On a scale of 1 - Poor 2 - Fair 3 - good 4 - Excellent 5 - superior Heath Ledger's performance is a 3. You have to wonder if the 9+ rating DK has with IMDb viewers is a sympathy vote. Notice that people under 18 give DK a 9.3 and people over 45 give it an 8.3. Call me and the +45's old fuddy-duddies but just maybe we have been around a while and know what quality is - DK is OK but not worth 9.3.

Heath Ledger's performance is about a 7 - Jack Nicolson's Joke, in my opinion, was much better. The portrayal of evil is a 4 (Excellent) but the overall story, subplots and getting to the end is armatures even for a comic book hero.

Also if I had to rate the 3 male leads performances it would be: 1 - Christian Bale 2 - Aaron Eckhart 3 - Heath Ledger