with himself, the pronoun "we", etc.) Indeed, everyone refers to him
as "Harvey" throughout the movie, Two-Face only comes up as a brief
nod to the comics. There isn't a splinter of his personality. TDK
Harvey is just a man who's worldview and ethics got horribly twisted
and changed due to a traumatic accident.
TIMELINE: Before Batman shows up to talk Harvey down from
killing Gordon's kids at the end of the film.
BACKGROUND: The Dark Knight starts off with us meeting Harvey
Dent: Gotham's DA, generally nice guy, determined to break up the
Gotham mob and boyfriend of one Rachel Dawes. One courtroom scene
shows us just how dead-set Harvey is on getting mob members behind
bars: when one mob member pulls a gun out on him, Harvey punches him.
Badass. Harvey forms a tentative trust with Comissioner Gordon of the
Gotham police in order to bring down the mob, despite the fact that he
really doesn't trust Gordon and knows that there are corrupt
cops in Gordon's unit. One night out on the town with Rachel, Harvey
meets Bruce Wayne (a Gotham socialite and Rachel's bffish) and the two
talked, forming plans for a fundraiser. That night, Gordon and Harvey
meet Batman on the roof of the police office, this being Harvey’s
first time he actually met the man face to face. The two tell Batman
that they need the mob’s accountant, who got wind of their plan to
raid the banks where the mob’s money was, hid the money, and moved to
Hong Kong. Batman succeeds and brings Harvey the accountant.
The accountant spills the beans about the other mob members and Harvey
rashly decides to try them all at once. Later, the Gotham mayor meets
up with Harvey and tells him that the trial will put the might of
Gotham’s underworld straight at him. Ooh foreshadowing ooh. At the
fund-raiser, Harvey awkwardly mingles for a bit, obviously not
enjoying himself. He gets some alone time with Rachel and is about to
propose to the woman, but then Bruce puts Harv in a headlock and locks
him in a closet. Good timing too, as the Joker shows up at the party,
intent on killing Harvey. The Joker reeks havoc, and everybody’s happy
when Batman comes to beat him up. Yay for vigilantes.
There’s more plot, this time about how the Joker wants to kill the
mayor. During the procession for the slain police commissioner, some
of the Joker’s goons infiltrate the honor guard and fire at the Joker.
Harvey grabs one of the goons and reads his name tag-”Officer Rachel
Dawes”. Oh shit. After a quick call to Rachel to make sure she's safe,
Harvey interrogates the goon, obviously annoyed and pissed off in the
process. Threatening to kill the mayor is one thing, but threatening
to kill his fiancee is a whole different story. He threatens to kill
the criminal, but Batman stops him, not knowing that Harvey never
planned to kill the criminal in the first place. Batman tells Harvey
that if anybody saw him about to shoot the criminal it would ruin his
good reputation and that Harvey should hold a press conference the
next day, where Batman will turn himself in.
Harvey hosts the press conference, ending with a claim that he's
Batman. He’s promptly arrested. However, the Joker targets the convoy
taking Harvey to prison. Gordon ends up capturing the Joker and Harvey
goes free, revealing that despite the fact he knew next to nothing
about the man, he trusted Batman to save his ass and catch the Joker.
However, Harvey doesn’t get to go home just yet, as corrupt cops
capture him and Rachel. Harvey is trapped in an explosive ridden
warehouse, with a phone connection to Rachel. There's a timer going
off and it's obvious one of them will die. He keeps reassuring her
that everything will be alright. While trying to free himself, Harvey
knocks into an oil drum, soaking half his face in oil. Batman rescues
him, leading Harvey out of the building as it explodes. Harvey is
obviously distraught about this, not knowing that Batman had intended
to rescue Rachel, but only went to Harvey's building because the Joker
told him the wrong address. Harvey believed that Batman rescued him
for the good of Gotham, even though that meant sacrificing Rachel in
the process-something Harvey couldn't bare to think about.
Unfortunately, a spark from the exploding building sets half of
Harvey's face on fire. Also, Rachel dies. This creates some
massive survivors guilt in Harvey, as he lies in bed in the
hospital. It also helps create a conflict of identity and a
renunciation of his old ways, shown by him refusing skin grafts and
showing the world 'what he really is': two-faced.
