There’s always grumblings in the entertainment world of the last installment or the last movie of a franchise (‘Transformers’ anyone?). But this time it truly sounds like this movie will be his last as Christian Bale confirms he’ll no longer be playing the Caped Crusader in an interview with the Philippine Daily Inquirer.

It’s been 6 years since Bale first put on the Batman cowl and he admits that playing the character of Bruce wayne/Batman was “very enjoyable.” He also had some kind words to share about his co-stars.

Regarding Joseph Gorden-Levitt:

“Joseph is a very intriguing guy. I would see Joseph’s performances in other films while we were filming. He’s somebody who truly seems to love acting. He’s a good, smart guy. He did a very good job in the movie.”

Bale also praised Tom Hardy as “phenomenal” with regards to his work as Bane:

“I like working with him a great deal. He goes the whole hog. I know that Bane has been seen in movies before. But, in my eyes, Tom is essentially creating Bane for the first time so there’s great freedom for him to be able to do so.”

But the person he felt had the hardest role to overcome was Anne Hathaway:

“I had plenty of scenes with Anne … and I was there when we did the screen test for her. The thing that I said to Chris [Nolan] that day was that there were many very accomplished actresses who had read for the role. I’m terrible at auditions, so I’m very impressed when somebody really seems to acquire an ownership of a character without having worked on it or prepared for some amount of time. I saw that in Anne. When Chris watched the screen test, he agreed that Anne did a wonderful job. In many ways, she has the hardest job. There are a number of people who feel that the Catwoman role has been defined previously. So, I always saw Anne’s role as being the toughest job of any of us.”

Bale confirmed that the production of ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ has finished filming and that last week when he wrapped up his scenes was “the last time (he’s) taking that cowl off.” “…it’s all done,” he continues to say, “Everything’s finished. It’s me and Chris –that will be the end of that Batman era.” This should come to no surprise as last year before filming began he told E! News that “this will be, I believe, unless Chris (Nolan) says different; this will be the last time I’m playing Batman.”

‘Batman Begins’ earned more than $372 million worldwide while its 2008 sequel, ‘The Dark Knight’ pulled in over $1 billion. With a budget of $250 million for ‘The Dark Knight Rises,’ the last of the Nolan trilogy is expected to earn much more and break box office records.

So with this being the end of the ‘Dark Knight’ series, is this the end of ‘Batman’ films or would you be willing to see another reboot of the franchise?