Batman franchise media

Theatrical movies

A number of Batman theatrical films have been made. There have also been several attempted projects during the hiatus between Batman & Robin and Batman Begins.

• 1943: Batman, 15-chapter serial starring Lewis Wilson as Batman and Douglas Croft as Robin.
• 1949: Batman and Robin, 15-chapter serial starring Robert Lowery and Johnny Duncan.
• 1966: Batman, feature film starring Adam West and Burt Ward.
• 1989: Batman, directed by Tim Burton and starring Michael Keaton as Batman and Jack Nicholson as The Joker.
• 1992: Batman Returns, directed by Tim Burton and starring Michael Keaton as Batman, Michelle Pfeiffer as Catwoman and Danny DeVito as The Penguin.
• 1993: Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, an animated feature spin-off of Batman: The Animated Series, starring Kevin Conroy as Batman, Mark Hamill as The Joker, and Dana Delany as Andrea Beaumont/The Phantasm.
• 1995: Batman Forever, directed by Joel Schumacher and starring Val Kilmer as Batman, Chris O'Donnell as Robin, Tommy Lee Jones as Two-Face, and Jim Carrey as The Riddler.
• 1997: Batman & Robin, directed by Joel Schumacher and starring George Clooney as Batman, Chris O'Donnell as Robin, Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl, Arnold Schwarzenegger as Mr. Freeze, and Uma Thurman as Poison Ivy.
• 2005: Batman Begins, directed by Christopher Nolan and starring Christian Bale as Batman, Michael Caine as Alfred Pennyworth, Gary Oldman as James Gordon, Liam Neeson as Ra's Al Ghul, and Cillian Murphy as The Scarecrow.
• 2008: The Dark Knight, directed by Christopher Nolan and starring Christian Bale as Batman, Michael Caine as Alfred Pennyworth, Gary Oldman as James Gordon, Aaron Eckhart as Harvey Dent/Two-Face, and Heath Ledger as The Joker.

Direct-to-video

• 1998: Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero, based on Batman: The Animated Series.
• 2000: Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker, based on Batman Beyond.
• 2003: Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman, based on The New Batman Adventures.
• 2005: The Batman vs. Dracula, based on The Batman.
• 2008: Batman: Gotham Knight, an anime-styled movie set between Batman Begins and The Dark Knight.
• 2009: Superman/Batman: Public Enemies

Television

Live action

• 1966 - 1968: Batman starring Adam West and Burt Ward as Batman and Robin.
• 1972: "Equal pay" Public Service Announcement featuring Dick Gautier as Batman, Burt Ward as Robin, and Yvonne Craig as Batgirl.
• 1979: Legends of the Superheroes by Hanna Barbera, featuring West and Ward as Batman and Robin.
• 2001: "OnStar" commercials featuring Bruce Thomas as Batman and Michael Gough as Alfred, and followed the visual style of the 1989-1997 film series.
• 2002: Birds of Prey, TV series that featured Batman in the first episode, Bruce Thomas reprises his role as Batman.

Bruce Wayne

In 1999, Tim McCanlies wrote a pilot script and series bible for a planned series called Bruce Wayne. Taking place in his teenage years, the series would cover his passage into young adulthood, training, and development into becoming Batman. Other characters would include Alfred, Sergeant Jim Gordon, law school student Harvey Dent, and a seductive young Selina Kyle. Planned to run for five to six seasons, it would show how he acquired his martial arts skills, his equipment, and detective abilities he would use in his war on crime. It would also focus on corruption within the board of Wayne Enterprises (an element which found its way into Begins to some extent), police affiliation with the mafia, etc. Bruce Wayne was nearing pre-production when Warner Bros. movie division felt it would conflict with the planned Year One movie and scrapped it. The result was Batman Begins.

Animated

• 1968 - 1969: The Batman/Superman Hour featured Batman in Batman with Robin the Boy Wonder. In this cartoon, Batman is voiced by Olan Soule.

Title card for The Dynamic Duo's guest shots on The New Scooby-Doo Movies in 1972.

