Bat-ology: A Review of "Batman Returns"

"I'm here to kill Jokers and hunt Penguins... and I'm all out of Jokers."

So Batman was pretty sick. It was the quintessential blockbuster movie, comic book movie, crime movie, mobster movie and action movie all rolled into one. "Crime" and "mobster" could probably be considered the same thing, but eh. So naturally, a sequel had to be developed and shoved into theaters in a reputable time frame to continue scoring on the Bat-fame. Hey, Batman had usurped Christopher Reeve's Superman films, which I had noted previous had been spiraling downhill in quality throughout the 80s, out of movie theater scene. Batman had also overtaken Superman in popularity in comic book sales. (Thank you, Superman IV, you unapologetic piece of shit).

The only thing that can fix me is a good spray tan.

After Batman, Tim Burton went on and directed Edward Scissorhands. You might've heard about it. This little... well "bizarre" is the nicest way I can put it... movie about a guy, cuts on his face and wacky hair, with scissors as his hands... and that's it, just about a guy with scissors for hands. I never understood the hype and love for Edward Scissorhands, and I just assumed this was Tim Burton getting free Hollywood playtime to direct whatever he wanted. The only problem is that it was a hit too, so when Warner Bros. contacted Tim Burton about returning to direct a sequel to Batman, they promised him total creative freedom as well, and booooy I still can't tell if Batman Returns is more a comic book Batman movie or just another fucked up Tim Burton movie. It has Batman elements in it, but it still has that strange Tim Burton "presence" to it, including a recycled "sad misfit" story for the Penguin. Let's put it on and figure this out.

I wonder who vacuum seals Selina into her Catwoman
outfit every night before she goes out to fight.

In the prologue, socialites Tucker (Paul "Pee-wee Herman" Reubens) and Esther Cobblepot (Diane Salinger) give birth to a deformed baby boy, Oswald. Disgusted by his appearance and wild demeanor, they confine the baby to a cage and ultimately throw him into the sewer, where he is discovered by a family of penguins at Gotham Zoo. Give this sequence credit, it still replicated a true Batman main title sequence with the Danny Elfman theme returning, so that helps make it feel at home. Thirty-three years later, millionaire Max Shreck (Christopher mothafuckin' Walken) proposes to build a power plant to supply Gotham City with energy, though he is opposed by the city mayor. During Shreck's speech, Gotham is attacked by a disgraced former circus troupe, the Red Triangle Gang. Despite the efforts of Batman (Michael Keaton) to stop the violence, Shreck is abducted and taken to the sewer, where he meets Oswald Cobblepot (Danny DeVito), the gang's secret leader now known as the Penguin. The Penguin blackmails Shreck with evidence of his corporate crimes into helping him return to the surface, and he accepts. So yeah, the Penguin isn't this mobster with a pointed nose that resembles a penguin, he's this deformed bird man who lives in the sewer with a pointed nose, flipper hands, long hair and pale skin. CAN WE HIT IT HOME ANY HARDER, AMERICA? Meanwhile, Shreck's secretary, Selina Kyle (Michelle Pfeiffer), discovers the true purpose of Shreck's power plant to drain Gotham of its energy and bring the city under Shreck's control by holding its power needs to ransom. Following a chilling and tense exchange, complete with a fake-out, Shreck pushes her out of a window to silence her, but she survives the fall and vows revenge, taking up the mantle of Catwoman. After cats gnaw on her fingers... so I guess the nine-lives of a cat are transferred via finger-chewing. Not really sure about the science on that one, but hey, I'll give it a shot.

"Tim, we need to do this scene again.
I gotta have more hairspray!"

The Penguin makes his presence known by "rescuing" the Mayor's baby from a staged kidnapping attempt, and requests to be allowed into the Hall of Records to find his parents. Batman's alter-ego, Bruce Wayne, voices his suspicions about the Penguin's true motives, and investigates his background and connection to the Red Triangle Gang. During a meeting with Shreck, Wayne meets Kyle and the two become attracted to one another. In order to remove his enemies, Shreck pushes for the Penguin to run for mayor and discredit the current mayor by having the Red Triangle Gang wreak havoc on the city. Batman intervenes, during a pretty great fight, and meets Catwoman as she attempts to sabotage one of Shreck's businesses; she escapes, but is injured and swears revenge on Batman by allying with the Penguin to frame him for an undiscussed crime. I don't know why revenge on Batman is necessary, when Catwoman could just keep sabotaging Shreck's businesses whether or not Batman shows up.

"Wow, Batman. You dance just like Bruce Wayne!"

