Christian Bale might be considered one of the great Batmans by film fans but the actor does not think he quite landed the performance he wanted. “I didn’t quite manage what I hoped I would throughout the trilogy,” Bale told Yahoo in a recent interview. “Chris did, but my own sense of self is like, ‘I didn’t quite nail it’.” Bale believed Heather Ledger’s Oscar-winning turn in the second film, 2008’s ‘The Dark Knight’, trumped his performance as the caped crusader. “Heath turned up, and just kind of completely ruined all my plans,” Bale said. “Because I went, ‘He’s so much more interesting than me and what I’m doing’.”
The issue of who made the greatest ever Batman is likely to be whirling in the ether for as long as Hollywood makes superhero movies. It’s particularly pertinent right now, with the world set to get its first look at the new caped crusader, Ben Affleck, in the much-hyped superhero beat-down ‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’.
So, what type of Batman do you like?
First let me say that I do get a bit tired of actors, writers, etc, all focussing entirely on the whole: “Oh, he’s so damaged and screwed up, let’s really make him even more messed up because acting/gravitas/grim/gritty/etc”
There are more ways to portray and interpret the character than that after all. I will always go back to the Conroy interpretation in TAS and Justice League as being a prime example – his Batman was clearly damaged, clearly very driven, but ALSO very heroic and, via his exposure to other people, still human and still capable of living.
It seems people are just obsessed with making an interpretation of Batman that is “ALL SERIOUS, ALL THE TIME, I AM THE NIGHT!!!” not necessarily because it’s true to the character, but because that’s “what a serious movie would do”. As if it’s a foregone conclusion. Which is quite sad really. I look forward to a version of Bruce Wayne onscreen that doesn’t just focus on his trauma, and demonstrates that he’s still a human being underneath it all.
I am open to different interpretations. Hey, I have seen the 60’s Batman television show. But if you look at who Batman would have to be to actually exist he is driven enough to be a leader in business as Bruce Wayne and he still goes out to fight crime at night. Also, you can’t get rid of the suit but he dresses up to do this. You can either have a total fantasy like the television show or you can start to consider who Batman would be, and for me it’s hard to imagine a realistic middle ground.
We’re talking about a man whose nemesis is a clown. That’s not to mention the inherent ridiculousness of naming everything after bats—Batarang, Batmobile, Batplane, Batline, Batsignal—or the high camp of an English butler, or Bruce Wayne as international playboy, or the entire effing Silver Age. Even just a semi-dark pre-Frank Miller Batman would be nice, honestly. You know, dramatic with a certain gravitas but not tortured to the bone. A dry sense of humour. Brutal to his enemies, but not devoid of empathy. And show me this so called greatest detective for ONCE.
Me personally, I like how Batman is portrayed in the animated movies. Bruce Wayne is the mask and Batman is who he really is. The pain of his parents death is like scare tissue that leaves him aloof and distant when he can be himself. You can see it in his relationships with Alfred and Robin in that they connect with, in Alfred’s case, the Bruce he used to know and in Robins case, the father-figure he projects onto Bruce. Batman isn’t at his worse when he is roaring at bad guys, for him that is a short-coming, it’s when he is perfectly calm and he is threatening to drop you off a bridge because neither you nor him knows if this will be the time that he actually does it.
As far as Movies/TV they will eventually do a lighter take when they want to react to this cycle. The 60’ Batman was the standard until Tim Burton’s wonderful and gothic 80’s/90’s take. Joel Schumacher did the camp thing poorly in the late 90’s. Nolan had a more realistic “gritty” take and the latest cycle takes a lot from the eighties comic batman which is the heyday of gritty-dark Batman. Zack Snyder’s video game looking beat’em up comes out soon and I am excited to check it. He kind of lost me with ‘Man Of Steel’. Spoiler, Superman is a crabber & frowns a lot. I mean, The Captain America movies have proven that a man with conviction can sell, and that is all he really needs to do with Superman. Make him a optimist, make him a man of conviction.
I’m guessing in the 2020’s someone will do a love letter to fun Batman and it will do great. Something like…Batman v. Batman v. Superman.
-Dagobot
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