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The Legacy of Batman- The Beginning
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Mar 31, 2025
Batman has been one of the biggest pop culture icons for decades. From Comic Books, Television, Movies, Video Games, Merchandise, Batman continues to be loved by generations of fans. But do you know the complete story of how Batman became the cultural juggernaut that he is? In this new series we are going to walk you through the complete history of Batman.
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Batman has been a presence in global culture for over 80 years
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He's been everything from a comedic children's show star to an avenging ninja of the night to a literal vampire
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However, it seems like he's even more ubiquitous today than he has ever been, which begs the question, how did we get here
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For our new three-part series, we're going to take a look at the entire history of the iconic Caped Crusader
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Join us in an exploration through over 80 years of Gotham City's Lone Defender
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The comic book character, the Batman, first appeared in Detective Comics number 27, published on March 10, 1939
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Created by Bill Finger and Bob Kane, the character was an avenging angel, a creature of the night
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and a distillation of all the pulp heroes of the 1920s. He was a mix of The Shadow, Zorro, Robert the Bruce, and Doc Savage
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And right from his first appearance, he was a smash success. When I started Batman, he was kind of a vigilante, dark, brooding, Dracula-like
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The character, who was created in an effort by national publications to clone the success of Siegel and Schuster's Superman
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captured a generation of readers' imaginations almost instantly. Children and adults loved the somber tone
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hard-boiled crime, and gritty violence of the character. It also didn't hurt that his costume was instantly iconic, even if it did have purple gloves
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However, this version of Batman that we all know and love today was almost very different
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Bob Kane, the man originally and widely credited with Batman's creation, wanted him to look a bit more like this
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His original idea was inspired by a museum visit to see the works of Leonardo da Vinci
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Bill Finger, a writer who was a fan of the pulps and sometimes worked for Kane as a ghostwriter
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developed him into the creature of the night we know today. He also created Gotham City, The Bat Signal, The Batmobile, Robin, and The Joker
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He didn't receive credit for these contributions until the Batfleck era. This initial version of Batman was much more a judge, jury, and executioner type pulp hero
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He took the law into his own hands, killed criminals, and used guns. He was a reflection of the time
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Crime in the 1930s was running rampant in America. The population wanted someone with a sense of moral turpitude to step in and do something about it
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Batman became a symbol of wish fulfillment for the hungry masses. Batman's first appearance on the silver screen came in the form of the 1943 Columbia Pictures serial simply titled Batman
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Chronicled over 15 parts and released in the lead up to World War II, the film is very much of its time
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Directed by Lambert Hillier and starring Lewis Wilson as Batman, it's a jingoistic and racist piece of propaganda
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in which Batman goes toe-to-toe with the cartoonishly evil Dr. Daka, an agent of the Japanese government hell-bent on overthrowing America
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Ultimately, it's not hard to see exactly how this film was a direct reflection
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of the fears and prejudices of its time. It's just a bigoted screed against Japanese-Americans
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It is, without a doubt, the most shameful and regrettable aspect of the long and storied legacy of The Dark Knight
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In 1949, a sequel series was produced, also by Columbia, titled New Adventures of Batman and Robin, The Boy Wonder
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It starred Robert Lowery as Batman, Johnny Duncan as Robin, and follows the dynamic duo as they go up against a villain named The Wizard
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who can control cars with a handheld piece of futuristic technology. This serial is far less racially divisive than its predecessor
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but also fails to have anything substantial or new to say about the Dark Knight. At least Batman's cowl looks much less like a last-minute Halloween store purchase
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You better be careful. I think she's beginning to get wise that Batman and Bruce Wayne are the same
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As we moved into the 1950s, Batman was being reinvented on the comic book page
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Gone was the dark, brooding, and murderous vigilante. This new iteration was a trippy, psychedelic adventure book
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Four-color fantasy and goofy villains were the taste du jour. Dick Sprang took over the artwork from the supposed original co-creator Bob Kane
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who in fact never drew the book, but used an army of ghost artists and writers
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Sprang's work was a direct reaction to the fact that in the early 1950s
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comic books were being blamed for all the evils of the world A Senate subcommittee had been convened led by Senator Estes Kefauver to publicly try comic books for all the juvenile delinquency the country was experiencing Is directly responsible for a substantial amount
