Batman: The Movie (1966)

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Adam West IS...The Pink Avenger!

Holy cinematic insanity! The guys sat down this week to watch the classic 1966 Adam West and Burt Ward vehicle, Batman The Movie! It's got Cesar Romero! Frank Gorshin! Burgess Meredith! Lee Meriwether! Exploding sharks! Suicidal porpoises! Uncomfortably stiff romance! Bomb-getting-rid-of inability! And, yes, a lot of homoerotic subtext.

Adam West is Bruce Wayne...sophisticated millionaire playboy during the, er, night...and Dark Avenger of Justice by...day, we guess. (editor's note: Can we look into this? It sounds wrong for some reason.)

As Batman, he keeps the city of Gotham safe from crime, all the while endangering his youthful ward, Dick Grayson (Burt Ward), who doubles as his catchphrase-abusing sidekick, Robin!

Someone has kidnapped Commodore Schmidlapp (Reginald Denney) and taken his revolutionary new dehydrating technology, and they plan to use it to dehydrate the ambassadors at Gotham's version of the United Nations. (Okay, when we say "someone", we all know it's the Penguin, the Joker, the Riddler, and Catwoman, right? Right. Moving on.)

But they look so upstanding and honest...

Batman and Robin, the Caped Crusaders, must rush around Gotham, running like idiots in at least one instance...

"Holy coronary, Batman!"

...solving rotten riddles, jerky jokes, and other alliterative things involving cats and penguins, until they face the evil quartet down in a poorly-executed fight scene on top of a surplus submarine! (Seriously...We can't make this shit up.)

Will our masked heroes triumph over the fearsome foursome?

Well, of course they will. What are you, stupid or something? It's freakin' Batman and Robin. Jeez. Get a clue.

"Am I going to have to cut a bitch?"

Still, it makes for a fun movie to watch, which you totally should. If for no other reason, you should watch it for the greatest scene ever committed to film. It looks a little something like this:

But a lot longer. And funnier.

Derek is more concerned with the characters' sex lives than the actual story itself. Particularly, those of Alfred the butler and Aunt Harriet. Is Alfred hitting that, or what?

Larry is deeply disturbed by Bruce Wayne's inability to muster up any enthusiasm for necking with Miss Kitka (Catwoman "disguised" as a reporter for The Moscow Bugle, because why the hell not?) Larry would happily step in and take over, were that technology readily available.

Jake is wall-punchingly enraged by Batman's willingness to leave his equipment laying around all willy-nilly, as well as his lack of concern over bringing just anybody into the supposedly "secret" Batcave.

And all three of them are terrified by Frank Gorshin's wordless rage as the Riddler.

There's also news in The Lobby, Coming Soon, One Thing, Larry's List, Hollywood Purgatory (it's a good one!) and Larry's new game!

So download this episode and we'll see you next week. Same Bat-time (possibly), same Bat-site (definitely)!