A Geek History of Time - Episode 86 - Batman through the Ages Part VIII

Episode Date: December 19, 2020

BELLS Blow in her face and she'll follow you anywhere. You are destroying the Constitution of the United States. May God have mercy on your souls. Good day. Yes. It's a very sad thing. We could be saying that we just elected the right white man to power. That's creepy, but that's a different category of creepy. Zizuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuzitzuz and find out what the fuckin' truth that man was trying to get at. Like with most episodes I can bring him back to wrestling. Oh, right. Well, he's got other people who work for him who also do things.

And they can get new take-out, human size, into smaller worlds after all. Fuck you. I still don't give a shit about getting fake property in a fantasy game. This is a geek history of time. Where we connect to the real world. My name is Ed Blalock. I'm a world history teacher with a site of English, in this case, remedial reading up here in Northern California, doing all of that over the interwebs.

And I have just recently actually gotten back into painting assembling and painting war him or 40K figures. I have just recently actually gotten back into painting, assembling and painting, wore him a 40k figures. The new ninth edition of the game has come out. I'm very excited about it. And yeah, I now actually kind of feel like with the direction, hopefully, knock wood, things are going in the world. I can feel comfortable going into a

religio-fascist fantasy world to relieve my stress without feeling guilty about doing it because the actual world is turning into a religio-fascist state. So that's where I am right now. Who are you? Sir. Well, I'm Damien Harmony. I'm a Latin teacher up here in Northern California, and no sides of anything. And I, in my spare time, yell at school boards.

It seems to be because there's a lot of that that needs doing right now. And have board will travel apparently, because I spent my entire day, yesterday, either in a meeting or teaching, or in a meeting, a union meeting, or at a school board, shaming people. So it's been fun. So I don't paint so much as I yell at school boards. So.

Well, you paint pictures with words. I do. You paint word pictures. Yeah. So you paint you paint word pictures full of many many many shades of furious red. Yeah. Rage high coup. I think this. Oh, I kind of now want to make rage high coup. I want to make that kind of kind of do. Fuck you. Goddamn son of a bitch. You. Other fuck.

They're fucking things still doesn't work. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah. Should have bought another. Yeah. So speaking of fascists, we were talking about Batman. And, oh. Wow, just gonna go right into the paint. Yes. Yes.

Yes, we we now have the point of analyzing the 89 bad man film, Keaton One. Yes. And now we're in the Michael Keaton Two. Okay. Yeah. Okay. The 92 bad man.

Yeah. What are you going to say? Okay. Well, no. Pick up. Keep going. I'll, the thought got lonely and left So when it when it shows back up all jump in with it all right. Oh, that's what it was. Sorry. It showed back up If you all could have seen the screen. I was leaning in about to start and he's like oh the thought is okay

Oh, wait, yeah, yeah You know, I think I think While we're talking about it being the keyton Batman, and I know we talked a little bit about it last time as well, but I kind of want to pick back up with it for a minute. Sure. Both of these movies are also Tim Burton films. Yes. And

like this is kind of where Tim Burton became Tim Burton. I would say this is where the studios recognized him as a huge draw, but I would say that Tim Burton became Tim Burton during Beetlejuice. Okay, I, but they recognized him as a huge draw at this point. Yes. Yeah, and well, and I think I think his his artistic Sensibility was definitely on display in in Beetlejuice definitely, but I think in Batman You know, there's there's the trope originator and then there's the trope codifier You know, definitely it was it was a Group I think yeah, and I think I think Batman is really where it was no no

this is This is this is his aesthetic and Like it became recognized as a quantity yes, I would, it's kind of like when Tom Hanks, like, or he's like, oh my God, Tom Hanks is Philadelphia, it was the movie he came out in. I'm like, no, he came out really big in League of their own, showing a lot of range, and that's what opened the door for that. I think you're right.

Beetlejuice showed he had a style that he was doing, and then through Batman, it was, oh, that is his style. Okay, that's not just that's not that that's not that was that movie. This is no no this is this is his this is his aesthetic. Yes. Yes. You know, and and I think I think it's really interesting to see visually his his I think it's really interesting to see visually his take on the visuals of Batman. You know, because we talked a little bit about the costume in that film being as powerful on us and as immediately iconic and as much of a departure as it was. Yeah. But it's not just the Batman costume.

The whole thing. The lighting. It's the lighting and the angles. And, you know, and I know, as I'm talking about it now, I remember it got mentioned that, you know, Wayne Manor in those films is this heroic scale edifice? Yes. That, you know, the entire place is entirely out of scale with human habitation. Yeah, that's a really good way to play it. Yeah, and it's and it's it's

Kind of like the Castle of Coussey in France, and I'm probably mispronounced in French name But if you read a distant mirror it focuses on the noble family that ruled that particular manner as a window into the 14th century. And one of the things that gets mentioned is that when Eel de Cousseis or Château de Cousseis was built, it was built on a heroic scale. Like it was intentionally known as all of the stairs here and it's not just the old trick about,

you know, we've got a half step here to trip attackers up. It was no no, everything in the place was built at a... Grand scale, my scale. Yeah, look at your scale. Yeah, and so, you know, Wayne Manor comes across in that way and and the lighting and all of the coloration and and everything it goes from

Really super saturated on certain colors to flat and unsaturated in other parts of the spectrum So real quick, I want to I just want to come back to this yielded kusi Yeah, they were or shateau good to kusi So real quick, I just want to come back to this Yildekuji. They were, or Shateo Gildekuji. It's a French castle, essentially. Yes. And if I recall correctly, the family that built it had previously been, oh geez, they came up from obscurity because they were executioners,

and they worked specifically for the Frankish kings. And so, yeah, they were the punishers, and that's why they built their Frank Castle. Nicely done. Thank you. Nicely done. We're not even 10 minutes in. Nope. At this point, we'll done. Thank you. We'llid on where not even 10 minutes in nope at this point nope will well done

Thank you. So saturated colors go on yeah So you know that there are certain parts of the spectrum that are they're like hyper saturated and part of this is in my memory Okay, so I could be I could be partially wrong about this but colder shades, like throughout the entire film, colder shades are very heavily saturated. And any kind of warm yellow, any kind of warm red, like if it's a hellish red, yeah, okay, we're going to saturate that one. But warm crimson tones, we don't seeate that one, but warm crimson tones.

We don't see getting that same kind of effect. And so we wind up having this very, very skewed. It's like taking a comic book and I'm going to fuck with the color shift. And yeah, just that is aesthetic. Well, it was something that subconsciously, you know, really, really hyper, or hyperinflated as a word, it comes to mind, but really emphasized the comic book roots of the material.

Yeah, well, if you remember remember I talked about the cinematography and the whole point was to show how tormented Bruce Wayne himself was. And that was kind of the first real time that you see Bruce Wayne as the central character of a Batman movie. And that was in many ways Tim Burton's biggest contribution to it. Yes you had the send up of metropolis, but much worse. I think I said it looked like Picasso, fuck German expressionism.

I don't remember whether or not you did say that. Yeah, I think that's fitting. But they chose it to be deliberately ugly and in torment with itself. And so yeah, when you do a color shift like that, it's definitely there to make people feel a little bit off Yeah, so yeah absolutely right and and that continues actually with the 92 one Which I dubbed the other Burton one and the other Keaton one

It's bad memory Sadly, it is kind of an also ran by comparison. Well, it's because it's the second one. You know, so there's, I mean, you can't all be gotten how they're part two or Empire Strikes Back. So, Bill Fingers still didn't get any credit. Nope. Despite the fact that the two characters in this one are specifically his creation, the two

villains. Now, the main idea behind this one isn't so much a focus on one villain or even the villain itself or on Bruce Wayne. It's really the focus is now on the mundane villain. So it kind of gets back to what you talked about when we talked about the 30s and 40s, where it's not super villains, it's mundane villains, it's gangsters. Yeah, mobsters, mobsters, mobsters,

corrupt politicians, bad cops. And in this case, it's Max Shrek, which is a total send up of the guy who played Count Orlov, who's from Nosferatu, and so you've got more German expressionism in there, who's from Nosferatu. And so you've got more German expressionism in there, but his name is Max Shrek. Yeah. Fuck me, how did I never spot that before?

God damn it. Oh, it gets better. Like Max Shrek is. He played by the way, played by the way, by Christopher Walken. There you go. And one of his most wonderfully, understatedly batshit roles.