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of juvenile delinquency and child crime. Batman essentially stopped being a book
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about being a crime fighter. He became a zany kids' comic that was equal parts science fiction and comedy
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Bright colors and far-out ideas were the narrative grist for the metaphorical mill
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Batman would more or less exist in this way as a sanitized, squeaky-clean crime fighter in name only
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throughout much of the 50s and 60s. In fact, notorious DC editor Mort Weisinger
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who took over the Bat titles around this time, would generate story ideas by asking young children
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what they would do if they had superpowers. These non-sequitur and often exceedingly bizarre suggestions
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would be transformed into cover images at Weisinger's direction, and then the artist and writer would have to build stories around them
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That's how you get stories with titles like The Rainbow Batman and Sir Batman and Robin in King Arthur's Court
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Be smart. Snack on more Batman. Saving stamps and bonds. 1966 saw the introduction of the widely popular Adam West vehicle, Batman
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Despite only running from January 12, 1966 to March 14, 1968, the show was nothing short of a cultural phenomenon
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It captured the collective imagination by mimicking the tone and aesthetic of the spring-era comic with shocking accuracy
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Positioning the Dark Knight as a comedic persona, the show rode the wave of pop art and psychedelia
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to a legacy that's still being felt almost 50 years later. In many ways, this light and airy version of Batman
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seems to be making fun of the idea that an individual can affect serious change
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Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb. The 60s were a decade of massive upheaval for the country
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with rapidly shifting cultural mores, young people exploring their sexuality, and the flower power movement questioning every power structure and symbol of the status quo
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The TV version of Batman seemed to existentially mock every one of those new ideas
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The notion that someone could work outside the system and ostensibly will themselves into being greater than their means is the subconscious punchline of almost all the jokes within the show
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It happened at sea. Sea? Sea for Catwoman. The core idea of Batman is that his superpower is his mind
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He is human will personified. This idea was threatened by the growing power of the youth movement of the 1960s, and so this became the humor mechanic for every episode
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Batman's gadgets got so outlandish they became ridiculous. His detective capabilities were so unstoppable it was highly humorous
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It's the basic formula for escaping from the Siamese human knot. I just recalled it
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The global popularity of the Batman 66 TV show cannot be overstated
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It was so beloved it spawned bootleg films all over the globe. The Mexican Batwoman, Filipino Batman Fights Dracula, and James Batman being some of the most infamous
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In some ways, this Batman would be the Batman that all of the live-action iterations would contend with going forward
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The more serious and grounded they were, the more tangibly they were a reaction to the 66 TV show, the more they were directly not Adam West
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Also released in 1966 was Batman's first theatrical feature film, debuting two months after the climax of season one
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This film is in some ways the apotheosis of a four-color pop approach to Batman
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Despite its cultural dominance, the Batman 66 interpretation of the character was over before it started, and the rights to the character languished for close to a decade
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New adventures! In 1979, a young production assistant and comic book fan named Michael Uslin
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who'd been keeping an eye on the rights, came into the picture. He was waiting for his moment, and when the rights lapsed
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due to no one being interested in them, he purchased them outright from Fox
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This would prove to be one of the smartest plays in the history of Hollywood. How does a kid in his 20s buy the rights to Batman
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Nobody else in the world showed up. Meanwhile, in the comics industry, the 1970s saw Batman going through a renaissance
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Artist Neil Adams and writer Denny O'Neill were taking Bruce Wayne and pushing him back to his roots
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Gone was the biff-bang-pow, and here was a brooding detective, a creature of the night, a globe-trotting playboy with a deep well of torment
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This version of Batman, often referred to as the world's greatest detective, was a grounded, gritty, and character-rich version of Bruce Wayne
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Inspired by the deep mistrust of the government spinning out of Watergate in the Nixon presidency
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Batman during this time period was constantly involved in conspiracies. He was pushed to the limit of his being by a series of new villains, with Ra's al Ghul leading the pack
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Michael Uslan would spend nearly the next decade of his life attempting to get a Batman feature film off the ground with little to no success Hollywood just couldn see past the towering figure that was Adam West Sure the comics might be dark and serious but the cultural memory was Burt Ward shouting
