I tend to give DC a lot of flak for their frustrating live-action movies in recent years. The best one, by far, was Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman, which had a handful of cool scenes and broke some new ground by focusing on a female superhero – but even there the plot was quite pedestrian and, as a feminist text, the film remained pretty superficial (for a much more thought-provoking meditation on the character, watch Angela Robinson’s Professor Marston and the Wonder Women). Meanwhile, Marvel Studios continues to score one hit after another: this year alone, we got Black Panther (which blew everyone away with its political take on the notion of, not just a black superhero, but an African super-country) and Avengers: Infinity War (which amazingly pulled off a Star Wars-level epic space opera / crossover event, complete with geeky nods, over-the-top slugfests, and personal sacrifices galore, not to mention a killer ending).
That said, not everything is wrong in the world of DC-related filmmaking. Notably, it’s worth keeping an eye on the company’s animated line. For instance, while Sam Liu’s Batman and Harley Quinn was far from perfect, that movie occasionally brought back some of the old BTAS magic (albeit with tons of sex jokes). The best of the lot, though, is Return of the Caped Crusaders, based on ABC’s Batman television show from the 1960s.
The original show was all sorts of fun – part cliffhanger-based adventure serial, part live-action cartoon for kids, part self-reflexive slapstick comedy (not too distant from Get Smart, from around the same time), with a touch of Andy Warhol. It was also insanely successful for a while, inspiring a nationwide wave of Batmania. Moreover, since the opening of its first episode – in which the Riddler attacked the Prime Minister of Moldavia with an exploding cake – the series was steeped in Cold War imagery (the Batcave even had a nuclear reactor). In fact, despite the parodic wholesomeness of the heroes, there was a super spy flair to the proceedings, as each episode would feature at least one gorgeous lady and one groovy deathtrap or a bizarre murder attempt, not to mention some outrageous set designs, a psychedelic soundtrack, and plenty of colorful smoke.
In one way or another, subsequent Batman comics have lived in the shadow of this show’s resonance in popular culture, sometimes riffing on it head-on.
World’s Finest (v2) #6
For the past five years, DC has been churning out all-ages books that follow the TV series’ tone and characters, cheerfully embracing its strangest features. For the most part, these comics have been delightful, even paying homage to one of my favorite recurring bits – the window cameos:
Batman ’66 #1
The recent crossovers Batman ’66 meets Steed and Mrs. Peel (by Ian Edginton and Matthew Dow Smith) and Batman ’66 meets the Legion of Super-Heroes (by Lee and Michael Allred) are especially entertaining, capturing the show’s lighthearted vibe while telling stories in a much bigger scale.
In the same vein, 2016 saw the release of an animated sequel: Return of the Caped Crusaders, directed by Rick Morales from a screenplay by Michael Jelenic and James Tucker. Naturally, a big selling point is how close the film feels to the TV series. Some of the old stars reprise their roles, including Adam West (the sexiest Batman), Burt Ward (the Boy Wonder), and Julie Newmar (Catwoman). You get the same kind of visual style heavily informed by Dutch angles, plus the obligatory onomatopoeic fight scenes (one of them in space!). In typical fashion, the villains’ plan makes little sense and the Dynamic Duo’s outlandish leaps of logic are a joy to hear, thanks to Adam West’s offbeat, deadpan delivery.
Embedded in the usual strain of tongue-in-cheek humor, there are metafictional winks for the fans, like when Batman gets hit on the head and momentarily visualizes the different actresses who played Catwoman in the series. As the title suggests, the film has its share of fun at the expense of Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns and Tim Burton’s Batman Returns – a key plot point involves West’s upbeat adventurer gradually turning into a brooding, sadistic anti-hero, highlighting how preposterously this attitude would work out in such a wacky reality.
Even viewers unfamiliar with the old show – or who don’t hold it in high regard – can still have a good time watching Return of the Caped Crusaders. For one thing, the animation is pure eye candy, including a kickass car chase and a wonderful credits sequence built around classic comic book covers. Moreover, many of the scenes are just plain funny – for instance, the opening with Robin learning to ballet dance as part of his crimefighting training is the sort of thing that both sounds goofy and it actually makes sense in an oddball kind of way, once you’ve accepted everything else around it (which is the essence of Batman’s world, at the end of the day).
Last year, the team reunited for another madcap sequel, Batman vs. Two-Face, which introduced the titular villain (voiced by William Shatner) by giving him a silly origin worthy of the show’s campy spirit. All in all, both these films are a hoot, despite the absence of further window cameos…