10. The Prisoner

Most wouldn’t pick this seemingly random character from The Dark Knight, whom Batman never even meets on screen, as important to Batman’s crime-fighting career. But for the story and the audience’s reaction to seeing Tommy “Tiny” Lister’s huge, imposing presence on the screen as a handcuffed prisoner, he perfectly plays on our preconceived notions of a bad guy. It’s Deebo from Friday, man. In Dark Knight’s epic ferry scene, the Joker (Heath Ledger) rigs two separate ferries with explosives, one holding citizens and one holding prisoners, and places each ferry’s detonator on the opposite boat. He wanted to show Batman that the citizens of Gotham aren’t worth saving because they’d kill each other to save themselves.

No one saw that ingenious plan being shattered not by a good, upright, working citizen but by this criminal who took it upon himself to do what the police and the citizens on the boats couldn’t. He was the one who knew the only choice was to choose life over the false choice of “survival.” Batman’s speech to the Joker after the boats in Gotham Harbor fail to explode is due to someone who could be on the opposing side of the Dark Knight. Did Batman inspire this person to make this choice, or did even the lowest in Gotham have enough moral and ethical standards and community with everyone in Gotham to inspire Batman from falling to the Joker’s nihilistic outlook and continuing to protect the city?