Batman/Awesome Music


 * Danny Elfman's Batman theme is the only element of the original film series that the many people think Nolan films haven't come anywhere near topping. The opening titles are so awesome on the basis of the music alone that you can fail to notice that nothing's happening onscreen.
 * Nor have they topped the theme's reprise at the film's end
 * Incidentally, a reprise of this is the opening theme for Batman the Animated Series.
 * "Waltz to the Death," which is what the Joker and Vicki Vale were dancing to while Batman was beating up Mooks, is also quite amazing.
 * The latter two films in the series may not have been the greatest, but both include pop soundtracks that are actually enjoyable to this day. At the very least, no one can deny that "Kiss from a Rose" was the single of 1995.
 * And while still a distant third to Elfman and Zimmer/Newton Howard's scores, Elliot Goldenthal's score was one of the few genuinely decent things about the Schumacher films.
 * Goldenthal's score is an absolute Ear Worm.
 * The opening titles to Batman: Mask Of The Phantasm (at the beginning of video). Considered by some to be Shirley Walker's magnum opus.
 * "Molossus" and "Antrozous" from Batman Begins.
 * Whilst it seems to only be on the soundtrack to Batman Begins, not in the actual movie (at least, not in it's entirety), "Lasiurus" possibly sums up the essential character at the heart of Batman better than any piece of music (even some of the other fine pieces listed here) ever will -- it's dark, brooding and melancholy, and yet there's a subtle note of hope weaved in there that gradually and powerfully builds to a crescendo, giving the listener the impression that the night will end and evil will be overcome...
 * Artibeus, which also doubles as Nightmare Fuel.
 * From Hans Zimmer and James Newton Howard's The Dark Knight:
 * The opening track Why So Serious? sets the mood for the entire film. Amazing how much Nightmare Fuel is contained in a single note....
 * Listen to it over headphones, or surround sound in an acoustically perfect room; that single note jumps around, well... chaotically.
 * The Crystal Method's Remix of said song is not quite as creepy, yet... it is. In its own "Crystal Method way."
 * Like A Dog Chasing Cars pretty much sets the tone for this Batman, right down to a lapse into "Why So Serious?"
 * The last minute of Aggresive Expansion. If "Why So Serious?" builds up the tone of the Joker, this song smashes it down on you like a 5000 pound hammer. It's impossible to listen to this song without imagining him bursting into the room and holding a knife to someone's neck at the last second, and to top it all off, the scene it's used in is when he kills the goddamned judge and commissioner.
 * The sheer awesomeness of Agent of Chaos.
 * Harvey Two Face, especially in its stirring reprise of the love theme. Awesome in spite of the fact that the ending part doesn't show up in the film.
 * The Dark Knight Rises: DE-SHAY DE-SHAY BASHARA BASHARA