Batman: The Movie (1966) and the comics

[BatmanFurst]

A fair question that often gets asked is if West's Batman is so good, why does he get captured all the time?

The obvious answer is the studio adhering to the cliffhanger formula they established. However, talking in-universe, you can't undersell the threats he faces on a regular basis.

So my final retort is this: the fact he escapes every time in extraordinary ways allows him to regularly prove why he's so good.

In those comics from the early 40's thugs always got the drop on Batman. There are so many times where he gets knocked out from a criminal hitting him in the head.

[Silver Nemesis]

So my final retort is this: the fact he escapes every time in extraordinary ways allows him to regularly prove why he's so good.

Escapology is one of Batman's greatest talents, but in order for him to demonstrate it he must first be trapped. Countless comic stories have explored these scenarios, and the entire middle act of The Dark Knight Rises concerns him having to escape from the Pit. The scene where he escapes from Two-Face's trap at the beginning of Batman Forever is one of the most impressive in the movie. As you say, these escapes merely demonstrate another skill that Bruce has mastered and exemplify his indomitability.

In those comics from the early 40's thugs always got the drop on Batman. There are so many times where he gets knocked out from a criminal hitting him in the head.

Oh boy, I've lost count of the number of times the Pre-Crisis Batman got knocked out cold by regular street thugs. Younger fans who complain about the cathedral fight in the 1989 film and think Batman should instantly kayo every opponent without taking a hit should try reading some of those older comics.

[The Joker]

Oh boy, I've lost count of the number of times the Pre-Crisis Batman got knocked out cold by regular street thugs. Younger fans who complain about the cathedral fight in the 1989 film and think Batman should instantly kayo every opponent without taking a hit should try reading some of those older comics.

That's so true. Younger fans tend to forget that the prior cinematic interpretations to Batman 1989 took punishment left and right ('40s serials' , 60's tv show), but still continued to fight on despite the cards being clearly stacked against him. So the precedent was there. It was as if the character of Batman's determination and resolve literally overcame what a normal man was physically capable of absorbing.

Kinda like another character with a firm resolution.

[The Dark Knight]

I just found out about this the other day.

Batman 66 Meets Wonder Woman 77 of all places contains huge Westverse continuity information:

Dick went to College
Bruce worked with Batgirl for a while
Batgirl left to devote more time to her ailing father
Batman's enemies grew harsher
Joker found out Batman's identity and entered Wayne Manor
Alfred died of heart failure during the invasion
Bruce killed the Joker
Bruce retired
Robin stepped up as Nightwing

I can buy the timeline the comic presents, as Dick going to College was a season four idea, I believe. I've also long enjoyed the idea the joyful 66 Batman eventually became what we see in TDK Returns. We're not given specific details but Bruce killing Joker is where I start to get uneasy. I get the the point that the disillusioned 70s took hold, and it's a full decade after the golden age of the show. However I think an accidental death of some kind for Joker would be better, like Molly's fall in the batcave.

Do I consider this canon. Not right now. But it's an interesting Knightmare-esque take, nonetheless.

[BatmanFurst]

I haven't listened to it yet, but I saw that Hollywood Babble-on just posted a commentary for this film. It should be an interesting listen since Ralph Garman is such a hardcore 60's Batman fan.

[Silver Nemesis]

I just found out about this the other day.

Batman 66 Meets Wonder Woman 77 of all places contains huge Westverse continuity information:

Dick went to College
Bruce worked with Batgirl for a while
Batgirl left to devote more time to her ailing father
Batman's enemies grew harsher
Joker found out Batman's identity and entered Wayne Manor
Alfred died of heart failure during the invasion
Bruce killed the Joker
Bruce retired
Robin stepped up as Nightwing

I can buy the timeline the comic presents, as Dick going to College was a season four idea, I believe. I've also long enjoyed the idea the joyful 66 Batman eventually became what we see in TDK Returns. We're not given specific details but Bruce killing Joker is where I start to get uneasy. I get the the point that the disillusioned 70s took hold, and it's a full decade after the golden age of the show. However I think an accidental death of some kind for Joker would be better, like Molly's fall in the batcave.

Do I consider this canon. Not right now. But it's an interesting Knightmare-esque take, nonetheless.

