Some characters or stories grow such cachet they break banks not just between media, but throughout culture. As Diane Nelson, president of DC Entertainment Studios, says, “The origin of Batman, Bruce Wayne, and the famous citizens of Gotham are legendary and likely a story you know inside out, even if you've never picked up a comic book in your life.”
Born in Detective Comics No. 27 (May 1939), the comic book Batman was inspired by the masked avengers of literature and the dime store pulp dramas of the day; he originally had little remorse over killing crooks.
Familiar elements, from the square jaw to the utility belt, fell into place over the next year, and a two-page story in edition No. 33 revealed Batman's origin story and showed young a Bruce Wayne promise to fight crime over his parents’ graves after witnessing their murder.
Batman got his own series in 1940 and the basic mythology is said to have been in place by 1942, but rather than reflect the bleakness and suffering in the real world, DC moved away from its darker elements in favor of fun and escapism, making Batman a respectable citizen and father figure.
Fifteen-episode theatrical sequels appeared in 1943 and 1949, more serious than the ‘60s TV series but hobbled by cheap production, rights tangles, and standards of decency. The vigilantism of the story was absent, none of the iconic villains from the comics appear, and both series are said to be outrageously racist.
Out of Light Comes Darkness
Batman remained light and cheery into the post-war economic boom, as the dynamic duo turned into aliens, met Bat-mite, and wore different colored costumes each night (“The Rainbow Batman”).
ABC offered Batman to producer Bill Dozier and playwright Lorenzo Semple, Jr. (who died earlier this year at age 91) after the pair had worked on TV pilots together. “I thought it was a sensational idea,” Semple later said when Dozier showed him the comic. “I never doubted it would be enormous fun and a big success.” ABC liked the pilot script so much they ordered the entire series into production before even shooting it.
The Papillon/Three Days of the Condor writer happily acknowledged the comedy of the series later. “It never crossed my mind to do it any other way,” Semple told Starlog magazine in 1983. “The comic books were camp in themselves. They were treated totally straight, yet were deliciously absurd.”
Aware of Batman's dark side, Semple didn't hold back when addressing the offense comic book fans took at his light-hearted treatment. “To think that comics books are a legitimate form of artistic expression is utter nonsense!” he told Starlog. “As for those who live comic books … you need say very little more to me about their intellectual tastes.”
Batman's always had an inherent darkness, agrees DC publisher Jim Lee. “He's more deeply rooted in reality and has a darker side. Even the Batman of 1939 stands out from all the other superheroes that were dressed in very bright costumes. He really fit into the shadows.”
Those who'd always loved the conflicted soul at the heart of the Batman mythology were vindicated in the ‘80s by the appearance of two seminal works of graphic novel lore, Frank Miller's Batman: Year One series (1987) and Alan Moore's standalone title The Killing Joke (1988).
Chronicling the origins of police commissioner Jim Gordon and the Joker, Miller and Moore's titles explored realism, grit, and humanity, and sat much better with many comic and graphic novel fans. The Killing Joke (along with Moore's other big title, 1986's Watchmen) was crucial in gaining attention from outside the world of comic aficionados, as traditional book publishing and literary critics took notice.
The Eras of DC On-Screen
Director Tim Burton saw Batman as a misfit and an outsider, like Miller and Moore had, who dressed like a bat to fight crime thanks to near-psychosis rather than the pursuit of justice.
Audiences eventually rejected Burton's aesthetic in the wake of less successful sequel, Batman Returns (1992), and as director Joel Schumacher bought the franchise full circle back to the one-liners and bat-trickery of the ‘60s TV show. Even Batman & Robin star George Clooney admitted he'd killed a franchise.
It took another eight years, but Memento and The Prestige director Christopher Nolan gave longtime Batman fans the vision they'd longed for. Retaining Moore and Miller’s grim tones, but using stark realism instead of the twisted, fantastical worlds of Burton and Schumacher, Nolan catapulted Batman back to the forefront of public consciousness with Batman Begins (2005).
Post-Nolan, Batman's fiercest enemy won't be some larger-than-life tyrant, but rival studio Marvel, and industry analyst Rob Salkowitz thinks it has the drop on him. “[Marvel] waited a bit longer to get off the ground but approached it strategically, building up the Avengers franchise one film at a time to get the wheels turning,” he says.
Salkowitz might be right—the first film in Marvel's current production effort, Blade (1998), arrived only a year after Batman & Robin tanked, giving the studio a decade to fully realize the value of screen superheroes thanks to the success of Iron Man (2008). A year later Disney agreed, paying $4.64 billion for the company.
By the time Dark Knight (2008) and The Dark Knight Rises (2012) became billion-dollar films, Marvel's cinematic universe was in full swing, culminating in The Avengers (2012), which made $1.51 billion ($623 million domestically).
Warner Bros. executives would likely have been looking on with envious eyes. 2011's Ryan Reynolds-starrer The Green Lantern (a DC title) made only $219 million globally ($116 million domestically) from a $200 million budget, and a Justice League movie featuring topline DC characters, under Australian director George Miller, fell apart in January 2013.
Batman: Phase Three?
May 6, 2016 will be a very important date for Warner Bros., when it releases Zack Snyder's Man Of Steel sequel. Not that Disney is worried; as we said in our Disney studio series, “Consider the cojones Marvel displayed by announcing that they'll release the third [Captain America] the same day as the Superman/Batman film in May 2016. Marvel and Disney don't fear Warners and probably shouldn't."
But Warner Bros. is certainly trying to catch up. In 2009 it set up DC Entertainment to re-engineer its characters for other media. Next year it will move from New York to Warner Bros.’ Burbank home—a strong message that movies are where DC is at.
A picture of Ben Affleck as Batman stoked already frenzied interest online, and in April Warner Bros. confirmed the long-mooted Justice League movie will follow, with Snyder directing.
Nor is the studio confining itself to big screens. Batman video games continue to rack up blockbuster sales, and the origins of the characters will be further explored on the Fox series Gotham, premiering later this year.
Though late to the superhero party, Warner Bros. seems intent on giving Marvel and Disney a run for their considerable money, and Batman will be a lynchpin in the company's strategy—an honor certainly befitting a 75-year-old superhero.
More from the SSN Franchise Analysis:
Part One: The Evolution of Batman
Part Two: Empire of the Bat