Katie Holmes vs Maggie Gyllenhaal? - Batman

Holmes by quite a bit. She came across as way more likable version of Rachel Dawes who seemed very determined to make Gotham a better place as well as being strong/confident all while being vulnerable at the same time. (not to mention way more attractive )

Maggie Gyllenhaal came across as an arrogant snob in The Dark Knight. She came across as a cold selfish opportunist and I didn't care at all that she was blown to bits in the sequel either

I rewatched Nolans first two movies leading up to seeing The Batman and to my surprise enjoyed Batman Begins way more than the Dark Knight. I think it's a movie that works much better and while the early world traveling bits drag, as soon as he returns to Gotham and dawns of the Batman cowl the movie rules. I think it integrates it's villains really well while being a movie primarily about Bruce Wayne and Batman. While watching Dark Knight, and honestly groaning at how uneven it is, some sequences are amazing, but for the most part its so cringe and just sloppy in conception and execution. However I did appreciate Maggie Gyllenhaal so much more. In my early twenties when she was seemingly in every movie I thought she was unbearable, but now when I watch her in movies like this I see how much energy, personality and sexuality she brings to everything. If I had to guess when Nolan wrote The Dark Knight, the Rachel Dawes character was written just as wooden as she was portrayed by Katie Holmes. I don't think Katie Holmes put in a bad performance, I think she just played the role exactly as Nolan wrote it, stoic, unmoving, and just as a dispenser of virtue and justice. You could never see her version of Rachel Dawes walking the hallways with Aaron Eckhart suggesting they take the rest of the day off to go home and relentlessly bang, and you absolutely could never picture Christopher Nolan writing such a line, at least without blushing and immediately hitting the backspace key several times. Maggie Gyllehaal plays the Rachel Dawes character as a young ambitious professional. Her Rachel Dawes clearly enjoys what she does, it's not this burden placed upon her like Katie Holmes, she is excited talking about cases and laws, and apparently gets so excited about her work that it always leads her to banging whoever is DA. Her final scene is also really good because of how composed and strong she keeps herself while talking to Harvey Dent over the radio, while you can clearly see she's heart broken, terrified, and crying.