My position is that the Schumacher Batman films are better than any Batman film that’s come out since, and it’s because of a fundamental ideological question:
Nolan, Snyder, Reeves, all of these guys, have continually asked, “What would Batman look like in the real world?” And the answer has meant grittier, darker reboots all inspired by the same couple of Miller books. They need to constrain Batman to things that “make sense” and find ways to make him “seem realistic.”
Schumacher, and Burton before him, asked the much more entertaining question: “What would the world need to look like to idolize a vigilante in a furry costume?” And that opens up so many more possibilities, so much more fun. The Riddler made elaborate pop-up clues rather than staging brutal crime scenes. Two-Face didn’t mourn his almost-relationship with an assistant DA because he was too busy macking on a different girl for each face. Bane? Doesn’t matter if I could understand him, because he doesn’t have any lines anyway. He’s still the evil lady’s main henchman, but now he’s actually monstrously big.
The '90s approach says yes to every wild idea the directors had, every silly gag from the comics or other TV that it wanted to steal, because it wasn’t beholden to a sense of the real. It was okay to enjoy the silly superhero movie on its own terms.
Unfortunately, we’re stuck in a world where each decade brings a grimmer, darker reboot of Batman.
I agree with you wrt Batman Returns and Batman Forever. Batman and Robin was just plain bad, though. It was a comedy that wasn’t funny.
But yeah, Batman fundamentally can’t exist in the real world. Other superheroes have an acknowledged break from reality that allows them to work (“It’s like the real world except there’s this alien who’s physiology allows him to leap tall buildings in a single bound,” “It’s like the real world except a 1 in 10^1,000,000 radiation accident gave a kid spider-powers”, etc.) but Batman doesn’t have this. We’re expected to believe that Batman became a superhero just because he really wanted to be one. The only way Batman makes sense is if the world he lives in is fundamentally off-kilter.
My position is that the Schumacher Batman films are better than any Batman film that’s come out since, and it’s because of a fundamental ideological question:
Nolan, Snyder, Reeves, all of these guys, have continually asked, “What would Batman look like in the real world?” And the answer has meant grittier, darker reboots all inspired by the same couple of Miller books. They need to constrain Batman to things that “make sense” and find ways to make him “seem realistic.”
Schumacher, and Burton before him, asked the much more entertaining question: “What would the world need to look like to idolize a vigilante in a furry costume?” And that opens up so many more possibilities, so much more fun. The Riddler made elaborate pop-up clues rather than staging brutal crime scenes. Two-Face didn’t mourn his almost-relationship with an assistant DA because he was too busy macking on a different girl for each face. Bane? Doesn’t matter if I could understand him, because he doesn’t have any lines anyway. He’s still the evil lady’s main henchman, but now he’s actually monstrously big.
The '90s approach says yes to every wild idea the directors had, every silly gag from the comics or other TV that it wanted to steal, because it wasn’t beholden to a sense of the real. It was okay to enjoy the silly superhero movie on its own terms.
Unfortunately, we’re stuck in a world where each decade brings a grimmer, darker reboot of Batman.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=2uMLIs4vN84
I agree with you wrt Batman Returns and Batman Forever. Batman and Robin was just plain bad, though. It was a comedy that wasn’t funny.
But yeah, Batman fundamentally can’t exist in the real world. Other superheroes have an acknowledged break from reality that allows them to work (“It’s like the real world except there’s this alien who’s physiology allows him to leap tall buildings in a single bound,” “It’s like the real world except a 1 in 10^1,000,000 radiation accident gave a kid spider-powers”, etc.) but Batman doesn’t have this. We’re expected to believe that Batman became a superhero just because he really wanted to be one. The only way Batman makes sense is if the world he lives in is fundamentally off-kilter.
Jim Carrey Riddler might be my favorite movie Batman villain.
Kay apparently strongly disagrees.