What Vinnie Thinks

 “Holy retro, Batman”. The classic superhero has had many versions of movies and TV series and is still making more. Batman (1966-1968) was the first version I’ve seen, which stars Adam West and Burt Ward as the dynamic duo.

What makes the franchise so memorable to me are the colorful villains. The Joker (Caesar Romero) is a clown, the Penguin (Burgess Meredith) has different umbrellas and wears a purple top hat, the Riddler (Frank Gorshin) has green tights and leaves riddles, and so on. The villains’ henchmen sometimes have names that stick out. For example, Catwoman (Julie Newmar) once had henchmen named Eenie, Meanie, Mynie, and Moe. In another episode, the Joker had henchmen named after the planets of the solar system while committing zodiac related crimes. That’s pretty clever. There were many other colorful villains as well. Unfortunately, villains like Two-Face, Poison Ivy, Scarecrow, and Harley Quinn were not among them. So I didn’t know about those characters until later on.

My favorite parts in the series are the fight scenes, where words pop up to express the action. The violence level is very minimal. Not much different than Get Smart, but I still think it works just as well. Real comic book style.

In 1966, there was Batman – The Movie (Special Edition) based on the series, which featured all of the same actors. Except for Catwoman, who was played by Lee Meriwether. Then again, Julie Newmar and Eartha Kitt also played Catwoman. That used to confuse me, but who keeps track.

I met Adam West at FX Convention 2008. As much as I enjoyed this series, I thought it would be nice to meet the legendary star. Unfortunately, it wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. First off, Adam West charges $50 for his autograph. Normally an autograph is worth $20 or $25. Instead, my sister took my picture with him, which cost me $20. The first attempt, Adam West didn’t smile at all. She tried again while asking him to smile and Mr. West was all, “Oh, god.”  As you can see here, this was his best attempt.  I wasn’t disappointed because it was still good to have met him.

At the different conventions, I’ve heard from other people that it wasn’t the first time Adam West was like this, but that’s not gonna stop me from enjoying this classic series.  Uh-uh.  In fact, I still recognize the bronze statue, which is actually a switch to open the secret passage to the Bat cave.  It’s in the convention programs all the time.