Harvey Dent, the district attorney of Gotham City, is a central figure in Christopher Nolan's 2008 film The Dark Knight. Dent's journey from an idealistic crusader to the vengeful Two-Face is a tragic exploration of morality, chance, and the corrupting influence of chaos.
The Rise of Gotham's "White Knight"
Elected as Gotham City's district attorney, the idealistic Harvey Dent dedicated himself to ridding the city of organized crime. He was publicly revered as their "White Knight". Dent's unwavering commitment to justice made him a symbol of hope for Gotham, a city teetering on the brink of despair. His crusade against crime eventually led him to cross paths with the Joker, an anarchistic criminal mastermind who plunged Gotham into chaos. The Joker, recognizing Dent's importance to Batman and his fiancée Rachel Dawes, orchestrated a series of events designed to break Dent's spirit.
The Joker's Orchestrated Downfall
The Joker knew Batman's connection to Dent and Rachel Dawes, his fiancée, so he kidnapped them both and strapped them to two time bombs, telling Batman their locations, but only giving him enough time to save one. Batman chose to save Rachel, while the cops went to secure Dent. However, the Joker lied about the locations, both to philosophically challenge Batman and orchestrate Dent's downfall. When the Joker's bombs went off, Rachel was killed, and the left side of Dent's face caught fire (due to being covered in gasoline in his attempt to escape), leaving him hideously disfigured. This physical and emotional trauma marked the beginning of Dent's transformation into Two-Face.
The Birth of Two-Face: Vengeance and Chance
Harvey Dent's transformation into Two-Face. When the Joker's bombs went off, Rachel was killed, and the left side of Dent's face caught fire (due to being covered in gasoline in his attempt to escape), leaving him hideously disfigured. Two-Face learned that one of the cops in Gordon's unit, Wuertz, was corrupt and had given him over to the mob. Two-Face then confronted Gotham's reigning mob kingpin Sal Maroni, who told him that another corrupt officer, Anna Ramirez, had kidnapped Rachel. Two-Face then flipped the coin which landed good heads for Maroni, but bad heads for his driver, whom Two-Face then shot and killed. Two-Face takes his revenge. Finally, Two-Face confronted Ramirez, who begged forgiveness and said she had only done the mob's dirty work to pay her mother's hospital bills. Unmoved, Two-Face flipped the coin, which came up good heads; Two-Face spared her life, knocking her unconscious instead of shooting her. The coin, once a symbol of Dent's faith in justice, became a tool of chance, dictating life and death. The world is cruel. And the only morality in a cruel world is chance. Unbiased. Unprejudiced.
The Final Confrontation and a Hero's Sacrifice
Two-Face planned to take revenge on Gordon by killing the person he loved most: his son. As Gordon pleaded for the boy's life, Batman shows up, confronts Harvey, and rightfully tells him to "judge the people truly responsible for Rachel’s demise". Two-Face decides to flip for Batman, himself, and Gordon. Two-Face shoots Batman through the stomach when the coin landed on bad heads. He then flips for himself, sparing himself when the coin came up on good heads. He then decides to judge Gordon's son and flips the coin. The confrontation ends with Two-Face's death, a moment that forces Batman to make a difficult choice. To preserve the hope that Dent represented, Batman decides to take the blame for Dent's crimes in order to preserve the late DA's image as a hero and give the people of Gotham something to believe in.
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The Legacy of Harvey Dent
Dent's death was used to create a new law dubbed the "Dent Act", which gave law enforcement enhanced powers to prosecute criminals. The Dent Act all but eradicated organized crime in Gotham City, leading to eight years of prosperity and peace. However, Gotham was soon under the threat of a revolutionary terrorist leader known as Bane and his army called the League of Shadows - whose late former leader Ra's al Ghul had sought to destroy Gotham, which he believed to be corrupt and decadent beyond redemption. Eventually, however, Batman resurfaced and, after defeating both Bane and Ra's daughter Talia, went on to foil the League of Shadows' plan by apparently sacrificing his life to save Gotham City from a nuclear explosion. In reality, he faked his death and started a new life under a new identity. The Dent Act, born from tragedy and deception, becomes a symbol of a flawed system built on a lie.
The Duality of Harvey Dent's Character
Harvey Dent starts off as selfless, charismatic, astute, idealistic, fearless and cerebral. He showed slight cynicism and borderline cruelty towards criminals, such as Lau and Thomas Schiff. He was also extremely self-confident and rationally independent. He was motivated by his care for the people of Gotham and was selfless enough to do anything in order to protect them, even endanger his own life to the mercy of someone as sadistic and masochistic as the Joker. Largely because of his past of being a victim of repeated child abuse by his father, a retired cop, and the cops' failure to help him and his mom, he also had a pronounced hatred of the corruption that infamously plagued the Gotham City Police Department. However, after Rachel's death, Harvey was embittered beyond sanity and became murderous and smug. He also implied when encountering Detective Wuertz that he considered himself "half-dead." He became vengeful and obsessed with killing the men whom he believed to be responsible for Rachel's tragic death. He was ruthless, callous and showed all the signs of becoming a sociopath: Paranoia, carelessness, violence, manipulation, elusiveness, mercilessness, and disregard for the people's, and his own life. Similar to the Joker, he also was shown post-transformation to back out of earlier promises and at the same time technically keep his word, which is best demonstrated by how he dispatched Sal Maroni: After confirming who the cop who sold Rachel out was, he tried to flip a coin while threatening Maroni at gunpoint, doing so because he said earlier it "didn't hurt [Maroni's] chances" at surviving, and later proceeded to technically spare Maroni from being directly shot by him due to the coin landing good side up, but then proceeded to shoot Sal Maroni's driver after choosing his fate via coin flip due to it going bad side up. And although he did not necessarily hate Gordon, he was still angry with him and held him responsible for Rachel's death and tried to teach him a lesson to know what it feels like to lose everything, and still dispatched him as well. During his final confrontation with both Batman and Gordon, Dent, when told by Gordon that the cops were creating a perimeter around the building they were in and that the place was surrounded, Dent said "You think I want to escape from this? There is no escape from this!", implying that he by that point was willing to commit suicide. This was also reinforced when he willingly put a gun to his own head when deciding to judge via coin toss those most responsible for what had occurred, with it being strongly implied that he was willing to kill himself had the coin gone bad side up. However, that could have just been due to Batman telling him to point it at either him, Batman, or Gordon. After his death, he became incredibly charismatic: The people of Gotham looked up to his legacy and for what he was believed to have stood for. Batman decided that Harvey Dent was the hero of Gotham, not him, showing that he knew that Dent would appeal to the people as the fallen idol. He was still capable of showing mercy to a certain extent, as he spared Ramirez from being killed despite her role in selling him and Rachel out to the Joker, and by extension the latter's death (settling only for punching her out instead), spared Joker, and avoided killing Sal Maroni directly via gunshot. However, it's heavily implied if not directly stated that he only spared them because the coin went good side up. The character of Two-Face serves as a commentary on the fragility of morality and the ease with which even the most virtuous can be corrupted.
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