• 1972: The New Scooby-Doo Movies produced by Hanna-Barbera - Batman and Robin appeared in episodes "The Dynamic Scooby-Doo Affair" (9/16/72) and "The Caped Crusader Caper" (12/16/72), where Olan Soule reprises his role as the Caped Crusader.
• 1973 - 1986: Various Super Friends series produced by Hanna-Barbera. Olan Soule reprises his role as Batman in all but the last two Super Friends series, where he is replaced by Adam West;
  • 1973 - 1974: Super Friends
  • 1977 - 1978: The All-New Super Friends Hour
  • 1978 - 1979: Challenge of the SuperFriends
  • 1979 - 1980: The World's Greatest Super Friends
  • 1980 - 1983: Super Friends
  • 1984 - 1985: Super Friends: The Legendary Super Powers Show
  • 1985 - 1986: The Super Powers Team: Galactic Guardians
• 1977: Batman appeared in The Batman/Tarzan Adventure Hour series. He appeared in The New Adventures of Batman segments, in which he is voiced once again by Adam West.
• 1992 - 2006: The DC Animated Universe produced by Warner Bros. Animation. Batman is voiced by Kevin Conroy in all appearances;
  • 1992 - 1995: Batman: The Animated Series; the first series of the DCAU.
  • 1997, 1998, 1999: Superman: The Animated Series; Batman guest stars in multiple episodes.
  • 1997 - 1999: The New Batman Adventures; a continuation of Batman: The Animated Series.
  • 1999 - 2001: Batman Beyond; an aged Bruce Wayne passes the mantle of Batman onto Terry McGinnis (voiced by Will Friedle).
  • 2001 - 2004: Justice League; the original Batman becomes one of the founding members of the League.
  • 2002, 2003, 2004: Static Shock; Batman guest stars in multiple episodes.
  • 2004 - 2006 Justice League Unlimited; a continuation of Justice League.
• 1997: He appeared in the Animaniacs episode "Boo Wonder." Adam West reprises his role as the Caped Crusader.
• 2004: Teen Titans; Batman appeared in silhouette in the episode "Haunted," in a flashback sequence. He is not voiced by anybody.
• 2004 - 2008: The Batman; in this series, Bruce Wayne is a young crime fighter just three years into his career as Batman. He is voiced by Rino Romano.
• 2005-2006: In Krypto the Superdog, Batman himself makes no appearances, but his pet dog Ace the Bat-Hound does, although Ace prefers to refer to himself as "Batman's partner," rather than his pet.
• 2008 - present: Batman: The Brave and the Bold; based in part on the comic book series of the same name, the series has Batman (voiced by Diedrich Bader) team-up with several other DC Comics heroes.

Newspaper

From 1943 to 1946, Batman and Robin appeared in a syndicated daily newspaper comic strip produced by the McClure Syndicate. Other versions appeared in 1953, 1966, and 1989. The original run is collected in the book Batman: The Dailies. One more comic strip series ran briefly after the success of the 1989 film.

Books

Batman is also slated to appear in a novel by cyberpunk/horror novelist John Shirley, entitled Batman: Dead White from Del Rey books. Many other novels and short story collections featuring Batman have been published over the years, including novelizations of each of the recent movies and several of the more popular comic book arcs. There are also several more scholarly works, aimed at either Batman's history or art, such as Les Daniels' Batman: The Complete History and compilations such as Batman: Cover to Cover : The Greatest Comic Book Covers of the Dark Knight. In 2004 The Batman Handbook: The Ultimate Training Manual, written by Scott Beatty was published by Quirk Books (ISBN 1-59474-023-2). Written in the same style as The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook series, the book explained the basics on how to be Batman. Amongst the skills included in the book are "How to Train a Sidekick", "How to Execute a Backflip", "How to Throw a Grappling Hook" and "How to Survive a Poison Gas Attack". Finally, there are of course countless sticker, coloring, activity, and other children's books [1] featuring the Dark Knight.

Foreign comics

• Batman: Child of Dreams by Kia Asamiya - Manga
• Batman: Dark Mask - Manga
• Bat-Manga!: The Secret History of Batman in Japan by Jiro Kuwata - Manga
• Batman trong Hőtữ Thần by Nguyễn Th - Vietnamese comics
• Batman: God of Africa - Manhua

Radio

Beginning in March 1945, Batman and Robin made regular appearances on the The Adventures of Superman radio drama on the Mutual Broadcasting System. Efforts were made to launch a Batman radio series in 1943 and again in 1950, but neither came to fruition.

In 1994, the comic book storyline Batman: Knightfall was adapted to radio by BBC Radio 1. It was adapted, produced and directed by Dirk Maggs - with music composed by Mark Russell - who had recently made Superman: Doomsday & Beyond on BBC Radio 5. This show, however was not commissioned of its own, but rather to be three minute episodes on the Mark Goodier Show. This meant it was written with a sense of immediacy; having to make an instant effect and each three minute segment contains a major plot development or sound effect stunt and end on a cliffhanger. DC acknowledged the effort in an issue Shadow of The Bat by having villains jump past a sign that read Dirk Maggs Radio. Michael Gough reprised the role of Alfred Pennyworth from the Burton/Schumacher film series.

Batman was also featured in the audiobook adaptation of Infinite Crisis.

Both Batman & Robin are mentioned in the 2007 song, "Make Me Better" by Fabolous ft. Ne-Yo.