Yes, like it's right up there with Zorn, from yeah, yeah. Yeah, it really is. So yeah, so they're taking the name Max Shrek from Count Arloff. And he's actually the only villain who has a plan. Everybody else is kind of activated. He's kind of behind the scenes.

So he's even manipulating or trying to manipulate, and then, you know, the host becomes the parasite, or the parasite becomes a host. He's trying to manipulate the super villain to his own gain. He's a Robert Barron from the 1800s, basically, and he dresses, like they took pictures of JP Morgan and said, make him look like that. I can totally believe that. And I would pull away from Robert Baron, and I would say he is a gilded age. Yes, industrialist. Yes. And he is essentially a German expressionistic combination with political cartoons of people taking graft.

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Straight out of a nasty cartoon. Yeah. Yeah. So here's some fun facts. Michelle Fyfer was not the original cat woman

The original cat woman was a net bending What yeah, because and that bending was in grifters and And Tim Burton was like I got to have her in here But she got pregnant. So she dropped out. Oh, mm-hmm. That would have been an entirely different fucking movie. Yes. Uh, that would have been like, mm-hmm. And you know, and the funny thing is, this is one of those cases where, you know, this person wasn't supposed to play this role, but like we're supposed to play

this role. Yeah. You can't imagine anybody else doing it. So Fyfer was kind of the second choice. She beat out a bunch of other women for the role and she was given a percentage of the box office, which I thought was pretty cool. No shit. Really? Yeah. Yeah. Jack Nicholson kicked that door open, man. Okay. Who?

Okay. Okay. Yeah. Who was it? What actress was it? Who made a huge big deal about I need to be Catwoman? I am, like, went on a couple of talk shows

in a Catwoman get up. You mean Patrick? Patrick? Yeah. Oh, I don't remember anything like that. Because I remember, hold on a second. I would love it if you would share. No, no, that would have been

well, while you're trying to, while you're trying to stretch your mind to figure that out, guess who played Oswald Cobblepott's dad? Oh, wasn't it Burton himself? No, it was Peeley Hart. Yes, nice job. Yeah, I'm shit.

I would not have guessed that if you would like put a gun to my head and like kicked me Oh, no, because I remember because I remember my my you know best friend and I Uh-huh seeing the movie in in the theater. Mm-hmm. We were both like wait No That can't end at the end of the film. We're like, oh my god, it's actually hip. That's yeah. So, okay, so this time Bruce Wayne is actually trying to pull someone else out of the darkness,

which is a different, it's, you know, you basically are mirroring what happened with Vicki Vale trying to pull him out of the darkness. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he's really trying to pull himself and Catwoman out of the darkness. But first, I wanna talk about Shrek a bit too. Batman in many ways is trying to pull him out of the darkness,

but for very different reason. He's not trying to redeem Shrek. He is trying to expose him and the penguin as false idols. So there's your justice side of Batman. There's your Dark Avenger. Okay. Second, it is a redeeming story because he is trying to save Selena Kyle. I was gonna say Katina Sile, but that the yeah, which although Marvel should come up with a character named Katina Sile. They should. Yeah. And that's that's actually a negative universe. Yes.

Yes. And William Kyle. Or they could do Selena Sile, like Slade Wilson and Ways. There you go. I like that. So do you know who was going out campaigning for the back? No, I'm having trouble finding it. Somebody's going to have to tell us.

Because I remember it was somebody who had a reputation for being kind of nuts. Okay. And the whole campaign did not help that. Was it Madonna? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, it was it was a Drew Barry. I'm going through people who are nuts. Okay. No, no, no, no. Okay. It's, you know, I'm going to after we finish recording tonight, I'm going to go to bed and I'm going to gonna sit bolt upright like three in the morning go. Oh my god. It was you know Because it's like right here sure right there in like floating on the edge of the speech center my frontal cortex I just can't get it to come out. Yeah, so anyway keep going. Okay, so

Bruce Wayne is a Redeemer so the first one is Batman the Avenger, or I'm sorry, this movie is two parts, one part Batman the Avenger, two part, or the other part Bruce Wayne the Redeemer. He even stops Batmanting in order to try to save her, literally tearing his mask off. Bruce Wayne is fully engaging himself in order to save Selena Kyle from her double life. And it's a nice sequel arc actually to a man who couldn't engage last time unless he was behind the mask. So he's growing through this one. And that's one of the reasons I really like this one because it pays off. A lot of the damage that he came with, he is now able to grow through. Yeah, and it's really, I don't think it's another case of Keaton not getting enough credit for the acting he did in these movies because I do remember clips in my memory, their

bits out of the film. And I remember, you know, his interactions with Catwoman, Selena Kyle, you know, and him managing to bring all of his pattern, all of his comedic, you know, all that same kind of sense of timing and same energy. And and bring it in a way that wasn't joky. Yes.

Like, you know, because suffering from disconnect as well. Yeah. But he was further along and he was empathizing for her. Yeah. And there were, there were, there were so many moments that were like genuinely funny. But, but never played for a joke. Yeah, he brought a coaxing vulnerability as he was trying to pull Selena Kyle out of Catwoman. Yeah, that's a really great way of putting it.

And again, like nobody, everybody looks at it as a three color comic book movie. And they, and they, they're right, but also. Art or ghetto. Yeah. But, so yeah, there's Bruce Wayne trying to make the world safe for Selena Kyle to come back. And in many ways, they'll fucked up as that.

Yeah. Well, and that's the thing, he's much more fully realized in this film. And what's fun is that he and she are realizing this at the Christmas masquerade ball, where Kyle and Wayne are the only two people for once not wearing masks. I'm gonna have to rewatch this fucking movie. Yeah. Because that's...

The implications are Jarellian in their complexity. after we watch this fucking movie. Yeah, because that's the implications are Jarellian in there in their complexity. Who gets the screenwriter credit on this one? Oh, good question. I don't recall. Because that's, because that is genius. Well, and that might not have been in the writing

that might have actually just been in the directing. Like I want them without masks. But yeah, it's really quite something when you think about it because at that point, think about this. Could it be that Wayne has become the disguise and that Kyle is the disguise because they're wearing their disguises to the masquerade ball? And then Batman and Catwoman are actually, they're more dominant personalities that they're wearing their disguises to the Masquerade ball. And then Batman and Catwoman are actually their more dominant personalities

that they're now doing a Clark Kent version on. She even says this, once they realize who each other are, she says, I guess I'm tired of wearing masks. Like he realizes she's Catwoman and she realizes he's Batman and she says, I guess I'm tired of wearing masks, where in fact, she is not wearing a mask and yet her real identity is now Catwoman

who is a masked character. And so she disguises Selena Kyle in broad daylight. Yeah, it's yes, yeah, Ed's head is Waters. Um, I don't know from him, but kudos. Poor one out for Daniel Waters tonight. I tell you, you know, I will. Poor one out. But your dad, John Waters is really, really fun. So I'll drink in his honor. There you go. There you go. So eyes on that. Yeah. So there's just that bit about, I guess, I'm tired of wearing masks and it's what

I really liked is that in the early 1990s, masks are an interesting entrance into the zeitgeist. If you think about other movies that came out or mini series, Phantom of the Opera came out in 1990 as a mini series, Silence of the Lambs, Speaking of Masks. Oh, yeah, okay. Point break. Oh, shit. Star Trek 6.

The assassin had a mask. It's about the future. Right. Yeah, okay. All of their major plot points involve some sort of mask to hide their true identity. And a number of documentaries came out popularizing the use of Native American people's masks too, including something called the spirit of the mask. Star Trek would come out with an episode in 1994 titled Masks. And it was really

confusing. Jim Carrey's movie The Mask debuted in 94. Like the early 90s were all about goddamn masks. And it was a therapeutic technique, by the way, in talky therapy. I know, having been thrown into it, you know, you had to draw your mask. It's like, Jesus Christ. When I was in drama class in high school, we made masks.

Woman shouts was shown to us. Just so much masky stuff in the 90s. Okay, so why? What? Yeah, okay. Like, okay, because I mean, you know, we can, there's, we can, we can spitball about shit, but like, I mean, that's what we do on this podcast.

Let's be real. But like, so, so if we're talking about the early 90s, we're talking about the end, basically, the ending of the Reagan era. Yes. Because that's the end of Bush ones. Oh, so you've got the end of the Cold War. You've got the falling and the crumbling of the Soviet Union. And the, well, I'm going in reverse order.