I haven't actually read the Wonder Woman crossover comic yet, but I'm not sure I'd accept any of those developments as canonical. When it comes to the Westverse, the only things I consider 100% definitive are the original series, the 1966 movie and the 1967 Batgirl pilot. West and Ward played Batman and Robin in several later productions, but as with the Batman '66 comics, I think you have to be selective about what you consider canonical and apocryphal. All those later stories, including the comics, make for fun 'what ifs' but aren't necessarily definitive. For example, if you take the 1977 animated series The New Adventures of Batman as canon (I'm planning to make a thread about that show soon) then it obviously contradicts the idea of Dick becoming Nightwing by 1977. So does Legends of the Superheroes, which showed Ward's Dick Grayson still being Robin in 1979.

Not all of these stories can be canonical. Perhaps none of them are.

It's great that towards the end of his life West got to see an explosion of new Batman '66 stories and merchandise. But while I enjoyed the B66 comics and animated movies, I can't honestly say that any of them fully captured the feel of the TV show or 1966 movie for me. Perhaps one or two comic stories did, but a lot of them veered too far away from the style and formula of the TV series and towards a more generic tone that oftentimes felt inconsistent with the world Dozier created. For example, take the Batman '66 comic's depiction of Bane. They made some attempt to adapt him for the style of the Westverse – giving him a more colourful costume, toning down the backbreaker storyline – but it's still a far cry from what he would have been like if he'd actually appeared on the TV show. For one thing, he wouldn't have had that monstrous Jeep Swenson level of muscle.

Instead he'd have been played by a well known actor with a more realistic physique. I always imagined Ricardo Montalban would have been a good fit for a sixties Bane. He was a superb actor who made guest appearances in numerous American TV shows around that time (Bonanza, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Star Trek, Mission: Impossible, Gunsmoke, etc), but for some reason he never appeared on Batman. He was also an amateur bodybuilder, and while he was nowhere near as grotesquely proportioned as the comic book Bane (no prominent sixties TV actor was), I think he was big enough to embody the Westverse version of the character.

If a 5'9 Tom Hardy can be the Nolanverse Bane, then a 6'0 Montalban could have been the Westverse iteration. As far as costume goes, he wouldn't have worn his mask all the time. With the exception of False Face, the villains in the sixties TV show generally only wore their masks during capers. The rest of the time they showed their faces for the camera. Bane would have too.

There also wouldn't have been any references to steroids in the sixties TV show. Instead Venom would have been re-imagined as some kind of magic potion that temporarily boosts his strength, similar to Popeye's spinach. They also wouldn't have depicted him breaking anyone's back. Obviously fighting featured prominently in the sixties TV show, but the choreography always veered towards a safe family-friendly style that eschewed realistic bone-breaking moves in favour of cartoonish slapstick. They wouldn't have wanted the kids at home trying to imitate anything dangerous. So instead of showing Bane breaking someone's back, his strength would have been demonstrated simply by having him lift heavy objects. Perhaps pulling open the door to a sealed bank vault. That sort of thing.

There could have been a scene in his first episode where Batman and Robin are preparing to pursue Bane and his goons following a heist, so Bane drinks his Venom potion and steps out in front of the Batmobile. The car halts and Bane reaches down and lifts the front section off the ground. This would have been a simple special effect to achieve, raising the front two wheels with the aid of an off-camera jack while Montalban, or whoever was playing Bane, pretended to lift it. Bane would then drop the car suddenly, thereby damaging its suspension and preventing Batman and Robin from driving after him and his gang. Instead of breaking the Bat he'd have broken the Batmobile. Of course it'd be fixed by the next episode.

For the final showdown, I can imagine Batman and Robin surprising Bane in his lair. Bane then takes a swig of his magic voodoo Venom potion and Batman hurls a gas pellet at him. Bane confidently squares up to Batman and the two of them lock hands in a contest of strength. But to everyone's amazement, Batman is able to overpower Bane.

BANE: Ay, caramba! How can this be?!

BATMAN: Simple. That gas pellet you inhaled contained traces of my universal bat-antidote. It counteracts the effect of your magic voodoo Venom.

ROBIN: That's right, Bane! If you want to pit your strength against Batman, you'll have to do it like any honest hard-working athlete – without performance enhancing potions!

BATMAN: Well said, Robin.

BANE: Get them, men!

Cue fight music.

