I’m already doing a rewatch of a show that debuted in 1966 that has become a popular culture icon and stars a man known (whether fairly or not) for his overacting. So why not another one?
Starting next Friday, I will be doing The Bat-Rewatch! I’ll be looking back at the Batman TV series developed by William Dozier for ABC, and which ran from 1966 to 1968. Between seasons one and two, we’ll also take a gander at the Batman feature film that was released in the summer of 1966.
Each week we’ll go over a single story, so each entry will cover both parts of all the two-parters (48), all three parts of the three-parters the show did (3), and single entries for the single episodes (15).
As if my wont with all my previous rewatches (Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Star Trek The Original Series, and Stargate), this rewatch will be divided into appropriate categories, which will be as follows:
The Bat-signal: This will be the plot summary.
Fetch the Bat-shark-repellant! Batman had an amazing array of gadgets, all modified with the prefix “Bat-.” This section will catalog them.
Holy #@!%$, Batman! Robin’s catch-phrase has become seared on the public consciousness over the past five decades. We’ll catalog his uses of it here.
Gotham City’s finest. Batman is mostly necessary in this iteration because the Gotham City Police Department may be the most spectacularly incompetent police force in the history of the universe.
No sex, please, we’re superheroes. A modification of the category seen in the Trek rewatches, while this was a show very much geared toward children, there were occasional hints of romance.
Special Guest Villain. The villain (or villains) that appear in the episode.
Na-na na-na na-na na-na na. A funny quote from the episode.
Meanwhile…: This will be the trivial matters section, with the usual collection of nonsense relating to the episode. Among other things, I’ll also be providing links to The Batcave Podcast, a fantastic podcast (on which I have appeared) that examines each episode of the show, hosted by John S. Drew.
Pow! Biff! Zowie! The review of the episode.
Bat-rating: The least important part of the rewatch, the ranking of the episode on a scale of 1-10.
We’ll begin next week with “Hi Diddle Diddle”/ “Smack in the Middle.”
Keith R.A. DeCandido‘s Heroes Reborn eBook novella Save the Cheerleader, Destroy the World is now available for preorder. One of six novellas tying into the new NBC series, Keith’s tale will be released on the 20th of November, and can be preordered from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or Kobo.
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