You've got the crumbling of the Berlin Wall, the Baltic states, Baltic or Balkan. Yeah, Baltic states. And the Soviet Union, yeah, well, I'm talking about the Baltic though. Lithuania, Estonia and Latvia. Yeah, well, I'm talking about the Baltic though. Lithuania, Estonia, and Latvia. Yeah, break away republic. Right. So you've got that. So they are no longer underneath that brand.

And I'm wondering if there's a need to cover up. And also, then if America has won, which we spoiler alert, they didn't because we just had four years of proof. But if America has won, then what can they do next? What happens to all those anxieties? And so now you kind of have to cover up those anxieties with something else, maybe? I don't know. I am spitballing here.

Okay. Let me spitball in a different direction. Sure, sure. We see revelation of a lot of things. So by 92, we knew that the Reagan administration and the Bush administration had been funneling money to all kinds of nasty places in the name of the Cold War. Yes. By 92 and later, the Soviet Union had fallen

apart and we now saw really what had been going on in the Soviet states, which was basically we spent them into oblivion and they couldn't keep up with us anymore. And in the process of getting there, they had turned their own economy into a sick man. What we had been led to believe during our childhood was this terrifying monolithic threat. Turns out not really to have been one at all. Right and so you know on on these You know again pattern on the wallpaper kind of kind of ways we see the revelation of Identities and we saw masks kind of being pulled away We see also a bunch of dictatorships. Oh gone. Go on so so so it just means that we were aware Suddenly that there had been masks. That could be.

We also see, previously, we see dictatorships falling too in South America. Pinochet falls in 90. Brazil's, Brazil's military dictatorship had fallen in 85, I want to say. I don't remember Argentina off the top of my head No, don't cry over it. Yeah Yeah, I'm I'm not remember truth is they never left You know we we're seeing that to be proven though, so yeah Because there was the coup in 76 and I'm just trying to think of how long they lasted, I think.

Oh, no, no. They went back to, they kicked out their dictatorship quick. They stopped in 83. Yeah. And okay, wait, hold on. Okay, tell their dictator. You're talking about Argentina. Yes. You have the dictator in 83. The Balkans was 82 to mm-hmm. Okay. Yeah. No, no, it had to be it had to be later than that because I was in Hawaii during fault clans. Oh, okay. So fault clans was 83. Okay. But anyway, so anyway, so some dictatorships and and actually losing the Falcons was the last gas by think of that regime. Yes. Yes. So in an event.

So yeah, I mean, I think we could go either way on that or both ways for that matter. Yeah. Because stuff happening in the sub in the mass subconscious doesn't necessarily have to be entirely consistently logical in one direction at a time. Right. And I would point out that both of these characters had a mask of similar design, covered everything except for their mouths. This is true.

Which I will get to that when I get to the Nolan Batman's, because there's a very important thing there. But I do want to put a pin in that. So that is tabled. Yes. Keep track of that. The villains that he's fighting this time are less about chaos and violence and more about power and the exploitation of our democratic processes.

So with Joker, it was chaos. Every time Joker shows up, it's, he's fighting chaos, he's bringing order. When it's, when it's penguin, he's fighting corruption because he's fighting the credulity of Gotham for Gotham's own good, not just fighting against Gotham's criminal element, but fighting against their sheepishness. Because again, who is, who is running for mayor? Cobble pod, right? Yeah, okay.

And he's got his own little design on that. You know, if he runs for mayor, then he can look up, you know, and steal and reverse Moses things. He starts off, by the way, he starts off in a river, and now he wants to come back and kill everybody's firstborn. Like it's pretty god of clear. But and who's backing him the whole way

is the rich industrialist. Yeah. Now again, that is also, I would say, a bit of a send up of 1992 politics. A little bit. Yeah.. Little bit. Yeah. Because this would have been written in 91. So, yeah, you know, it's kind of pointing out, hey, Leia Cok, it was there on the top of

the White House a while back, you know, helping him destroy the solar panels. Yeah. God, I watched the Robocop the other day. I don't remember why I decided to. Yes. And Paul original. Yeah, God I watched the Robocop the other day. I don't remember why I decided to yes and Paul original were yeah, we're gonna have to do a whole episode of Paul Verhoeven's idea of satire because but so just because he doesn't he doesn't do it very well Well, he's not subtle and the problem is we're we're so bass is a culture that we like it and and I will tell you this story, my father and I,

so father, not dad, father, bio father. I was made to visit him when I went to visit my grandparents. And so I spent an evening with him and we rented Robocop. And he was on the edge of his seat, just screaming, go Robo, go Robo. And it's like, even then it seemed a little off to me, but watching it now, I'm like, oh wow.

This violence is supposed to, it's kind of the Warhammer 40K thing. This violence is supposed to be over the top and ridiculous. Yeah, grievously over the top. And you're over here cheering it, dude. Like it's supposed to be this way. Like, damn.

So. Oh yeah, well, you know. Yeah. So anyway, he's, so back to be this way. Like damn. So. Yeah, well, you know. Yeah. So anyway, he's, so back to this. Yeah. So he is, Batman is localizing his fight on rescue, not vengeance. Whereas in the first one, he's centered it on vengeance. Oh yeah.

Yeah, pay back in a big way. Now Bruce Wayne is still tortured by his double life and he's jumping into a literal iron maiden to get down to the back cave now. Oh yeah. Like this this movie is symbolism 101. Like if this movie is not shown in film classes. But he's also managed to integrate both parts of himself much more fully, and he's able to actually offer intimacy and peace to a person and not just react to their attraction to him. Here's what just occurred to me hearing you talking about it.

So Batman is by one definition the most actualized mother fucker in the world. In this movie, yes. Well, hold on. Hold on. In any interpretation of the character, oh, I see what you mean, yes. He is hyper competent. He, you know, if he needed to learn it, he went out and he learned it. He figured it out, you know, master of at least two or three forms of martial arts.

Right. Best of greatest detective in the world. learned it, he figured it out, master of at least two or three forms of martial arts, best to greatest detective in the world, forensic scientist, you name it, he figured it out. Yes. And so on that level, he's immensely hyper-hyper-actualized. But in the first, in the first Keaton movie, we see that he's like mechanically actualized, but emotionally he's a cripple. Yes. And in this film, we actually see him becoming truly emotionally actualized, along with all

of his Wonderful toys Yeah, you know and and Yeah, shit. I'm gonna need to go back and watch that movie. Mm-hmm. Because yeah, I think taking them as a pair is a really good idea Because of the arc that that Burton and Keaton draw together on this character. Yeah, yeah No, you make a compelling case for that definitely. Yeah together on this character. Yeah, yeah, no, you make a compelling case for that. Definitely. Yeah. So he is in this one again fighting against he's fighting to rescue someone's soul and that's someone is Gotham. He's saving them from themselves and yes, and also, Selena Kyle, whereas in the previous one, he's fighting to yes, yes, and he's fighting and I think it's micro macro to

Oh, yeah, because ultimately it's it's micro micro macro because He is fighting to save his soul And so doing he's fighting to save Selena's soul and in so doing he's fighting to save Gotham's soul He needs to save all three from themselves. Man, that's a lot of shit to get done. Well, yeah. So, uh, so yes, he's tortured. He jumps into an iron maiden. Um, and like I said, he, uh, I had completely forgotten that. Yeah, me too. I can't do it. As I was doing the research, I'm like, oh shit. Yeah. So in the first Keaton Burton movie, he was the broken one, right?

And he was fighting a broken person who whose main approach was nihilism. Oh yeah. And so here's where it gets, you know, again, twisted around a couple different times. Batman is fighting the Joker, who Batman shattered. And the Joker, in turn, had previously shattered Bruce Wayne's life.

And of course that nihilism and then the response to nihilism and then the conflict and then that response and then it's just this nihilistic clusterfuck circle jerk. Yeah, yeah, and yeah, you know, you put your point that out and there's a part of me that wonders what would have happened if If we had seen And now I'm forgetting his name, but the director of Conan the Barbarian. Oh, John Millius? John Millius.

If we had seen John Millius work the same story, there would have been some, you know, it felt like a doom moment, you know, I made you. Yes, well there was that moment. He said that, he says, you know, you know, I, you know, I made you, he's like, you made me, I made you, you know, and you know, or no, know, I made you. He's like, you made me, I made you, you know, and, you know,

or no, no, you made me. He's like, you idiot, you made me. And he's like, I made you, you made me. And he's like, and then he's like, well, if you're gonna, you know, and then he tries to sucker punch him and hits the armor and all that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, but okay, so in the first one, it's a shattered man.

