Two-Face (Aaron Eckhart)

Running for District Attorney
In The Dark Knight, Harvey Dent has been elected DA of Gotham City. His election takes place during the viral marketing campaign that lead up to the film. He is supported by Bruce Wayne's love, Rachel Dawes.



Disfigurement


While trapped in an explosive-rigged warehouse, Dent falls knocks over a large can of gasoline which spills onto the left half of his face. Later, as Batman is saving him and the building explodes, a fire catches on the left side of his face, burning and disfiguring him into Two-Face.

Post-Disfigurement


Though Dent is taken to Gotham General Hospital, he refuses pain medication and skin grafts due to his grief and rage; he blames Rachel's death and his disfigurement on Batman, Gordon, and the Joker. Later the Joker breaks in and feeds him his hatred. Thus Two-Face is born. Harvey "Two-Face" is then seen confronting the corrupt cops and the mobsters one by one, flipping a coin to decide their fates. He is not seen again until the end of the film when Batman finds Gordon and his family with Dent at the building where Rachel died. Harvey proceeds to judge Batman, himself, and Gordon through the chance of coin flip, which he sees as the only fairness left in the world. Harvey shoots Batman in the stomach but before he can determine Gordon's fate, Batman tackles him over the side of the building, saving Gordon's son. Dent lies motionless on the ground, not clear if he was dead or not.

Behind the Scenes
Aaron Eckhart as Harvey Dent/Two-Face: The Gotham district attorney who is hailed as Gotham's "White-Knight"; Dent's battle with the Joker turns Dent into a murderous, disfigured vigilante called "Two-Face". Producer Charles Roven described Dent as initially the "white knight of the city". Wayne sees Dent as his heir, which comes back to the theme of him realizing that being Batman will be a lifelong mission, and the tragedy that follows when Dent is corrupted. Whereas Two-Face is an evil villain in the comics, Nolan chose to portray him as a twisted vigilante to emphasize his role as Batman's counterpart, and Eckhart, who has played corrupt men in films such as The Black Dahlia, Thank You For Smoking and In the Company of Men, notes: "He is still true to himself. He's a crime fighter, he's not killing good people. He's not a bad guy, not purely," while admitting: "I'm interested in good guys gone wrong." Nolan and David S. Goyer had originally considered using Dent in Batman Begins, but they replaced him with the new character Rachel Dawes when they realized they "couldn’t do him justice". Before Eckhart was cast in February 2007, Liev Schreiber, Josh Lucas, and Ryan Phillippe had expressed interest in the role. Nolan chose Eckhart, whom he had considered for the lead role in Memento, citing his "extraordinary" ability as an actor, his embodiment of "that kind of chiselled, American hero quality" projected by Robert Redford, and his subtextual "edge". For Two-Face's make-up, Eckhart warned, "When you look at him, you should get sick to your stomach. Being the guy under all that, well, that was a lot of fun for me. It's like you would feel if you met someone whose face had pretty much been ripped off or burned off with acid ... There are fans on the Internet who have done artist's versions of what they think it will look like, and I can tell you this: They're thinking small; Chris is going way farther than people think."