Winston Chu has a bulging, tattooed body, a gold-plated gun and a massive square head. He’s a gangster, so that face is locked into a permanent scowl, a symptom of years of steroid abuse and a childhood under the fist of a psychotic mother with an unhealthy love of cleavers.

Welcome to life in the triads.

Mrs Chu is your mother, too, in a sense. You’re Wei Shen, undercover cop, on a mission to bring down the triads from the inside. The trouble is, once you’re initiated, you’re family. Another brother in a grotesque gang of crooks and killers. You’ll spend most of your time in this richly realised, open-world Hong Kong performing missions for thugs, the better to get close to the sharp suits who run the show.

It’s a good enough excuse to step into the slippers of every Hong Kong action movie hero of the last 30 years. There are shadows of Bruce Lee in Wei’s fighting style as he fends off knife attacks in alleys. In gun fights he channels Chow Yun Fat, vaulting over tables and hosing down enemies in slow motion. On rooftops, he trades on Tony Leung’s ability to look cool in a suit by putting on shades and standing still in front of sunsets. Sleeping Dogs occasionally delivers these moments with more style than any other member of the Mafia/GTA family, but they’re folded into a humourless and predictable tale set in a Hong Kong that often feels like a beautiful backdrop rather than a bustling, interactive city.

At the time of writing this  The Dark Knight Rises review, it is impossible to view the finale to the story of Bruce Wayne and his crime-fighting alter-ego, Batman, as just a movie. The film arrives on a wave of massive hype, yet it is still trying to outrun the long shadow of its predecessor, The Dark Knight - a film that not only set a new bar for what a comic book movie could be, but also blew away critics, snagged two Oscars, and excited fans to the tune of a $1 billion worldwide box office. TDK also changed the course of the industry by launching the “full IMAX” trend in filmmaking, and even coerced the Oscars to expand its Best Picture category to include more nominees (after Nolan’s film was snubbed).

In that sense, it’s almost impossible for The Dark Knight Rises to meet the level of expectation facing it – but has Chris Nolan managed to end his Batman legend on a note that will at once please fans and critics, tie off the story in proper fashion, and still deliver the biggest and best blockbuster movie experience of the year?
The answer to those looming questions is…sort of. The Dark Knight Rises does bring Nolan’s trilogy full-circle to a well-earned conclusion, and features a number of big blockbuster moments and will likely please many fans (and critics) – but it also stumbles in its execution of said conclusion, never really captures the sheer spectacle of films like The Dark Knight or Inception, and will ultimately leave some fans (and critics) cold with its very unique take on the Batman mythos.