He's a broken man fighting a shattered man who had previously broken his life. And whose life he had previously broken as well. Like there's a, every, both of them like double dipping. In the second one, Bruce Wayne is again Bruce Wayne, not Batman, but Bruce Wayne is the most together of the heroes and the villains. And he's fighting one of them on their own behalf and he's fighting two of them on behalf of the people of Gotham. Okay, so it's a hell of an arc. Like, so it's no longer about depression, it's about redemption and rescue. Recovery. Oh, there it is. There it is. Yeah.

So that's the 92 one. And again, Psychotherapy was not a big deal. Yeah, yeah. So then, now, and that is gonna dovetail nicely into the 1995 one, Batman Forever. This is called the really 1991. Batman Xtrees. The Val Kilmer one, the Joel Schumacher one. And this one is like, you know what?

You know what worked really well? Camp. We're going to return to camp in a big way because two-faced and riddler are just chewing through the scenery and neon colors and purples and greens because it's the 90s. And let's talk about color saturation. Oh, yeah. Like, Jesus. So, okay, I need to, I need to vent. Here for a second. Sure, sure.

All right. So you're going to make a Batman movie, right? Uh-huh. And you decide that one of the villains you're going to do is, is Harvey Dent, two-face. Yes. Yes. Classic, classic character has a great villain arc, you know, I mean, yeah, just an amazing character. And then, and then you cast Tommy Lee Jones to be to face, to be to play Harvey Dent both sides of Harvey Dent.

Yes. Okay. Except it's not Harvey Dent. At this point It's it's the absolute two-face. There's no origin story or anything. Yeah, yeah, like they have two lines on it And that's it. He is yeah, he is comic two villains. Yeah, okay, so so but but hear me out here So so you decide you're gonna cast Tommy Lee Jones, right? Mm-hmm. Who is an amazing actor?? Yes. And if you had just had him, you could have had no shit, the most amazing portrayal of two-face. Like, I have absolutely no doubt in my mind at all. The left to his own devices, Tommy Lee Jones could have owned that role the way Nicholson owned the Joker.

I agree. So all right, so far so good. Then you decide, okay, well, we're not just gonna have one villain because that's not enough. We gotta have more than one villain. So we're gonna go with Edward Nigma. Well, hang on, the previous movie had two villains.

No, I know. You've got that. Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. No, we got, we've got to go back to one. Following is, yeah, yeah, you've got it, you've got it, you got it. So we got to, we got to at least go with two villains because we can't go down to one because that's like lowering the stakes,

even though it didn't have to be, but whatever, from a production angle, it just looks like you are so okay, so we gotta have two villains So who are we gonna use as the other villain? Okay, well, we've got you know the the we're gonna We're gonna go with the class that we're gonna go with the riddler. Mm-hmm. Okay, awesome Who you gonna cast as the riddler? It is 90-5. I know I know I understand Jim Kerry Okay, so here's the deal by himself playing the riddler Jim Kerry Could have been

Absolutely balls to the wall fucking amazing like like like like our version of Frank Orson. Oh Yeah, oh yeah, you know usually. Yeah. It could have been amazing. Here's the deal. You put him next to Tommy Lee Jones. And you have Schumacher direct the fucking thing. Uh-huh. And everything winds up being no, no bigger. Yeah.

And then you have now pushed. Uh, and I'm not even, I'm not even going to start with the one that makes me angriest. I'm going to go with the other one. You've now pushed Jim Carey into pet detective territory Yeah, because bigger means okay, well, that's the direction. I'm gonna go and of course He's comfortable doing that and he can pull that stick. Yeah, but you're under utilizing him

Yeah, cuz you're only asking for him to crash the cymbals when in fact he's played amazing drums. And, and, and, you know, you're, you're, you're expecting him to only do things in the loudest register possible, which by itself is a tragic underutilization of a guy who turns out to be a really amazingly empathetic actor. Yeah. And then, and then, basingly empathetic actor. And then, and then, and this is the part that I'm still bitter about years later, all right, let him literally on the screen at the same time as Tommy Lee Jones, who is not that kind of actor, and forced Tommy Lee Jones to play everything broad. Mm hmm. Like, why did you cast Tommy Lee fucking to play everything broad. Like why did you cast Tommy Lee fucking Jones in the first place? The man's whole toolbox is centered on understatement,

is centered on, you know, is he isn't Pacino, he doesn't scream, you know what I mean? Right, well neither did Pacino until, until a woman. Yeah. Yeah. Well, but you get what I'm saying. Yes. That that that turned into his dick. He himself, self-flanderized himself. Yes. You know, and but but like, both of those actors were so completely in in one case, completely underutilized because you told, because she mock her told, carry, go big. And that's it. Just go big and keep going bigger. And then you force Tommy Lee Jones to be a shouting scenery chewing,

glowering mega villain when like you could have had such a much better two-phase Well, I'm gonna you had I'm gonna push back a little bit on the Tommy Lee Jones thing because in 92 He was in under siege and he played that villain who was the road runner and he was goofy and crazy He was like an ex-hippy who could fight really well with knives until he saw what's his face? Yeah, and in 93 he was a badass in the fugitive, which is what you're talking about. The, you know, I don't care.

It's just an iconic line and it's so understated. But then he played a mad bomber in blown away in 93 as well. And I wish mad bomber. Yeah. Oh, your wife and daughter are home and he's kind of crazy. And then in 94, he was in natural born killers and he was the The Warden and whose hair looked like a goddamn studa baker and he had a pencil thin mustache and he was a character caricature of of all that shit

He was doing those kinds of roles leading into 95. He absolutely was so I could see casting him in that role in into 95. He absolutely was. So I could see casting him in that role, in, in that effort at that role. That makes sense to me. You shouldn't have done that character as that way, maybe. But they're going camp. Well, okay. One, you shouldn't have taken that character in that direction. Number two, I'm going to argue that as much as he may have enjoyed doing under siege. I saw that shit opening weekend in the theater. Sorry, you just lost all credibility. I went with a bunch of friends who were like dudes, sick all-movie, you know. Sure.

And the title only has two words rather than three. Maybe this one will be good. Point. No. No, no, no, no. The only part of that movie that's worth rewatching is Erica Aliniac coming out of the cake. Like that's it.

I would say Gary Busy sitting there going, do I look like I'm mentally deranged in full drag? Just because it was definitely for voting. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah. I don't know if it was even foreshadowing. But it was that was that before after Gary Bucy smacked himself on the pavement. I do believe that was before, but I don't record. Okay. Yeah. Because one wonders. But anyway.

Yeah. So, anyway, I have very strong opinions about the casting and and territorial choices. Well, it's not really about the casting, it's about the direct, territorial choices. You're going to have a lot to chew on here. So, to Vason Ridler, like you said, going broadly, just being the backster, Stockman little droids chewing through the scenery, the way the Mausers would chase after Shredder. There's also a new guy playing Batman for the first time. Okay, so Keaton owned that role, and now you've got a new guy playing Batman,

and you've introduced Robin as well. Now Val Kilmer plays Batman. Yes. I have always had a soft spot in my heart for Val Kilmer. Nicole Kidman plays Dr. Chase Meridian. Get it? Chase Meridian. Or Chase Meridian, yeah. She's pursuing balance.

Yeah. And the villain is two-face, and Batman lives a double life. Okay, and now he's got a child to take care of. So some some animals need to be dropped. We're hard here. Yeah, also there she is also a character who's created specifically for the movie. So we see this happening. This is true. This is true. Now speaking of balance, now I just want to back up a second. It always felt to me like the lighting and the color choices that they made in that movie specifically were a cinematic version of, okay, when I was in high school, Mountain Dew was wonderful, right?

And so was Dr. Pepper. And so was Agnog. And then we combined Mountain Dew with Agnog. And then we combined Mountain Dew with Dr. Pepper. And then we combined Mountain Dew with Dr. Pepper and Agnog. And then we had chugging contest to see who could swallow a quart of Dr. Dunoag in the shortest amount of time possible Because our friend had gotten it to the point where he could swallow a quart of eggnog in four seconds And that became a game at our rallies at our high school from then on

And so yeah, so Mountain Dew like I get it if it's not your thing, but plenty people like Mountain Dew, plenty people like Dr. Pepper, plenty people like, Ignog. If you combine them together, their color is gross as shit and they taste terrible, that's exactly what happened to all the colors in this movie. This movie is Dr. Duneog. You know what? That's going to have to become code on our on on on this podcast, going forward, that is Dr. Duneog. That is Dr. Duneog. Alright. Yeah. There we go. That's in any time what he used to phrase a dog's breakfast, instead of I'm going to force myself to say Dr. Duneog.