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Holy mechanical armies! Exactly, Robin! There's something new in Gotham City. No, I know
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Hi. Batman cartoon kid! As the 80s rolled around, the one-two punch of Frank Miller's Dark Knight Returns
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and Alan Moore and Brian Boland's The Killing Joke took the character to new levels of maturity and sales
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These two books were massive successes, catapulting the character to being read by people
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outside of the comic world for the first time in decades. Towards the end of the 80s
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Warner Brothers, who had recently bought DC Comics, came calling on Michael Uslan
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They wanted to buy the rights to Batman from him with the intention of making a new feature film franchise
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However, Uslan refused to sell. This ultimately settled in a deal where Uslan would license the character to WB
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for a fee and an executive producer credit on every Batman project. That's right, he's been a
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producer on every version of Batman that has been produced ever since. 1987 saw the young
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hot director Tim Burton handed the reins to Batman. WB executives were initially hoping that Burton
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would be interested in developing a script titled The Batman, written by James Bond screenwriter
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Tom Mankiewicz. Burton felt that Mankiewicz's draft was too jokey and Bond-esque. I never joke
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about my work 007? At one time, Ivan Reitman had been attached to the project
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and had wanted Bill Murray to play Batman and Eddie Murphy to play Robin
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Burton eventually worked with comic book scribe Steve Englehart to write a new draft of the script
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based on Englehart's Batman Strange Apparitions book. WB felt the project lacked gravitas
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and let Englehart go in favor of hiring the young up-and-coming screenwriter Sam Hamm
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He proved to be the secret ingredient to get the film to a place where Warners were seriously considering giving it a green light
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Ultimately, it was the massive financial success of Burton's Beetlejuice that convinced WB to give the film the go-ahead
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I've been in show business, what, 35 years? You've been in your life. 40 years, and this is the biggest thing I've ever been able to
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1989 saw the release of arguably the biggest event in Batman's 80-year history
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the release of Tim Burton's Batman, starring Michael Keaton as Batman and Jack Nicholson as the Joker
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The film redefined Batman and the cultural consciousness yet again. Gone was Adam West's campy comedy romp
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and in its place was a neo-German expressionist gothic take on the character
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equally as influenced by Fritz Lang and Robert Wein. This version of Batman captured the imagination of a generation unlike anything before
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The Bat logo might as well have been a national insignia in the summer of 1989. Warner Brothers capitalized off the success of the film with a publicity tour
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and merchandising tie-in campaign the likes of which had not been seen before. The film itself took a tone closer to the original comics of the 30s
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but swapped out much of the gallivanting playboy Bruce Wayne for a lonely outsider
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pretending to be a playboy. The element that really captivated everyone and worked to redefine Batman
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was the aesthetic of the film. The production design by Anton Furst is jaw-dropping
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Its use of matte paintings make it feel otherworldly in a way a comic book film never had
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It's hard to overstate just what a success Batman was. News broadcast declared it the summer of Batman
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They're bat fanatics. The film they have been waiting for. Batmania this summer
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So big it had to be held in two theaters. It was nearly inescapable how pervasive The Dark Knight was
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The immense hunger for the character couldn't be satiated by the film either, with loads of merchandise, comics, and video games being sold in its wake
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The film was critically praised, made over $400 million worldwide, and made being a nerd cool for the first time
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The dark and gothic aesthetic of the film was pushed to even further heights in 1992
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with the release of Batman Returns, the most bizarre and overtly fetish-driven Batman film that will ever be produced
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Burton and Keaton returned to Gotham, this time joined by actors Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman
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and Danny DeVito as the Penguin. Given free reign after having proved himself
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with the original Batman and Edward Scissorhands, Burton pushed every element of Returns
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to its furthest possible capabilities. There were more matte paintings, more characters
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more sets, and more outlandish ideas. It's not every comic book movie
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where one of the lead characters is dressed as a dominatrix and says, The thought of busting Batman makes me feel all..
