I love all the film bat suits, from the '89 suit to The Dark Knight. I think they were all really well done. The only ones I didn't like was the blue nippled Clooney suit and that ridiculous silver "ice proof" armor in Batman and Robin.
Personally, I was a bit disappointed that we didn't get a new suit for TDKR. From film to film for the past 20 years it was like a traditional thing. One of the very first pieces of promotional material would be Batman's new suit, Batman's new vehicle and Batman's new toys. I still remember how excited I was when they first revealed the Begins suit picture where he's crouching on the rail in Arkham in 2004, or the Dark Knight suit where was standing on the squad car outside the MCU. That always makes for an exciting time and sort of sets the image and tone for that particular film.
TDKR had none of that. I remember holding out hope when they showed pictures/video of the Pittsburgh fight between Batman and Bane, but nope, never happened. Sure, from a story perspective, it might have been frivolous to introduce a new suit, but they did a good job of incorporating that concept in The Dark Knight? Batman is always looking for the latest in technology and upgrading his gear, 8 years later should have made no difference. Not when,
- In The Dark Knight, Bruce gave Fox some sketches and Fox had it done lickety-split
- Fox has "the Bat" for him
- Batcave is all decked out
- Bane beat the hell out of Batman and presumably took all of his gear
Would have been perfect for Fox to be like, "I've got just the thing" after he busts him out, or have a situation where it was needed. If Fox was making all these other Tumblers (let's remember, the Tumbler in Begins was in proto stages, not mass production), EMP guns, etc. What would stop him from making his own updates to the TDK suit? Seems like the sort of thing he'd do, especially when he encourages Bruce to come out of retirement. While it was cool to see the Batbunker again, I thought that was kind of lame and lazy that he some how utilized it for "spares". If you're going to go with the idea that he's been stripped of everything but the Bat. Thats he's lost everything from his butler to his wealth, then depict that with Batman. I think it would have been cool and appropriate to the story if Batman emerged for the "war" in a sort of streamlined, bare bones version of the suit. I'm not talking about him looking like Brian Douglas or any of those guys, but a really, well done "the people's Batman" for the climax of the film. Maybe something more like that statue at the end?
I dunno, something to say, "look, this is the TDKR Batman". Every film Batman has a specific "look" EXCEPT TDKR. I'm all about visual identity for the films, so even though I love the Dark Knight suit, I don't think I would have been against another Nolan costume. Batman's image is all about the costume and toys, like a sort of branding for each film.
Batman
- '89 armor, rough around the edges
- Batmobile
- Batwing
- nifty grapple gun (first time appearance instead of a "silk rope w/Batarang")
Batman Returns
- new streamlined, pristine armor
- Batmissile
- Batskiboat
- remote batarang
Batman Forever
- Panther suit
- Sonar suit
- new batmobile
- Batplane
- sonar batarang
Batman and Robin
- blue suit
- Ice suit
- new batmobile
- "Ice hammer"
- ice skates
Batman Begins
- Nomex prototype suit with skimask
- new Bat suit
- new batmobile
- new grapple gun
The Dark Knight
- Beat up Begins suit
- new, armored Bat suit (neck movement, first of it's kind)
- new Batpod vehicle
- sticky bomb gun
TDKR had the BAT and EMP gun, but was missing the new suit. Would have been nice to have. Begins had the "teh puffy" suit/Tumbler combo. Dark Knight had the TDK suit/Batpod combo. TDKR could have had the "TDKR suit"/The Bat combo.