Here got almighty. I can't imagine anything that is voluminous. Like right. Oh, it's gross. It was so bad that when you drink it you laughed like that's how bad it was I shit you not my best friend at the time he drank it Eli If he ever listens to that shout out to Eli for the doctor do not he drank it and just started laughing. It was that bad so But yeah, so yeah You know what I it is getting to be that season of the year. I might actually I'm 42 now. Let's see. We were doing that when I was like 16. Don't do it Don't do it. Don't do it. It'll hurt you.

Yeah, probably will at our at our age. I you know, you do not know. Yeah, but I'm kind of hoping like it'll hurt me in the way that like a bad samosa will hurt me. Like I'll lose weight that night. You know, because that's what I love about a Samosa is like, if it's good, it's great. And if it's bad, it still tastes great. And I lose weight. Like it's. So art direction. Clearly, clearly there was some. Yes. Um, it was a very 1990s

ification of prior efforts. So they took the prior stuff and then they neon it, right? There's a lot of purple, a lot of green, which is very comic books because bad guys are secondary colors. Well, yeah, well, yeah, there's a fair amount of turquoise because it's the 90s. I'm going I'm going with Batman extreme. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. That was that was for whatever reason, I don't I would really like to know where it was that that whole.

Extreme. That that whole that whole extremist. It was, you know what it was? It was an outgrowth of the use of neon colors that we saw in the 80s. So it was just the next step really because neon for its own sake really came in in the 80s. And then as you get into the 90s, you start to see different color palettes getting mixed together that, yeah, again, you know, it's, and they're all coming back now because girls are rating their mom's

closets and moms are, I have a theory about this, moms are perpetually much more optimistic about their clothing from their childhood than dads, dads are like like, no fuck it, my ass is a FedEx truck now. I'm not saving those jeans. Whereas moms will be like, someday I could get back to my prom weight. So the daughters go through their mom's closets and check stuff out for homecoming rallies and stuff like that. Then you see, because every 20 years, you see a reintroduction of similar styles and it's because the daughters are rating their mom's closets and coming back.

So because look at what's coming in now, booty shorts and high rise. And they take their own flair now, but that's what's coming in. And I started seeing kids showing up with overalls again. Yeah, that was a thing. So I'm teaching middle school. So it's a whole different kind of thing. Because DL is like, I'm looking at kids who I'm comparing to me in the seventh and eighth grade. Yeah, but you're between generations,

these kids have parents that are roughly my age or a little younger. Okay. Okay. Because I got started late. So, so I got started like hyperlips. But, yeah. And you're much older than I. So, fuck you much.

What is this three years? Screw you. We're still both gen-exers. Don't be adding me about this stuff I'm all on so But so the kids who are coming in age warm under the bridge I'm just trying to get you go

Well done. Yeah, well, I ain't even mad. I yeah, you were a little rough. You were a little yeah, I usually am So anyway carry on all right girls are ready. I'm sorry. Did I hurt your leg? Nah, me. Okay Good day, sir. There you go So yes girls are rating their moms closets and they're they're styling them in different ways Because now we're starting to see kids showing off their midrifts in the high schools again They're doing it by tying knots on their shirts. That's the thing But yeah, and that if you go back to when I was in high school midrifts were showing because they were stealing their mom's low-rise jeans And so yeah, you had that aesthetic. Yeah. Okay. So well, actually,

they're stealing their mom's high rise dreams. And then they were wearing mid-riff shirts. And then the wastelands started getting lower because they were stealing the low rises. And then you had like that, that gap increased in the early 2000s. So what's going to suck is in about 10 years, we're going gonna see the 2000s come back stylistically Which is cool because I still have cargo shorts and I'm looking forward to buying more zip-off pants Okay, okay, I'm gonna hold on sure gonna stop here right there. We're we're now both in a phase of life where cargo shorts are eternal Oh, I've never left that phase as soon as I found that aesthetic, I'm done. Screw that. Yeah, no.

Yeah, no. And it's because I want to carry stuff. Well, yeah. That's it. It's the pockets. And I get made fun of all the time. And I don't give a shit. Like who cares?

Whatever man. It's comfortable. No. And like, you want to send a signal you're a dad. Yes. And I do. I do want to send that signal. Well, that's what I'm saying. Yeah. There's no clearer way of saying everybody. No, no, no. I'm a dad. Yeah.

How you doing? Yeah, you know, you know, I mean in my case, I I Sometimes don't like right now. Of course, I'm wearing jeans because it's for reason fucking cold, but you know like right now, of course, I'm wearing jeans because it's freezing fucking cold. But, you know, when it is shorts, whether I tend to wear a quilt more often, because I think I look better in that. But, you know, but yeah, no, this summer, it was an awful lot of current shorts,

because I wouldn't go anywhere to show off the quilt. So, right. Yeah. So, the architecture, so you've got a ton of turquoise. You've got the architecture is way more contemporary and less metropolis-y. And I mean metropolis, the movie, not the place that's not Gotham.

The costumes included nipples and outsized cod pieces. Robin had an earring because it's the 90s. And there was a deliberate and conscious effort to make the costumes much more MTV aesthetic A lot of rave scenes Esthetic stuff too very very mid 90s rave scene is a lot of black lights a lot of turquoise a lot of that and at this point Batman movies are getting to be like bond girls, which celebrities gonna be in the movie matters way more than the movie itself. Oh, and let's talk the music for a second.

You two and Seal. How much more nineties can you get? I had forgotten about you two. Yes, I can't like seal. Hold me, kill me, kiss me, kill me. Yeah. Yeah, you're right. Yeah.

Yeah. Now, this time Batman is not fighting his identity. He's got that shit locked down. He is, however, dealing with a young man bent on revenge. So he's counseling a kid through what he went through and he's fighting the chaos of two face and riddler who are obsessed with finding his secret identity and they eventually succeed in destroying Wayne Manor. Yes, riddler's device secretly steals people's information from their minds, but it's advertised as projecting TV broadcasts straight into people's minds,

which if you remember people's like hatred of MTV, it had to do with that. And I just would point out thoughts being inserted into brains. Okay, hold on. Hold on. Because thoughts being inserted into brains reminds me of the TV series from the 80s. So it started in 87. Oh, history. Yeah. Funny. Funny. We'll play it. Yeah. You're in PC. Yeah. Do you remember blipverts? No. Okay. Max headroom. Yes. Okay. And they hacked the signal. Yeah. They hacked the signal. Yes. That actually happened. And then that inspired Max Headroom. Yeah. Yeah. And and the the the the McGuffin in

the very opening in the pilot of Max Headroom was an advertiser who had figured out how to condense an advertisement into like a second and a half to take it to take a 30 second advertisement turning into a blip-furt. There was only a second and a half long and flashed by so fast that the advertisement was essentially programmed into your brain subconsciously. Like, like, what's what I'm looking for? A subliminal. Well, you want to know what other movie came out at the same time? Johnny Namanik.

Okay, well, there you go. Also, also visually, like way over the top, based on a really, really great William Gibson short story. And not a really great adaptation. We could have a conversation about how great it is as its own thing, but similar kind of idea. Again, in that case, it's, I have a wet drive in my brain that I can't access.

And somebody wants to get a hold of it. And so, yeah. Literally shit inserted into my brain. Yeah. And in 94 natural board killers would come out where it's talking about the influence of the media on serial killers and the youth. There's a lot of stuff going on.

And so the height of where social panic about video games, violent video games. Yeah. So because you know, being a Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter and all that. And then here's the thing, there's thoughts being inserted into people's brains. There's unwelcome intruders. And where do they go? They go to Batman Sanctuary and blow it up. Your home is not safe.

It's being invaded. Now this movie is nothing about Bruce Wayne anymore, except for the hamphisted way to discuss memory and dreams and shit like that. And what's interesting is this one is all about dreams and suppressed memories, which absolutely makes sense because in 1993 the term false memory syndrome was coined. Which means that for a while.

