Last Monday, all across the country, thousands of people were tricked into wasting an entire day to watch a trailer three days before everyone else. Well, tricked implies they were going to put their time to good use anyway.

The viral marketing campaign for “The Dark Knight” came to a head today with a scavenger hunt that lead make-up wearing nerds on the search for clues at public locales, which led them to a movie theater for a screening of the new trailer.

Unfortunately, the trailer hunt didn’t go as smoothly as it sounded. In fact in some cities like Dallas, the hunt for Osama Bin Laden went more smoothly by comparison. According to the Dallas Observer’s Unfair Park blog, the cops showed up and spoiled the Joker’s fun.

The Joker’s entourage were summoned to a parking garage at a local mall where mall security guards immediately showed up and ordered people around. Some of the Renaissance Faire rejects thought this might have been part of the hunt, and I’m sure they would have stayed around right up until Mr. Tazer made his big screen debut.

After the crowd exited the mall and began searching for clues in the parking area, about a dozen cops swarmed the area and started questioning everyone. Police began questioning everyone in a clown mask, but most of them stayed in character, including Dopey, the world’s most appropriate named clown.

Eventually, the hunt was called off and they were herded into a theater where they got to watch a three minute trailer for a sure-to-be substandard sequel for almost getting stun gunned and arrested. I hope all the soiled underwear you’ll have to wash now, Dallas, was worth it.