there's a couple of issues i have to take with your assessment, mostly that this review doesn't really seem to be about the film The Dark Knight at all. obviously your own personal morality is your own personal morality, but when you "review" a film, your goal is to try to discover the point of the film or the meaning of the story and then discuss how well or poorly the film achieved it's goal of putting across its point or meaning in an engaging way. you don't just say "i didn't like the moral of the story and so the story sucked."
the only moral course of action is to kill him. And Batman fails to do this. Why? I can't tell.
the whole point of the Nolan retelling of the Batman story is to try to get it as far away from the idea of the "superhero" as possible. Nolan has gone to excruciating detail to tell stories about a world in which the Batman is realistically possible. first of all, in Nolan's version Batman hasn't read the last 80 years of Batman comics. the character of Bruce Wayne doesn't know that the Joker is totally irredeemable and will continue to break free from jail over and over and over again. they say so directly when Bruce is attempting to rationalize the Joker's actions and Alfred tells him such a task is futile. remember, in the timeline of Batman Begins / The Dark Knight Bruce has only been at his crusade for a short time. and by the time he encounters the Joker on top of the building the Joker has only been active for...what...a few weeks at the most? even if Bruce Wayne was willing to kill, he has no way of knowing at this point in the movies' narrative that the Joker cannot be stopped by any other means.
you are correct in correctly identifying Harvey Dent's correctly identifying the Joker as a terrorist, but you've missed the entire point of the film in saying every single murder that the Joker now commits is on Batman's head, as far as I can tell. the whole point of the Joker's plan is to make everyone - include Bruce - believe that. his goal is to prove that everyone in the world, below the surface, is as twisted and evil as he is. read Alan Moore's The Killing Joke, which actually provided a lot of spiritual substance for the Nolan version of The Joker. the Joker's grand plan is to prove that everyone is easily corruptible, and that madness lies just beneath everyone's facade. by claiming that Batman is responsible for all the murders committed by Joker's manipulation, and making everyone play into that false reality he is playing with the ultimate firepower: fear. it's the same game that government's play when they tell their citizens to rat out their neighbors or else "the terrorists win".
Batman doesn't kill the Joker for one very specific reason: by the end of the film he has realized that he himself is walking on a very thin razor's edge of becoming the Joker. the Joker is a man of obviously high intelligence and skill who is capable of bringing an entire city to its knees through selective intimidation and flashy tricks - the same exact techniques Bruce is using in an attempt to inspire Gotham to rise from it's knees and stand. Or, to be less melodramatic, imagine that you - in real life - began dressing up in body armor and patrolling the streets of your city, beating up criminals. one day, you are put in a situation where you have a choice of killing a criminal. if you kill him, then this murder will eventually cause great harm to your psyche. not "possibly," and not because you are weak, but because you are a real human being and no human being can kill another without being deeply affected and psychologically altered. In the comics, it's true, Batman lets Joker live because you have to please the fans. in Nolan's version Bruce lets the Joker live not because he feels that the Joker should live, but because he realizes that if he crosses his self-imposed line and kills, it's only a matter of time before he becomes so cold and callous to life that he can no longer carry out his crusade. it is both a tactical decision and a human one.
no subject
the only moral course of action is to kill him. And Batman fails to do this. Why? I can't tell.
the whole point of the Nolan retelling of the Batman story is to try to get it as far away from the idea of the "superhero" as possible. Nolan has gone to excruciating detail to tell stories about a world in which the Batman is realistically possible. first of all, in Nolan's version Batman hasn't read the last 80 years of Batman comics. the character of Bruce Wayne doesn't know that the Joker is totally irredeemable and will continue to break free from jail over and over and over again. they say so directly when Bruce is attempting to rationalize the Joker's actions and Alfred tells him such a task is futile. remember, in the timeline of Batman Begins / The Dark Knight Bruce has only been at his crusade for a short time. and by the time he encounters the Joker on top of the building the Joker has only been active for...what...a few weeks at the most? even if Bruce Wayne was willing to kill, he has no way of knowing at this point in the movies' narrative that the Joker cannot be stopped by any other means.
you are correct in correctly identifying Harvey Dent's correctly identifying the Joker as a terrorist, but you've missed the entire point of the film in saying every single murder that the Joker now commits is on Batman's head, as far as I can tell. the whole point of the Joker's plan is to make everyone - include Bruce - believe that. his goal is to prove that everyone in the world, below the surface, is as twisted and evil as he is. read Alan Moore's The Killing Joke, which actually provided a lot of spiritual substance for the Nolan version of The Joker. the Joker's grand plan is to prove that everyone is easily corruptible, and that madness lies just beneath everyone's facade. by claiming that Batman is responsible for all the murders committed by Joker's manipulation, and making everyone play into that false reality he is playing with the ultimate firepower: fear. it's the same game that government's play when they tell their citizens to rat out their neighbors or else "the terrorists win".
Batman doesn't kill the Joker for one very specific reason: by the end of the film he has realized that he himself is walking on a very thin razor's edge of becoming the Joker. the Joker is a man of obviously high intelligence and skill who is capable of bringing an entire city to its knees through selective intimidation and flashy tricks - the same exact techniques Bruce is using in an attempt to inspire Gotham to rise from it's knees and stand. Or, to be less melodramatic, imagine that you - in real life - began dressing up in body armor and patrolling the streets of your city, beating up criminals. one day, you are put in a situation where you have a choice of killing a criminal. if you kill him, then this murder will eventually cause great harm to your psyche. not "possibly," and not because you are weak, but because you are a real human being and no human being can kill another without being deeply affected and psychologically altered. In the comics, it's true, Batman lets Joker live because you have to please the fans. in Nolan's version Bruce lets the Joker live not because he feels that the Joker should live, but because he realizes that if he crosses his self-imposed line and kills, it's only a matter of time before he becomes so cold and callous to life that he can no longer carry out his crusade. it is both a tactical decision and a human one.