Batman, Batman -- How I do Love my Batmans

[maggie2]

Batman was my first true television love. Back when I was seven, I just loved Batman, Robin, and their battle with all those diabolical villains.  When I was older, I realized that Batman was a spoof and I still loved it.  Great that it could work for a literal-minded seven year old.  Great that it could amuse her when she got older.  Adam West and Burt Ward linger in my heart with the warmest affection.

I loved Tim Burton's Batman with Michael Keaton.  Mostly because batman was back and I am and always will be pro-batman girl.  I liked the serious tone, along with the cartoonish tone from the original show.  I'm not sure they worked together very well, though.  I loved that first Batman movie a lot, but more as a really cool failure than as a spectacular success.  The sequels just got worse from there.

I really like the new Batman with Christian Bale.  Oddly, I've only seen the first one once.   It's a bit long and takes itself too seriously.  But I like Dark Knight a lot.  It makes you think a bit.  It's definitely got some of that essential darkness that the TV show didn't have and that Burton couldn't quite blend with the cartoon sensibility..

Folks, these are three very different approaches to the source material which is batman.  If you want to take one of them and canonize it and say the other two don't measure up, that's your perogative.  But I'd like to be free to like all the batmans.  I don't want to live in a world where embracing Christian Bale means I have to renounce Adam West.  I want to live in a world that celebrates them both and which recognizes that the source material for batman is just that rich that it works well as serious brooding drama and as spoofy cheese.

Batman and Robin is a bad movie because it doesn't have the zany cheese of the series, or the weird combo that Burton tried.  It's not a fun movie, or a serious movie or any kind of good movie.  So of course, it's worse that Dark Knight.  But NOT because it fails to be properly serious.    Batman the series is NOT worse than Dark Knight.  It's just different.  Difference is good. 

To the argument in question, season 8 might well be an abject failure -- but at least let it be a failure of Joss to do justice to his own schtick, not a failure to do something he isn't even trying to do.  And please don't tell me that for any given set of ideas there is One True Way.  (Or less snarkily, any subject worth doing well is worth doing in multiple tones.  Literature is a conversation, not a dictatorship).

Comments

[gabrielleabelle.livejournal.com]

Ah...I'm reluctant to even wander into this mess because...you know my non-thoughts on the comics. I don't like to try to discuss them since I don't read them.

But I'm seeing a logic mishap with some of these complaints about S8 that's been bothering me. I figure you'd be the most sympathetic to it. :)

Cause...people are saying that S8 is derivative of Source X (though what Source X is seems to vary). Then, S8 is judged on that basis and found to be a failure.

If the latter is true, then wouldn't it be easier to conclude that S8 isn't derivative of Source X and is, instead, doing its own thing (perhaps with a few Buffy-style homages)? Or is the premise of S8 being derivative a hard and settled fact that can't be adjusted?

It just seems that the end result (The conclusion that S8 is a failure) is the primary starting place, and so arguments to prove it are often based on some shaky logic that just doesn't hold up.

I mean, take Normal Again, which uses a pretty standard sci-fi premise (It's all in the character's head!). Let's say some classic sci-fi story used that prior to Buffy used that trope and let's call it Source A. It would be awkward to see criticism of NA on the basis that it's derivative of Source A, but it does so poorly, therefore the episode sucks. If that's the conclusion, wouldn't it be better to attempt to view and judge the episode based on its own merits? Or is the derivation of Source A that set in stone?

Ah, I probably shouldn't even wade into this. But I've done stupider things during my time in fandom.

[2maggie2.livejournal.com]

You've just well-articulated exactly what I've been trying to say. Right down the line. I've got nothing to add except that I hope Andrew is OK. I'm rooting for you crazy kids.

[gabrielleabelle.livejournal.com]

Heh.

Course, the natural continuation of the "judge it on its own merits" train is that some people will decide that, on its own merits, it sucks. But those direct criticisms sit better with me than this odd twisted finagling to compare it to something else just to justify why it sucks. It's kinda odd.

I've got nothing to add except that I hope Andrew is OK. I'm rooting for you crazy kids.

Thanks. He'll be fine. He's just gonna resemble Frankenstein for a while what with the massive metal staples in his head. :)

[2maggie2.livejournal.com]

I've got no problem if people judge the comics on their own merits and decide they suck. That's been happening for quite a while now, and while I'm not ready to say they suck, I can certainly see why people think they do.

Glad to hear about Andrew! Give him my well-wishes.

[gabrielleabelle.livejournal.com]

Oh, I know. That wasn't directed at you, specifically. I was just pontificating out loud lest someone get the impression I'm saying NO CRITICISM EVER!!! I tend to think you present fairly even-handed arguments both for and against the comics.