As a result, as a result of what they had found out, what psychologists had found out from the aftermath of the satanic panic. Yeah, and more. The 80s. Yes. So, there had been a lot of news and cultural awareness raising the idea of suppressed memories, especially in the aftermath, like you said, of satanic panic, but also in the examinations of a lot of large group child abuse

and cult accusations that were finding a lot of those had been based on false memories, which is really unfortunate because plenty of people lost their livelihoods and years of their lives to incarceration. Stuart Florida is just such a place. Psychologists formed the town to help kids who'd recovered memories of Satanic child abuse at a Montessori school. The more psychologists and police officers showed up,

the more cases came up. And it turns out many of these therapists in their zeal, in their desire to be part of something, had implanted false memories into hypnotized kids. And studies began as early as 1986 when psychologists started longevity studies in asking people about where they were when the challenger had exploded. Flash bulb history. People's answers tended to change over time, getting more and more dramatic and more in line with the coherently and accepted popular narrative.

And this is starting to happen with these kids. And it led to something called the memory wars. Where people believed that memories could be repressed and others believed that false memories could be implanted. And they were arguing over some very important points. And since this absolutely impacts witness testimony, it's not an agreed-to-disagreek type of thing. So there are very few documented examples of actual repressed memories. Now I'm somewhat sensitive to this because I had

seen family members go through repressed memory therapy and this is where you had things like past- regression therapy. And because your memory is so repressed that it goes into a past life and stuff like that, I mean, it's really quite something. So hard for a woo. Yeah, it is. Certainly, certainly at the edges of it, that's heavy duty woo woo. Oh, yeah, absolutely. And I say this as a church going Catholic. Yeah, yeah, it's like if I'm pointing to it going like, dude, yeah, good point. Wow.

Yeah, I would agree with you, especially in this instance, because there's, there's just so much damage that came about as a result of this. And this was basically what was in the air at that time. You might remember in 91 there's a movie called Dead Again. Yes. Yes. And his dead wife. Yes. Um, Trollwani, uh, Christ was her name and Emma Thompson. Yes. She's phenomenal. Thompson. But yeah, she's amazing. He he shouldn't have left her She can do better their relationship is not mine, but they are phenomenal actors

But he was in a movie that was all about past lives and so you have these movies about repressed memories that are really coming to the fore and That's in here, right? And that's in this movie. This movie is is tagging onto that. Psychologist Elizabeth Loftus said that there's simply no evidence that people can create amnesia through sheer terror. And that all the examples that were compiled in the 90s could be explained in other ways.

And often she says they're just false memories. And I went into a huge rabbit hole on that very topic, which was left me kind of sad and wishing I drank. But because you've got like a four year old who is being interviewed by an authority figure and they want to make that authority figure happy. And so the authority figure asks leading questions and they mean well, and here's the thing, they mean well. They're trying to save these kids, you know, and it's just, it's the road to hell is paved

with good intentions in the worst kinds of ways. So, so Batman is tugging on what is in the zeitgeist, which is exactly what Batman always does. But now it's doing it while braiding it with camp. So you've got camp plus dreams and repressed memories, 90s pop music, and lots, lots of purple and green. And all of that gets braided together. How could it be anything but a wild success?

Yeah, about that. Here's the thing. I ultimately feel really badly for what this movie did to Val Kilmer's career. Didn't he do tombstone after this? Was it after that? No, I think tombstone came before it. Yeah, tombstone was before it. No. Okay.

This didn't sink his career so much as his own behavior on certain movie sets. Like, I love Val Kilmer. But he... Yeah, granted. Granted, but this didn't help in anything. No, well, he came back for the St. and the St. was really good.

St. was an amazing movie. And it was absolutely there to highlight his acting range because he's playing all these different characters. Oh, chameleon. Yeah. Yeah. But, but yeah, he, he, let's see, he did, yeah, he did Tombstone and Truro Mans before this.

He did heat after this, but he did the island of Dr. Rowe and Ghost in the Darkness, which is like, but he did the saint and people like, Oh, wow, he's he's doing stuff. And they did the Prince of Egypt, which they loved that he was the voice of God and Moses. Yeah. And then he kind of did some rom com type stuff. And yeah. And they just basically they found that he wasn't the draw that they'd hoped he would be quite honestly. Yeah. I loved him in Alexander. A lot of people have trouble with that movie, but he played a great film at the fourth.

Oh, really? Yeah. I have to confess, I have not seen Alexander. I see. I liked it. There's been, but I liked it. Okay. There's, there's, because I looked at it and I went, this is either going to be really awesome

or it's going to be a complete shit show. Yeah, it was a shit show. And everything, and everything I heard from everybody I knew who saw it was like, yeah, no, it's no. I still liked it, because it captured Alexander as being a out of control sought. And I liked that. So.

Okay, all right. I might have to give it a shot. So that takes us to the 1997 Batman, Batman and Robin. George Clooney. Ah, the one that had Uma Thurman, the only redhead I've ever found attractive. Okay. That's not true.

There's that other gal that I met when I was 15 and then the night after we made out, Bart went on strike, proving that Redhead should not couple in any way. Because also, no, I wasn't 15. I was like, I was 17 because that was the very next day people killed themselves for Hell's Gate or Heaven's Gate rather. So again, proving Redhead should not, yeah, couple. Just, but no.

Just don't do it. But when with Thurman, it would be worth part going on strike again. Um. Okay, this movie is so bad that there's zero trivia listed on IMDB for it. I've never seen that happen. Okay, so that means it's not only really bad.

It's really bad in a way that's not even, oh man, it's so bad, it's good. Like, no, no, you're going to watch this. You're going to see how you fuck this up. Wow. And so this time we've got Batman, Robin, Batgirl, Poison, Ivy, Bane, and Mr. Freeze. Because if one's a good idea, six is a great idea. It's a great idea. It's just like aspirin.

Well, okay. You know, here's the deal. So was this also shoe marker? Yeah. Okay. Here's the thing. You talk about, you know, Dr. Dunock. I would say you added antifreeze to it. Because we need some green.

We need some green. Look how it glows and sizzles. Look at how it's, yeah, and it's got a tang to it. The burning sensation tells you it's where I came. Right. Yeah. You know, no, what I was going to say is, what are my drama coaches in high school, who is now a veteran drama teacher on her own.

But one of the things that she talked about, that she complained about in set design from various, very since undery other productions, because she would do this thing where she'd go to other schools in the district, and she would watch their traumatic productions, in the district and she would watch their traumatic productions. Like a football coach watches game footage from other schools. She would go and watch what other drama productions, or what other drama departments were doing. And one of the things she consistently complained about was this one other head of a drama department at another school. Just has to get out there and go jacking off on stage

Mm-hmm, you know and and and I went and I remember seeing this film Mm-hmm with a group of my friends again on opening night probably No, oh, it was not opening night. Thank God You know that's worse because then you heard reviews and you're like, no, no, I still have faith. No, I don't think we need well, it wasn't opening night. I put it like the next day. Oh, okay. Okay. But anyway, we went and saw it and I remember remembering.

There they are. Just checking off on stage. Yep. And ever since then, every time I've seen Schumacher's name, that's the only thing I've been able to think about. Nice. So now, this movie is totally like a bond girl, because what star is going to be Batman is going to make the franchise, right? So it's way less about Batman the character.

It's way less about, oh, here's an interesting take on him. It's way less about tone or anything else. It's full on 1960s comic mode. Bright colors as only the 90s can give us. Contemporary issues, eco-terrorism, taking down feminism, artificial intelligence, Batman universe, equivalent of steroids, status bars on old max, merchandising out the wazoo, all of these. Oh god. And a lot of this movie's villains are focusing on using science to enhance our alter physical bodies. Do you remember Dolly the sheep?

Do you remember BCE? Do you remember how much movement there was toward cloning in the late 90s? Oh wow. Now this iteration, this iteration suffered from the fact that the franchise started darkly and now it was something completely different from its originator and it came out less than a decade earlier. It had become, it had become a cartoon of itself in a bad way. Well, and because Warner Bros. essentially kept developing it so that they could get more toy commercial pricing, merchandising, all that kind of...

Moisture-dising. Yes. ...with a real money from the movie is. Exactly. Well, and that's exactly it. And the flame thrower. How many different outfits can we get him into? And so, who cares about coherence and depth? Yeah.

