But the opportunity to avenge his parent's deaths is cruelly taken away from him by fate. Fleeing to the East, where he seeks counsel with the dangerous but honorable ninja cult leader known as Ra's Al-Ghul, Bruce returns to his now decaying Gotham City, which is overrun by organized crime and other dangerous individuals manipulating the system. Meanwhile, Bruce is slowly being swindled out of Wayne Industries, the company he inherited.

The discovery of a cave under his mansion, along with a prototype armored suit, leads him to assume a new persona, one which will strike fear into the hearts of men who do wrong; he becomes Batman!!! In the new guise, and with the help of rising cop Jim Gordon, Batman sets out to take down the various nefarious schemes in motion by individuals such as mafia don Falcone, the twisted doctor/drug dealer Jonathan 'The Scarecrow' Crane, and a mysterious third party that is quite familiar with Wayne and waiting to strike when the time is right.

First off expect this Bats to be grounded more in reality which is why there's no costumed villains, little focus on gadgets, and a bigger role for Bruce Wayne - Director Chris Nolan says "I felt like doing the origins story of the character, which is a story that's never been told before. The world of Batman is that of grounded reality, ours will be a recognizable, contemporary reality against which an extraordinary heroic figure arises".

Helping that reality is Gotham City which won't be the stylised version we've seen in the Burton/Schumacher films, rather most of it will be on-location work in New York & London which will be assembled together to reinvent Gotham as a modern day metropolis - "Gotham will seem like this great city in a contemporary world and will be created through various cities, we are trying to avoid a villagey feel for Gotham, as it starts to get claustrophobic".

Expect the marketing angle to call this a re-imagining of the Batman franchise - WB Production Pres Jeff Robinov says "It's almost impossible to reinvent Batman, Chris is reintroducing Batman, and it feels smart and cool and fresh. That's no disrespect to the other movies, but it's really Chris' vision of Batman, and that's what we're supporting".