Character Analysis
As much as we hate to say it, this is pretty much a big boy's movie, and the major female character doesn't have a lot to do other than support her men and be brave in the face of a gruesome death. It's not cool, and we're glad to see superhero movies ramping up their act a bit with the likes of Catwoman and the Black Widow running around.
To be fair, Rachel Dawes isn't too bothered by it.
This fast-talking career gal has known Bruce since they were little kids, and what he does by night, she does in the brightness of day. She puts crooks away like her squeeze Harvey. She just does it with a little less psychosis and a lot more belief in the power of the law. That makes her purer than either Harvey or Bruce, though to be fair she neither watched her parents die in front of her nor got to listen to the person she loved the most die while gasoline put the sizzle on her face.
To a certain extent, Rachel represents everything that's good about Gotham City. She's able to keep Bruce's secret without entirely condoning it and she reminds Harvey that he's not nearly as slick as he likes to think he is. That serves to balance their fervor with practicality, and to keep their feet on the ground even if they're swinging across rooftops with a cape billowing behind them. She's their rock, their weight, the firmament on which they stand. Without her, who knows what those two might be capable of?
Okay, scratch that. We know exactly what they might be capable of, since she gets blown up by the Joker's bomb midway through the film. Bruce's grief overwhelms him, but doesn't stop him from doing what he has to do (that's why he's the hero) while Harvey uses it as an excuse to do what his nasty temper has always told him he should do. When she dies, a little bit of them dies with her, and like the rest of Gotham, their souls come a little closer to pure madness.
You may have noticed something else here. Rachel's role in the story is defined by her relationship with men. On her own, she doesn't have any qualities other than "ethical lawyer" and "nice girl who can keep a secret." This is what people are talking about when they say women characters don't have a lot to do. When your most important dramatic moment is to die horribly just so your fiancé can go on a coin-flipping rampage of revenge, it kind of diminishes little girls' ability to find something relatable in you. None of that is Rachel's fault of course, but considering that she's probably the Caped Crusader's only real friend, we'd like to have seen the movie give her a few more cool things to do.