First Image of Catwoman in 'The Dark Knight Rises' Appears Online

Official information regarding "The Dark Knight Rises" has been slow to come out and when it does it tends to be in very controlled way. This degree of control has become typical of director Christopher Nolan. Despite the secrecy there has usually been some build up to the release of anything official, so it came as a slight surprise when TheDarkKnightRises.com put up the first image of Selina Kyle, aka Catwoman without notice or fanfare. The image is the first look that the public has received of Anne Hathaway in the role. It's an image that answers some questions while raising others.

The first thing that fans will notice is that Hathaway's outfit seems incomplete. She is sporting what looks like a high tech version of the goggles the character currently wears in the comics and a tight black body suit, however there is no hint of the mask or hood that would sport the signature cat ears. Instead Hathaway's face is uncovered (besides the goggles) and her hair is freely flowing behind her. This begs the question as to whether the character will ever don the full costume that fans know and love. It's possible that the image is from a scene prior to her making use of the mask. However, given that from the very beginning Nolan and others taking part in the film have referred to the character as Selena Kyle and not as Catwoman she may actually never appear in the complete outfit.

The other notable feature of the image is that Hathaway appears to be riding the Batpod, which was introduced in "The Dark Knight." This would seem to answer the lingering question of whether she would be Batman's adversary or ally. While it's not impossible for the character to have stolen the Batpod it seems more likely that Batman gave it to her willingly, which would make her his ally. Catwoman in the comic books often flips back and forth between being at odds with the Dark Knight and fighting at his side so the film version could have gone either way.

The most likely reason that the image was released so suddenly was to get ahead of any potential paparazzi images. "The Dark Knight Rises" is currently shooting on location in Pittsburgh. Various unofficial images have surfaced from photographers who've managed to snap shots of outdoor filming. Nolan and his team probably didn't want the first images of one of the new key characters to be low quality spy photos. An apparent confirmation of this theory came when only hours later a number of spy photos of Hathaway on the Batpod emerged online.