The Dark Knight Viral Campaign Continues?

For those that have followed the viral marketing campaign for this summer’s upcoming blockbuster, “The Dark Knight” may have some serious doubts about it’s future. Between the months of July through December of last year (with a short hiatus in September) fans of the film were introduced to an underground recruiting crusade led by the Joker (played respectively by the late Heath Ledger). It all started with a countdown to Comic-Con, the famous California convention that hosted geeks and nerds world-wide, where “recruits” were led around the city in an online/real-world scavenger hunt in which the payoff turned out to be the first teaser trailer. It was just the beginning, but it left those participating waiting for more.

Soon after came the pumpkin, which day-by-day gradually started to resemble the famous cover from “The Long Halloween,” a graphic novel from which Christopher Nolan has stated The Dark Knight draws the majority of its inspiration from. Soon after, cities around the globe found themselves surrounded by people in joker makeup in front of various landmarks, the outcome of the November challenge, which revealed The Gotham Times, a newspaper that brought the campaign to an entirely new level and opened up the fan-base to a larger-than-life-scope ARG (alternate reality gaming) world. Fans were exposed to a variety of sites, from The Gotham Police Department to a memoir page dedicated to a girl caught in mafia cross-fire. Each site (over two dozen in total) contained clues and hints on how to get to the next level of the game, a progression of puzzles and riddles contained on the Why So Serious? site. The final step of the game required participants to race against each other to track down an assortment of bakeries in cities across the U.S. Once there, they would acquire a cake under the name “Robin Banks”, a cake inside of which held a plastic bag containing a joker card, a list of instructions, and a cell phone with a charger. The cell phone contained messages requesting that it be kept at the finder’s side 24/7, to await further instructions. Once all the cell phones were activated via voicemail, the site revealed the new teaser poster, tickets to the 7-minute prologue sequence shown in IMAX theaters before I Am Legend and the very first theatrical trailer for The Dark Knight.

That was the middle of December. Aside from a text message notifying the carriers of the phone that the lease was being extended through January, fans haven’t heard a word. And then, last week, Heath Ledger tragically passed away in his NYC apartment.

So where does this leave the marketing campaign? Unfortunately, the Joker’s game may be over. And understandably so. For one, the trades report that there’s been a shakeup of sorts in the Warner Bros. advertising division that’s been leading the campaign so far. The Creative Department has undergone a major restructuring and most of the team responsible for the creation of this campaign are no longer active in its continuance. Also, it’s a touchy decision to maintain the project directly on the heels of the death of the actor whose character is driving the entire campaign. Could it move forward effectively without exploiting his loss? Or could The Dark Knight marketing drive pay homage and respect to an actor that poured his entire being into this character. I believe it to lean somewhat closer to the latter, under the notion that the fans out there truly respected Heath and his devotion to the film and the performance, driving them to become even more dedicated to the campaign and the film that will stand as Heath Ledger’s final completed work.

And so it seems, the campaign will drive on, as just as recently as last night, I received word from a recent friend whom acquired the Cleveland phone that text messages have sprung up again, renewing the phone’s contract through the end of March. Whether the focus of the campaign is to sway more towards the Gotham corruption and Harvey Dent character has yet to be determined, but in all respect, “the show must go on.” For whatever reason, I have a feeling that Heath may have agreed.