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dirty. Unfortunately, audiences did not embrace Returns the way they had with its predecessor. It still made $266 million at the box office
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but the powers that be at Warner Brothers thought the film underperformed due to its dark overtones
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and sexual nature. Despite attempting to develop a third Batman film, Burton's relationship with WB
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fell apart and he left the franchise forever Warners knew they had a cash cow on their hands though They wanted to keep the franchise going just retool without burden And as such they wanted to keep the market warm and receptive to Batman content They used their burgeoning
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animation studio to push forward with one of the most successful incarnations of Batman to ever be
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produced. The project that spun out of this effort was Batman, the animated series, developed by
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iconic animation talents Bruce Timm and Eric Rodomsky. The series premiered on September 5
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1992, and ran until September of 1995. The show totaled 85 episodes, with a 20-episode
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spinoff reboot series titled The Adventures of Batman and Robin. Timm and Rodomsky would take
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some of the ideas from Burton's rendition, some from Neil Adams' visuals, and some from the
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original concepts of the character that redefined what children's animation could be. Bruce Timm
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and Eric Rodomsky developed a visual palette commonly referred to as Dark Deco, which has
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been an influence on almost every version of the Batman since. The show's backgrounds were animated
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on black paper, causing everything to have a murky atmosphere to it. It took the best of the previous
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incarnations of The Dark Knight from the comics, films, and TV show and repackaged them for arguably
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the best and most impactful iteration of the character. 1993 saw the release of Batman's first
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theatrical animated film, produced by the team behind the animated series, titled Mask of the
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Phantasm. The film failed at the box office, but would go on to be commonly considered one of the
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best Batman pieces of media ever created. I don't want to let you down, honest, but it just doesn't
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hurt so bad anymore. As 1993 rolled on, Batman had lost his way in the comics. Attempting to keep up
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with the trend of extreme things being popular, Batman had shifted to being depicted like an
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almost literal monster. The beloved horror illustrator Kelly Jones was the primary visual
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stylist behind this incarnation of Bruce. In fact, he was made into a literal vampire in the aptly
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named Batman Vampire. And then, of course, you have the whole Batman getting his back broken thing
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It was against the backdrop to this explicitly horror-fueled take on Batman that saw the Lost
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Boys and St. Elmo's Fire director Joel Schumacher being brought in for what would eventually be
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titled Batman Forever. After Returned pulled in significantly less money than its predecessor
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Warners decided to take pitches from multiple directors. They met with Sam Raimi, John McTiernan
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Ultimately, it was Schumacher that won the job. From there, screenwriting duo Lee Batchelor and Janet Scott Batchelor were brought in to pen the script
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The creative collective wanted the duality of Bruce Wayne and Batman to be at the center of the story
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This was initially very intriguing to Michael Keaton, who wanted to do an origin picture, pushing the darker emotional roots of Batman
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Schumacher and company didn't want to pursue this direction, and Keaton walked away from the project
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Schumacher's incarnation of Batman started to recast Val Kilmer as the lead in the picture
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and seemed like it would be a course correction from Returns. The film has a distinctly lighter tone to it
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aiming to be a more camp-fueled adventure romp. Regrettably, Forever doesn't hold a candle to the Burton films
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Between the bizarre shifts in tone slapstick comedy and Jim Carrey playing the Joker in a Riddler suit
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the film lacks the identity and personality that either of the Burton films have
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Despite its shift in tone, the film was embraced by fans and audiences alike
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pulling in close to $340 million worldwide. Thanks to this undeniable success
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Warner Brothers rushed a sequel into production. Schumacher returned to shepherd the project
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He wanted to do the big-budget version of the 1966 TV show this go-around
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Chicks dig the car! This is why Superman works alone. Batman and Robin, released in 1997, pulled in George Clooney as Batman
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and Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze. It was a critical and box office disaster
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It completely failed to connect with audiences, fans, or even fellow creatives
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The film is commonly considered the worst piece of Batman media ever produced
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and its failure sent the film franchise in a tailspin for close to a decade
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Both Burton and Schumacher struggled with studio interference as they were producing their first films
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and then, after financial windfall, were allowed more freedom. Burton's latex-driven, sexually preoccupied story holds together much better than Schumacher's campy throwback
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Unequivocally, things looked bleak for Batman on the big screen. The franchise was in shambles, the character was a punchline, and Warners had no idea what to do with him
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But thankfully, a new beginning was just around the corner. It's not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me
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Please come back next time to see just what the dynamic duo will get into as we continue our series, Batman, How Did We Get Here
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Same bat time, same bat channel
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