Should the Next Batman Films Switch Tones?

[wyokid]

I was thinking about how dark and dank Nolan's films are and how the next Batman film is probably going to have compete with it. I figured that they've done the dark and brooding Batman to death at this point and it's time for the campy and light-heart Batman to FINALLY make a silver screen appearance! Who's with me?

[HeckBoy]

I think Joel Schumacher pretty much made sure that would never happen. That being said, I wouldn't mind a Batman movie with a bit more adventure (though that aspect seems to work better when he's on a team) and a little less brooding.

[bat39]

I think Batman the Animated Series, and the 70's/early 80's Batman comics that inspired that show, are the perfect template for future Batman movies. They do have a dark film noir-like setting, but feature Batman as more of a noble and compassionate hero than a dark, brooding vigilante, and have their lighter humorous moments. Such a tone would also be appropriate for the reintroduction of Robin to the big screen.

[Redem]

I intend to watch Batman Begins, The dark Knight before watching TDKR and go watch Batman and Robin right after I come back from the movie theater

[The Greatest Hero]

Sounds like something Joel Schumacher would make.

F*** NO!

Something with the tone of the Arkham City games would be awesome. The games and the cartoons are the best place to get a real grasp of the tone of Batman/Gotham.

Also the comics, but the games/cartoons for people who don't read them.

[Mr. Holmes]

Yeah something like the Arkham games. It should be more outlandish, and probably in the same world as Superman, but we don't need something goofy. Keep it serious to some extent.

[SeventhTrump]

+1 to the role as portrayed in Arkham Asylum/City. He is the detective & martial arts expert without peer that he has always been but not protrayed on the screen.

[Quinnhop]

Grant Morrison: 'Batman and Robin', which opens with the 3-part 'Batman Reborn' arc, is maybe more poppy, and more colourful, but it's also creepier. It's like David Lynch doing the Batman TV show.

--

MORRISON: When I first described it, I said it was David Lynch directing the '60s television show with Adam West. That was kind of my goal for it, to give it a pop-art feel, but at the same time, I love the dark Batman, and I love the Chris Nolan films. I didn't want to lose that and go back to a goofy Batman, but I found there was a way to combine that kind of creepy fairytale quality of some of the Batman villains and the Gotham setting, pump that up, and get something that can be quite strange, quite 'American Gothic,' but at the same time there's a lot of color and weirdness and, as I say, trippyness, in it.

--

Morrison: I'm always trying to have my cake and eat it too. I recognize this too, and I like stuff that's convincing and I like the same pop-culture Batman as everyone else. I like to see movies and shows that seem believable and feel like they could almost happen. We need that in Batman. Batman has a certain amount of street-level and real life elements to it that we can't forget. These guys still have to eat to do their jobs. They still get their costumes messed up and have their bones broken. There's a lot of that in here. But we musn't also forget that Batman fought the Monk and has encountered numerous vampires, werewolves, ghosts and monsters in the course of his career. I just wanted to push it towards, like I said, to the David Lynch approach. Because the real world we live in is also very strange and inexplicable, and there are a lot of really demented people who have strange ideas about the way things work. And those are the kinds of characters Batman and Robin come up against all the time.

It's very much the 'real' world overlapping with the world of schizophrenia, paranoia and heavy drug use, which is of course a world just as real as anything else we can experience. That's the world that Batman and Robin are dealing with – the eerie, creepy, mentally-ill dark corners of life. I think that gives us the sense of the supernatural in the story even if these guys aren't supernatural. Professor Pyg isn't from another world; he's from here, but he's very, very sick. He sees the world as almost supernatural in that it's unnatural and threatening in every way. It's more of that sort of thing.

I think people will be surprised, because these are very realistic, bones-will-break kinds of stories too. Although there's a lot of color and UV and sound effects, these are not fantastical stories in that kind of Joel Schumacher 90s Batman way. It's quite gritty. It's quite hardcore. It's noir, but it's a psychedelic noir. I've talked to you about this sort of thing before. This is the Batman version of that dark, psychedelic noir. I might not be describing it that well because we're trying to combine two quite different approaches into one. Readers will see what I mean shortly.

+ David Fincher

[utukkuxul]

it's time for the campy and light-heart Batman to FINALLY make a silver screen appearance! Who's with me?

If you want campy Batman on the big screen, I have good news!

[GRANT!]

I think Joel Schumacher pretty much made sure that would never happen. That being said, I wouldn't mind a Batman movie with a bit more adventure (though that aspect seems to work better when he's on a team) and a little less brooding.

There's a happy medium between Schumacher and Nolan.

I think you could do a good Batman and Robin film in the same tone as the later Harry Potter movies. Those were still fun adventure films but not afraid to get dark when necessary.

[Mr. Holmes]

There's a happy medium between Schumacher and Nolan.

Yeah no one is really saying that we have to pick between the two. The OP specifically is asking about the campy Batman, and refers to this as a "switch" in tones.

I think you could do a good Batman and Robin film in the same tone as the later Harry Potter movies. Those were still fun adventure films but not afraid to get dark when necessary.

Batman is a different genre from Harry Potter though.

[MichaelPaytonMZ]

If you want campy Batman on the big screen, I have good news!

This movie was also 1,000x better than Batman Returns, Batman Forever or Batman & Robin.

[utukkuxul]

This movie was also 1,000x better than Batman Returns, Batman Forever or Batman & Robin.

I totally agree with you. I'd watch it over any of those, in a second.

[KurtW95]

Well I definitely think the Joker should be funny as well as psychotic. Like Mark Hamill's version. I do think the films should be dark, but definitely not like Nolan's movies. I would be happy if we got something moderately close to the Arkham videogames or the animated TV show.

Also, I don't think they should make Bruce a womanizing jerk.(I know that was kind of his cover story) I prefer to see him as an obscenely wealthy businessman and philanthropist.

[GRANT!]

Batman is a different genre from Harry Potter though.

What the better Harry Potter movies did was mix the fantastic with relatable real world issues and created a context for an adolescent hero to work in. Which would be ideal for Robin. Spider-man and Buffy have a similar tone as well.

Batman has just as many fantastic qualities as street level qualities.