Yeah. It's absolutely that. At least in G.I. Joe, they'd give you a new character. But this is just, no, icebat man, jungle bat man. You know, you know, kind of in the same vein, you know, thinking about the prior film, going back for a second to talk about Batman Forever, you went in that film, you didn't have, you know, six different batsuits, but you did have the really dramatic. I was just looking at the wiki pdf page for the film. And on the poster, it's really remarkable how much the bat suit had

obviously changed. Like the burden of the bat suit was this black armored rubber thing. The armored quality is still there, but it had become in Batman Forever. It was this metallic blue, like dark blue. The turquoise was all Robin, but it was this metallic dark blue thing with what really struck me were the fins. I'm going to say flanges that off says. Yeah, his gauntlets Yeah, let's go on. Let's looking like something out of a science fiction serial from the 30s. Yes, very very buck Rogers very swoopy and

and then going from there into Batman and Robin. And even more Baroque. Yeah. Baroque. That's the best word I can think of for it. This Rokoko actually not even broke Rokoko. Kind of aesthetic, too old, that shit was like Gonzo.

Like, nuts. Yeah. Yeah, and then and it makes toys look cool. And you can do it with cheap plastic. Yeah. So by this point, the production had become completely intruded unto. Yeah. And it's, the production is overtaking any possibility

of a real theme of any kind on any internal level. There is no internal Batman anymore. There is no Bruce Wayne anymore. It's just, this is all vehicle to get to the next picture or the next, yeah, the next set piece. Ultimately, Batman is become an empty vessel by this movie to attach to whatever toy accessory you want to.

And yes, there is a thing in there about trust. That is a bit of a theme about trust, which could be interesting when you're talking about people who are leading double lives together, because there was some stuff about, you know, I, you know, you need to stop reaching your hand down to rescue me. You need to trust me that I can do this myself. Well, yeah, there's, there's that, obviously. And, and the thing is there, there are moments, there are micro moments in that film that, that are, that are elevated above the draws of the rest of it.

But there's nowhere near enough of them to make. There's no coherence to the movie. It's almost like they forgot to edit those parts out. You know, I mean, they could have, like, there was a thing in there about what it takes to be a good mentor, which could have been interesting if you're talking about Batman and Robin in terms of passing the torch. And and and there's there's a wonderful might like honest to God, no kidding, other than the first time Alicia Silverstone shows up in the in the bad girl suit, which I love for entirely different reasons.

There's there's there's there's, there's a throwaway line where Bruce Wayne says, now I know why Superman works alone. Yes. And like that one moment is like, okay, tell you what, how about we take that line, which says so much in so few words.

Mm-hmm. And we build on that and we do something with that mm-hmm But no no I mean they could even touch on they could even touch on what makes family because Alfred and Barbara and you know Batman and Robin and all that no they there's so much that they could have done But instead they're like okay now this lesson was easily learned and it's not really there anymore. So let's go. So let's just keep making off on screen. Yeah, you know, to make money to turn out more toys. So in many ways, Schumacher made this movie as a return to the 60s, can't be Batman movie. He did. There were a ton of one liners. the 60s can't be Batman movie. He did. There were a ton of one liners.

And I'm cool with that. I'm okay with, well, of course, I'm cool with one liners, but I'm okay with a director's choice to go back to something else because what are you gonna do with grit? There's a lot of low stakes. That's a great point. There's a lot of low stakes combat. There's even a send up to the holy whatever Batman,

because in the beginning he said they're climbing up a thing and he's like holy, rusted metal Batman. And he's like, what? He's like the metal, it's holy and rusted. Thank you. Yeah. The only thing missing really is the Bamsat power cards. But here's the problem with it.

And a heart. Well, there's that. Yeah. So here's the problem. The 60s series had something there. Well, 60s series also had a couple years and it was serialized. Like, this is a two-hour movie. You can do more in a serial than you can do in a movie. You can, but I'm still thinking of what I said. Okay, alright. So here's the problem though. The movie and Batman himself are never self-aware enough

that the tongue-in-cheek delivery work, and I think that's what you're kind of getting to. Because the budget begs a much more grand scale. Okay, so because the 60s version was very self-aware and it was a low budget thing, you don't have this need to tell this thing. So, the doom of Lucas. Yeah, in a lot of ways. And in too much money and yeah. Okay, in a lot of ways. And in too much money. And yeah, okay. And nobody's

saying no. Right. Which, you know, this is ironic because there's a Batman credit card in this one. Yeah. You know, just like wow. I had speaking of suppressed memories. I had mashed to bury that one. Thank you. You're welcome. Now, that movie was just such, oh, no. How long was the 20th century? That's a trick question, right? No, no. 100 years.

Yes. And movies got started just a hair before that, right? Yes. Okay. This movie is listed as the number three worst film of the 20th century. You want to know what's, yeah, yeah, go ahead. Sure. What's, what are number two and number one?

Okay. Wild Wild West. Okay. All right. I, I, I, okay. And battle, I have a battle field worth. Okay. I'm going to point out, I believe all of those are 90s productions.

Are they not? Yes, they are. Speaking of Fendz, battlefield earth, I will totally say belongs where it is. I feel like Wild Wild West was as a matter of fact a shitty movie. Yes. But I don't think it deserves a place that high on the list. I think it does because the screenwriter for it is either screenwriter or the director shopped around the idea of a giant walking spider thing to like three different types of films. He was gonna make a fucking movie that had that thing

in it and he did like like there is somebody shooting a shooting an arrow and painting a target. Yeah. Yeah. Really? Yes. It's that's that's some cinema lore right there. Yeah. I don't know whether that affects my opinion of the film or not, but that's really sad. Yeah. Okay. So this who's who's list of the worst films of the 20s? I just A. Who is this this I don't I don't recall I don't recall it was a critic somewhere, but you know it was but it was so, so, but But that man and Robin minstranck number three yes Out of the entire the entire filmography. Yes, history of cinema. Yes the entire filmography. Yes.

History of cinema. Yes. Okay, wait. Wait, where was playing 9 from outer space on that list? Oh, it's probably in the top 10. It was probably in the top 10, but yeah. You're God Almighty. Oh yeah.

Yeah. I have to believe that A tour of Barbar, A tour of the Barbarian was somewhere on and hawk the of the barbaried was somewhere on and a hawk the slayer were both somewhere on that list. Oh, I have no doubt. Yeah, like, especially hawk the slayer. A tour was bad, but wow. Yeah, I mean, I'm surprised that it beat out laser blast,

quite honestly, but okay. I don't know if you ever saw laser blast. I saw it. I did. Oh my god. I kind of watched it. I saw it. I did. Oh my god. I kind of watched it. I saw it on TV some afternoon. I did.

It was an edited version. Yeah. It was. And laser blast was a pretty crap movie. But it had a coherent somewhat coherent plot that hung together. Okay. Point taken. There was awful lot about it.

There was just bad. like the acting was awful. The dialogue was shit. Yes. It's for those who don't know laser blasts. That's not too big. That's not too bad. But stop motion animation stuff. For those of you who don't know laser blasts, which hopefully that's most of you, a dude finds a a gun thing in a desert and puts it on his arm and then it possesses him and turns him into a monster. And he blasts shit with his arm and that's and then aliens come. And that's it's really. Yeah, I think elementic laser away. Yeah, spoiler alert. Yeah, so yeah, he winds up winds up. Yeah, going on going on to a rampage in his small middle of the desert town. Yeah So there's a romantic simple subplot where a girl tries to because he has to have a hands to gun and there's an amulet

Yeah, and like the amulet one of the things I remember very clearly is the amulet is like creating some kind of spot on his chest That's like a yeah, it's like a corrosive yeah yeah yeah and the girl tries to take it he's sleeping and the girl tries to take it off and he grabs her hand and stops her yes and that kind of is the precipitating event for him like going full monster it's yeah anyway it's it's a crummy crummy crummy movie but the plot actually hangs together it has a beginning in the middle in an end you're absolutely right you're absolutely right and it's got Roddy McDowell in it from a movie, but the plot actually hangs together. It has a beginning of middle and end.

You're absolutely right. You're absolutely right. And it's got Roddy McDowell in it. So. Well, okay. Roddy McDowell did an awful lot of stuff for the paycheck. Clearly. Yeah.

I kind of hope that he went for the points on that one. I don't know what he went for, but, yeah. Money dear boy, is the trope for the reason. Yeah, and you notice I didn't spend much time talking. Waiting for the check to clear. Yeah, notice I didn't spend much time talking about characterization or anything really about the internal lives of any of the characters in this Batman movie.

Because there isn't any. No, it doesn't exist. It is aliens to be out. There is nothing. Yeah, it is so like, I mean, there's all kinds of cool production shit about Arnold and like he puts Jack Nicholson shit to shame in a lot of ways.