IMO that would have been truer to the spirit of the TV series. I'm not knocking the Batman '66 comic. I enjoyed it and I'm glad it was published. But sometimes the stories felt more like regular Batman comics guest starring West and Ward's version of the characters, rather than a true reflection of the unique world featured in the sixties movie and TV show. I'd say the same thing about the two animated feature films. I'm glad they were made, but I don't necessarily regard them as 100% canon. The same applies to the Wonder Woman crossover.

As for the idea of West's Batman killing Romero's Joker, that's an interesting 'what if' concept but definitely not something I would ever accept as part of the official canon. Here's some relevant fan art.

I haven't listened to it yet, but I saw that Hollywood Babble-on just posted a commentary for this film. It should be an interesting listen since Ralph Garman is such a hardcore 60's Batman fan.

I wouldn't mind listening to that. Garman's obviously a huge fan of the West Batman, but he's also a long-time defender of Batman Returns. I'll never forget the episode of Hollywood Babble-On that was recorded right after West died. Garman couldn't stop crying the entire show. It was very sad.

[thecolorsblend]

I've never rly approved of the idea of incorporating Bane into the 66verse. Bane doesn't fit into the Sixties mythos and he certainly doesn't fit with what Dozier was trying to create. Honestly, SN just gave the best attempt I've ever seen at using Bane in that universe. And I still don't agree with it (no offense SN). But that's the closest anybody's ever come.

I guess my hangup is the Dozier show had such a wide variety of unique villains that I don't grasp the novelty of Bane (or any post-66 character) being anachronistically inserted into that world. Plus, you already know that Bane won't kill anybody or use Venom. Those are two of his more important traits. And to be blunt, I think Bane has been watered down enough in live action interpretations already that advocating yet another watered down version just seems disrespectful to Dixon and (Graham) Nolan and what they were trying to achieve (again, no offense SN).

If Bane is to ever be adapted into live action again (which I don't necessarily need rn) then I'd like him to be the real deal: Batman's intellectual equal, Batman's physical equal and (with Venom) a stronger fighter than Batman.

[Silver Nemesis]

I understand why they used modern characters like Bane in the B66 comic, and at the time I was in favour of it. But looking at how little they adapted some of those characters for the style of the Westverse, I tend to agree now that it wasn't really necessary. There were plenty of villains that existed in the comics back in the sixties that never appeared in the TV show for various reasons. It might have been more interesting to focus on incorporating some of them into the Westverse instead of shoehorning in villains like Ra's al Ghul and Bane. A few examples:

•   Cavalier
•   Tweedledum and Tweedledee
•   Calendar Man
•   Mister Camera
•   Monarch of Menace
•   Kite-Man
•   Doctor No-Face
•   Firefly
•   Signal Man
•   Planet Master
•   Eraser
•   Dr. Tzin-Tzin
•   Zodiac Master
•   Dragonfly, Tiger Moth and Silken Spider
•   Spellbinder

All of these characters existed in the comics when the TV was on the air and all of them could have fit quite easily with the show's tone. Some might say that these villains were too obscure, but then surely Mister Zero was as well. He'd only appeared in a single issue of the comics before the TV show revived him as Mister Freeze and made him an icon. They could have done a similar job updating some of these other villains in the B66 comic.

It's interesting to note just how many of those characters I listed ended up appearing in Batman: The Brave & the Bold. That show really was the spiritual successor to the sixties TV series. On the subject of B:TB&TB, Babyface would have been a perfect addition to the Earth-66 gallery of rogues. He'd certainly have fit in a lot better than Bane.

[The Dark Knight]

I liked the B66 comic (some of the issues are really good) and think they more or less captured the spirit of the show but under circumstances that wouldn't have been possible on the show. They had larger scale plots that wouldn't have been attempted given budget constraints. They introduced new villains, which I still think was rather fun to see, even though strict Westverse purity demanded characters we'd already seen. They also had new vehicles.

Having Bane in the comics stretched things too far. It just wouldn't have happened for obvious reasons: the character had not been invented yet, thus he couldn't possibly be considered. The original show is canon in the strictest sense, and after that it's what we consider to be canon. I choose to view the comics as an extension of an idea. Especially when they started doing the 'Batman 66 Meets' crossovers.

Time obviously marched forward from the 1960s, but in the context of the universe it's a perfectly preserved time bubble, forever looped with bright adventures. That's the whole point of this particular brand, and I get that. I like the idea West became more jaded, but keeping it as a hypothetical idea is probably for the best.

The comics took advantage of their medium, and I can't begrudge them that.