Why Is Christian Bale’s Batman Bigger Than Tom Hardy’s Bane?

I don’t know much about comic books, but I do know one thing, in the Batman and/or DC Comics Universe, the character of Bane is supposed to be a hulking behemoth.  Bigger than Batman.  The use of venom, or some other nerdlinger comic book potion, is said to be akin to juicing up hard on ‘roids.  Or something to that effect.

So why did Christopher Nolan cast a midget as Bane, in The Dark Knight Rises?  Not only is Tom Hardy not bigger than Christian Bale, he’s not even the same size as him.  Check out the picture above, Bale has 15lbs of lean muscle on Hardy.  In fact, Tom Hardy is three inches shorter than Bale and had to wear three inch shoelifts in the movie just to be able to look Bale square in the eye.

Even when Hardy looks ‘the same size’ as Bale in the movie, it’s often not even him.  Look at the picture above, that’s Tom Hardy.  Look at the .GIF below, that’s Buster Reeves, Tom Hardy’s stunt double.  Notice the obvious difference in his deltoids and biceps.

Christopher Nolan used doubles to make Bane appear swole!

Grounded reality, cry the Nolanites.  The fuck outta here!  It’s a movie about a man dressed as a bat, sourced from a comic book.  As if the rest of that movie was in any way realistic in the first place, tell me, how many Police Chiefs do you know are capable of disarming a neutron bomb?  The whole story was preposterous, yet they argue a supposed case of “realism” for the cast?  Bane is supposed to be 6’2, 240lbs, or in that ballpark.  Hugh Jackman, not that I’m saying he should’ve been cast, is 6’2 and I’m sure could’ve bulked for such a role, so don’t tell me Hollywood doesn’t have “actors” bigger than Bale.

In fact, imagine for a minute Hardy was cast opposite Ben Affleck, the new Batman.  Affleck is 6’2.5 tall, and usually in superb condition.  Casting Hardy opposite Affleck would simply not have worked, outright, and either he or Hardy would’ve been fired because of it.  Not even 5.5 inch shoelifts would’ve worked there.  Even Buster Reeves would’ve looked too small.  Noland would’ve been in a jam then, eh?  Now Tim Burton wouldn’t have had such a problem.  Because there’s a director who would’ve risen to the challenge of casting a truly imposing (yet somehow convincingly realistic) Bane.  He would’ve simply said “you are too small”.  Sad that McDonalds toy contracts ended his trilogy…