While he’s in the hospital bed being depressed about Rachel and angry
at everybody else, the Joker breaks in, gives him a hand gun and asks
him to create “anarchy”. After a moment of thoughts, Harvey does so.
He tells the Joker ‘heads you live, tails you die’, showing him his
two-headed coin that was scarred by the fire. This is a mostly
symbolic act, as Rachel had the same chances as he did while they were
in the buildings rigged to explode. Joker lives, as the clown explodes
the hospital, Harvey managing to escape before the bomb goes off. He
goes on a crusade against the corrupt cops and mobsters, flipping a
coin to decide their fate. He manages to kill at least one corrupt cop
and one mob member, sparing one cop because chance was in her favor.
Later, Harvey kidnaps Gordon’s family, intending to kill one of them
in front of Gordon to make him hurt just like Rachel’s death hurt him.
ABILITIES: Harvey is pretty well fit. Granted, he’s no Olympic
athlete but he can hold his own in a fight for a while. He takes
physical pain fairly well, as shown by him not complaining or
seemingly being affected by the FUCKING HOLE IN HIS CHEEK. He doesn’t
have any powers out of the ordinary, aside from slight charisma and a
mean right hook. He’s district attorney also, so he’s smart. He knows
a lot about law and law-related material. Also, he’s a good aim with a
gun-at least, good enough aim to kill somebody.
GAME INFO
EDENSPHERE NAME: Rachel
BIRTHDAY LOG: Sure, why not.
DREAM: He was in a room. The room was divided in half
color-wise. The left half of the room was clean, spotless with pure,
pristine white walls. There was a desk, sitting in that half, with
paperwork cluttering it. A filing cabinet stood against the wall.
All in all, it looked like an office. The other half was dark, with
sheer black walls. There were bullet holes in the walls. The floor
was burned. There were blood stains and scorch marks on the ceiling
and walls. And he was standing in the middle.
"You either die a hero." He knew that voice. It was gruff, sounding
like somebody needed a throat drop. It was a powerful, authoritative,
frankly kind of scary voice. And yet it was completely familiar. He
knew that voice. However, it wasn't the voice that terrified him,
even though by all accounts it should. What terrified him was what
was happening to the room.
The room was changing. The black was slowly creeping on the white
walls, mixing it so that it was gray. The papers flew off of the
desk, landing on the scorch marks on the floor. Gunshots started
going off, hitting the white wall. Blood stains started to appear on
the floor near the desk. The desk exploded in a shower of splinters.
He ducked, holding his arms up to protect his head. When he looked up
again, the walls were gray: black swirled with white. The room was
equally pristine and chaotic. A few filing cabinets remained in
place, neat and spotless while the rest of them lay cluttered and
scattered on the floor.
"Or live long enough to see yourself become the villain." He knew
that voice as well. And he hated it. That chaotic, tense
voice. The voice of a man without any rules, without any plans. He
could faintly hear something burning in the background, but that
didn't matter. For some reason, this loss of the dichotomy, this
chaos, this blending of white and dark...that was what mattered.
"Guess which one you are?" And then laughter. Insane, reckless,
maniacal laughter. Laughter that rang in the man's ears even as he
started to wake up.
JOURNAL SAMPLE: [the writing is neat, even if it is a bit
blocky here and there] That goop was possibly the most disgusting
thing I've ever been in. I can't get the taste out of my mouth.
Pointless whining aside, can somebody tell me where the nearest
hospital is? I've got a [pause, inkblots] condition that I need to
get checked out. I don't think it's life-threatening, but I'm
curious. [another pointed pause]
And whoever took my memories? Give them back. Now. I'm the
type of person who doesn't take kindly to being messed around with.
ASPIRATIONS: In Edensphere, Rachel'll probably be a purposeless
shell of a man for a while. He's been spending his whole life
fighting for or against things, that he won't know what to do now that
he doesn't have a cause. However, I'm sure that he'll eventually find
a cause, be it figuring out what everything in the Sphere about or
simply trying to get all his memories back. And HOO BOY he's gonna be
trying his damndest to figure out who Rachel is. Because man oh man
is this a wonderfully embarrassing name to be stuck with.