As Batman and Catwoman fight and feud in the streets, Wayne and Kyle begin a romantic relationship, and the Penguin abducts Gotham's Ice Princess and kills her, framing Batman for the act, at the same time sabotaging his Batmobile to rampage throughout Gotham (until Batman disconnects the controlling device). I must say, the rampaging Batmobile, all while Batman is subjected to Danny DeVito's hilarious one-liners while he's controlling the Batmobile and crashing into things, is probably my favorite scene in the movie. I just love it every time I watch it. The Penguin also abruptly ends his partnership with Catwoman, who didn't anticipate the murder of the Ice Princess, when she rejects his advances; he attempts to kill her with one of his flying umbrellas, but she survives after falling into a greenhouse. Hey I don't blame her, cats are supposed to eat birds, not have sex with them. Compliments to Burton and his team for getting the science right on that one. So much for that partnership! During the Batmobile rampage, Batman secretly records the Penguin's disparaging remarks about the people of Gotham and later plays them during his next speech, destroying his image and forcing him to retreat to the sewer, where he reveals his plan to abduct and kill all of Gotham's firstborn sons as revenge for what his parents did to him. Now may I say; this is kind of a story one-eighty. Oswald was perfectly fine letting the crime of his parents tossing him into the sewer go as long as he became mayor, but when Batman sabotaged him and ruined his image, he just immediately switched back to this homicidal deformed freak that decided to commit a cruel and inhuman crime. Really made this movie go from eerie and kind of fun to just downright gothic and unpleasant. Some like it, some don't.

"Wow, Bruce! You dance just like Batman!"

At a charity ball hosted by Shreck, Wayne and Kyle meet and discover each other's secret identities. The Penguin quite literally explodes onto the scene and reveals his plan, intending to take Shreck's son, Chip (Andrew Bryniarski) with him, but Shreck gives himself up in his son's stead, showing a human side for the first time throughout this movie. After Bruce overhears the Penguin explaining his plan to the crowd, he runs off and later Batman foils the kidnappings and heads for the Penguin's lair. In another memorable scene, The Penguin gives a speech to his army of penguins, claiming that the Liberation of Gotham has begun. The Penguin attempts to have his army of penguins bomb the city and kill everyone, though Batman and his butler, Alfred, jam the signal and order the penguins to head back to the sewer. Batman arrives and confronts the Penguin. In the ensuing fight, the Penguin falls through a window into the sewer's toxic water. Shreck escapes but is confronted by Catwoman, who intends to kill him. Batman pleads for Kyle to stop, unmasking himself in the process. Shreck draws a gun and shoots Wayne, and then shoots Kyle multiple times, but she survives and electrocutes herself and Shreck with a stun gun, causing a massive explosion. Wayne, who was wearing body armour, finds Shreck's corpse but Kyle is nowhere to be found. The Penguin emerges from the water, but eventually dies from his injuries and from the toxic sewage, and his penguin family lay his body to rest in the water. In the aftermath, as Alfred drives him home, Wayne sees Kyle's silhouette in an alley but only finds her cat, who he decides to take home with him. The Bat-Signal appears in the sky as Catwoman, who survived, watches on...

"Penguin, why are you choking me and why are you kinda hard?!"
"Don't you kink-shame me, Batman!"

So, I actually like Batman Returns, but I gotta say... it isn't as good as Batman. A lot of people like it, too. Hell it's my brother Caleb's favorite out of all of the Batman movies, including the first one. It's got Michael Keaton returning for his second and final portrayal of the caped crusader, and he's just as awesome as ever, but he takes a backseat in his own movie to the villains. Batman Returns is fun-ish, but it's moreso extremely edgy and weird, pushing the boundaries of a family comic book action film into the depths of a psychological thriller, more-so. It's bizarre scenery and side characters are both very Tim Burton-y, and there were some dark, dark story choices... including having the Penguin plot to kidnap and drown (you know, murder) the first born children of Gotham. While I love this movie, that is a little twisted to depict the plotting of. He even pantomimes in a scene how he's going to lure the children over to the poisonous lagoon before he kills them. I can see why parents were outraged at the violence and morbid subject matter with the movie, and Happy Meals even pulled their tie-in campaign with the film. Production personnel even tell stories of going to the movie and when the lights come up, children were crying as their parents were trying to console them. Pretty messed up.

As for the villains, there isn't any question that Danny DeVito and Michelle Pfeiffer, as well as Christopher Walken, steal the show together. They steal it a little too hard, as Batman is almost a side-character in every scene or sometimes, not even at all. He's kind of just there half the time, watching the other villains tear themselves apart through betrayals. He does foil a couple of the Penguin's plans, so it's not like he's entirely useless, but hey, you can tell Tim Burton likes telling the story of the sad misfit trying to find his place in a world that doesn't want him... this movie is very much in vain of Edward Scissorhands.

So for Batman Returns, I say it's a decent follow-up to Batman. It was the last for Tim Burton, last for Michael Keaton, and the last of the really good Batman movies of the nineties. I still like it a bunch, but it certainly is not without it's flaws.