The Dark Knight Loses Out to the Joker on eBay

The newest Batman installment, appropriately-named The Dark Knight, had my buddies and I buzzing this past week. None of us are particularly huge Batman geeks, but Batman Begins, the "we're kind of starting this franchise over" film released in 2005, was extremely entertaining. We also all happen be big fans of Christian Bale, the latest actor to portray Bruce Wayne (and if you are as well, check out The Prestige...and also The Machinist if you want to see someone take method acting to an insane new level).

But coming out of the theater (the movie lived up to the hype, by the way), we could only talk about Heath Ledger, who provided a chilling new twist on his character, The Joker. By now almost everyone knows about Ledger's tragic passing, and his fantastic performance here yet again underscores what a loss to the acting world that was. But it turns out that The Dark Knight is helping keep Ledger's legacy alive and well here on eBay. After I fired up eBay Marketplace Research, I saw that "Heath Ledger" items, of which between about 400 and 900 items had been selling each week over the past month, were taking off - in the week leading up to opening night, almost 1200 items had been sold. By comparison, roughly 150 "Christian Bale" items sold that same week. Just like in the movie, it looks like The Joker has stolen the show.