He got 25 million for it and he managed to make sure that he only showed up for 25 days of filming He ended up swallowing battery acid by accident because they were trying to figure out a way to make it glow There's just all kinds of wacky shit in there, but like oh, yeah None of it really mattered because this movie was as neon bad as it was What it really did was it killed the franchise in such a bright and shiny way that it opened the door for the Nolan trilogy to come. And that's where I'm going to leave it.

Okay. So having, having done, oh yeah, what are you going to say? No, no, no, go, go, go. So having done that so far, what have you gleaned? Wow. You know, what struck me in just the last second or two, which led to me, you know, saying something a second ago, is we, we started the cinematic journey with I mean the the the modern

You know recent cinematic journey. Mm-hmm with Burton. Yes, and Keaton and Burton and Keaton Did everything in in what we now recognize as the Tim Burton aesthetic, which is the off-kilter distorted, you know kind kind of spooky goth, kind of aesthetic, which they did for two movies. And then Shumacher took over and took kind of where they had started and he said, well, okay, we're gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna up the brightness a little bit. Mm-hmm. Or we're gonna up the brightness a lot

with Batman forever. And then they went and they up the brightness even farther. And in the process of upping the brightness, they completely shot the contrast out the window. Yeah. Metaphorically speaking, of course. Well, I don't think they were going for contrast though. Were they? Well, no, this is what I'm saying is there was no, let's up the brightness, let's up the brightness even farther and turn it into clown shoes.

And, you know, I think, I think what's interesting about it is visually speaking, I think what's interesting about it is visually speaking, if you look at all of these movies, the Schumacher movies, like I only remember a couple of scenes that take place in anything like daylight. Yeah, you're right. Everything is in the dark, but it's in the dark and immensely brightly lit.

Yes. Like the bad cave in Batman Forever is like it's a cave, but you can tell that like, no, no, he's got halogen bulbs in the ceiling. Like it's brightly lit. Oh, yeah. rightly lit. Oh yeah. Which is an aesthetic choice that I think is really symbolic of everything else that's involved in the decision making of the choices they got made with these movies. It's like we're going to take what Burton and Keaton did, which was create this really remarkably complex character with an arc. And we're going to make things lighter and fluffier, and we're making a conscious twist to do that, and we're going to try to be, we're going to go back to the 60s series, can be, can't be. And in the process of doing that, we're going to take all of the, as you said, there is no characterization

by the time of Batman and Robin. We're gonna take all the characterization, we're gonna take all the character development, we're gonna take anything like an internal life and kind of fling that out the window. And it got turned back into a CCA three-color comic. Yes, it did. You know, silver age.

Oh, hey, Superman, let me show you what we're going to look like in the future. And this Superman, Superman saying, let me show you what we're going to look like in the future. Yeah, you know, Bruce Wayne, whose parents haven't been murdered yet. By the way, Superman is a dick. You know, um, you know, I would point out that they did this at a time when the comics were going the other direction. Very, very pronounced. Sedly. Yes.

And so no one wanted this. No one. Absolutely no one. Schumacher. I'm gonna put nipples on the bad suit. Yeah. So like that it's it's so whereas whereas when you started with the 89 Batman it was a direct offshoot of the 85 comic that had come out. You know and so tonally it made sense as a continuation. I would also point out though that the arc of the Keaton Batman ended after the second one. Oh, well, yeah. And so to continue the franchise in any way without reimagining it is a problem to continue it so quickly without you know, to re- reimagine it so quickly afterwards

is a problem. Like at that point, it's they are just pulling the slot machine now. And the comics at that time were heading wildly and, you know, they were continuing the tone that Keaton had gone with. So yeah, yeah. It did. Okay. So I know, I know you and I discussed this, but I don't remember if it came up in

our last episode did I did I talk on on being while being recorded about the fan theory about Batman forever and Batman and Robin We touched on it. Yeah, okay, so so the idea is because you talk about having to have your reinvent the franchise. There is I actually give more and more away to this as we talk about it. There's a fan theory that Batman forever in Batman and Robin are the Batman movies in Gotham. Right. You know, the Batman after the second film, Batman has become this legend figure. And so movie makers are making superhero movies

about him. And that's the reason that we see the bizarre. Like, you know, Dr. Dunhawg, colors and choices. I'm sticking with that, man. Yeah, no, I like it. I like it.

I just wish we could have modified it earlier. We can make merch off of this. Oh, yeah, Dr. Dunog. I like it. And so, yeah, I think there is meaning to be found in assigning that to those iterations of the story. Yeah, because you're now making it kind of that play within the play motif. You're doing the, this is not real. This is hyper unreal. Yeah, well it's like my friends and I's like, you know, my friends and I from from high school.

And many of my friends from college and I insist that they only ever made one high lender movie. Mm hmm. You know, because obviously they wouldn't go screwing it up by making some kind of sequel where it turns out they're all aliens or something because that just beats stupid, right? Which, you know, there's a whole, there's a whole episode or three to be gotten out of that. I'm not going to say, yeah, you, uh, it's a Mr. Van Peable's to task. Yeah. So I mean, that's, that's my, that's, that's kind of my biggest takeaway is, is, is just, it, it is such a jarring change. That, yeah. Okay. Yeaharring change that yeah. Okay.

Yeah, yeah. How about you? Like I said, I think when you had the first two and with such a tidy arc, there was nowhere to go. And so instead of waiting a few years and then rebooting it and paying attention to the zeitgeist, they didn't and it was to their payroll. Yeah, well, yeah, it wound up killing the franchise for actually only eight years. That's really yeah. The difference in time between first key in Batman and final shoe marker Batman is the same difference in time between final shoe marker Batman and first Nolan Batman.

All right, well, I know what what I'm going to start talking about my mind being blown by on. So, okay, with that, what do you got going on? You want to talk about what you're reading, what are you interested in, what's happening? Let's see, as far as what I'm reading, I actually picked up a module for something called the Ravens Call. My daughter has me working on getting our neighbors to play a Dungeons & Dragons game with us. We're going to find some social distance-ly appropriate way to do that. So I'm reading through that.

I'm also rereading some old comics, including one called The Nice Guy, which was a creation of Michael O'Connell and Tim Watts, friend of the show Tim Watts, who did our viewpoint and episodes. And I'm reading something called the heart, what's it called, a rat queens. It's a D&D comic. A record novel. Yeah. Kind of, yeah.

Kind of just fingers in several pies. What about you? What are you reading? phrasing. I'm late. I've been doing an awful lot of reading of student work which any of any any teachers and audience will will immediately be sympathetic to I'll immediately be sympathetic to. But I also have been rereading the fellowship of the ring, because I'm reading that aloud at intervals to my remedial reading class, nice to help them with, you know, listening to red material as part of helping them with their fluency.

And, you know, what is interesting about that is rereading it after a number of years away. The amount of kind of self-referential humor in Tolkien's writing about bag-end, humor in Tolkien's writing about bag end and about Hobbiton is really, I'm getting an awful lot of enjoyment out of it. Now that I'm a middle aged dude, you know, married with a kid, there is a lot of domestic humor that I'm finding in the opening of the book. And that's kind of nice. Oh, good. So that's what I've got going on right now. Well, so we're, oh yeah, go on. No, you beat me to it.

Yeah. You take the right of way. Where can people find you on the social medias? If they are looking for me on the social medias, you can find me on Twitter at ehblaloc. You can find me on TikTok at the same address. You can find me on Instagram as Mr. Playlock. And if you want to try to find both of us to yell at us collectively about something we've gotten wrong, whether a fact or just an opinion that like no, no, we're wrong on You can find us at geek history time on the Twitter and now if they want to find you other than in these streets, sir Where can they find you?

Well, actually we're in the purple so you can't find me in these streets Well, actually we're in the purple so you can't find me in these streets. Am you. I'm having a conning answer available. Yeah, it's always. All right. No, you can find me at the Harmony on the Twin Stah. So you can find me there. You can also go find this podcast on Stitcher, Spotify, or Apple podcasts.

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They're coming well. OK. I don't think the anyway. I don't think people of India would agree. But. Yeah, well, yeah. But from India to Italy, how about that? OK. Well, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm on twitch.tv-capetal-puns every Tuesday night at 8.30pm. Pacific Standard Time.

Come check us out. So for a geek history of time, I'm Damien Harmony. And I'm in Blalock and tune in with us. Same bad time. Same bad channel. Oh my God, are we really going to do more episodes of this shit? episodes of this shit.