Musical theatre

While a parody of a Batman musical was featured in one of the most recent series' comics, in 2002, Jim Steinman, David Ives, and Tim Burton had worked on a theatre production called Batman: The Musical although it was ultimately cancelled. Steinman has recently revealed five songs from the musical. The first is the opening theme for "Gotham City" and the entry of Batman with his tortured solo "The Graveyard Shift"; followed by "The Joker's Song (Where Does He Get All Those Wonderful Toys?)", "The Catwoman's Song (I Need All The Love I Can Get)", "We're Still The Children We Once Were" (the climactic sequence) and "In The Land Of The Pig The Butcher Is King", sung by the corrupt blood-suckers ruling Gotham, recently covered on the Meat Loaf album Bat Out Of Hell III: The Monster Is Loose. These songs can be heard at the Batman: The Musical memorial site, Dark Knight of the Soul

A Batman musical is also parodied in the animated series Batman Beyond. The episode "Out of the Past," (first aired October 21, 2000) opens with Bruce Wayne and Terry McGinnis attending a performance of (a fictional)Batman: The Musical, featuring caricatures of prominent members of the Rogues Gallery (Joker, Penguin, Two-Face, Catwoman, Poison Ivy, and Harley Quinn). Series creator Paul Dini, who wrote the episode in question, also wrote a song for the fictitious musical entitled "Superstitious and Cowardly Lot."

An episode of the sketch comedy show Mad TV also featured a Batman: The Musical parody called Batman V: Out of the Cave which starred Tommy Tune as Batman, and Ben Vereen as Robin.

Video games

Screenshot from the Batman Begins video game

Several Batman video games were created:

• Batman (1986) for the ZX Spectrum, MSX and Amstrad PCW. Now known as Batman 3D.
• Batman: The Caped Crusader (1988) for various 8-bit and 16-bit platforms.
• Batman (1989) for Sega Mega Drive/Sega Genesis, Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), Atari Lynx, Commodore Amiga, Sinclair ZX Spectrum and other platforms. (In October 1989, the Amiga 500 was bundled with this game as part of the Batman Pack^[1], which was sold in the United Kingdom and was a phenomenal success).
• Batman: Return of the Joker (1991) for Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) and Game Boy.
• Batman Returns (1993) for Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), Super Nintendo (Super NES), Sega Mega Drive/Sega Genesis, Sega CD, Sega Game Gear, and Atari Lynx.
• Batman: The Animated Series (1993) for Game Boy.
• Batman & Robin: The Animated Series (1993) for Game Gear.
• Adventures of Batman & Robin (1994) for Super Nintendo (Super NES), Sega Mega Drive/Sega Genesis, Sega CD, and Game Gear.
• Batman Forever (1996) for Super Nintendo (Super NES), Game Boy, Sega Mega Drive/Sega Genesis, and Sega Game Gear.
• Batman Forever: The Arcade Game (1996) for Arcade, Sony PlayStation and Sega Saturn.
• Batman & Robin (1997) for the Tiger Game.com and the Sony PlayStation.
• Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker (2000) for the Nintendo 64 and the PlayStation.
• Batman: Chaos in Gotham (2001) for Game Boy Color.
• Batman: Gotham City Racer (2001) A racing game for the PlayStation.
• Batman Vengeance (2001) for the GameCube, PlayStation 2, PC, Game Boy Advance and Xbox.
• Batman: Dark Tomorrow (2003) for Xbox and GameCube
• Batman: Rise of Sin Tzu (2004) for the PlayStation 2, PC, Xbox, the GameCube and Game Boy Advance.

Batman in The Revenge of Shinobi

• Batman Begins (2005) for the PlayStation 2, Xbox, GameCube and Game Boy Advance (2005).
• Lego Batman: The Video Game (2008) A videogame in the style of Lego Star Wars based on the LEGO Batman toyline.^[2] There is speculation of a sequel entitled Lego Batman 2: Return of the Villains which will probably be releasing in 2010.
• Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009) for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Windows PC.
• DC Universe Online (2010) A video game based on the entire DC Universe, with Gotham City being one of the many areas where the player can choose to have his/her story for the PlayStation 3.
• The Dark Knight (cancelled) Planned video game based on the 2008 box office smash, to be released in 2009. Was cancelled after the bankruptcy of the Pandemic studio working on it.

Batman appears in Justice League Task Force Super Nintendo fighting game, a couple of Justice League games for Game Boy Advance, and an arcade game based on Tim Burton's original movie. Also, the 16-bit Sega game The Revenge of Shinobi features a (non-authorized) Batman as a boss. The 8-bit Nintendo Entertainment System game Final Fantasy features "Badman", a character with strong resemblances to Batman, as one of the enemies of the final area. He appears in the Justice League Heroes game for PS2, Xbox, and PSP and has appeared in the crossover game Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe [2]. In the trailer for the story of the game, Batman sees the merging of the two Earths and faces off against Sub-Zero in the Batcave. Batman's Brutality is where he throws a Batarang at the opponent which begins emitting sonic shouts, attracting a swarm of bats that begin antagonizing the opponent, causing them to fall over and try and fight them off.

Games, action figures, and other toys

Batman is one of the few fictional characters that can be defined by his toys and merchandising. The first boom started in 1966 during the hit television series, and since then, along with every major movie or cartoon series has come a wave of toys, collectibles, and just about any other merchandise imaginable. Over the years, hundreds of Batman action figures, die-cast models, and other miscellaneous items have reserved the store shelves. Of the many companies that have acquired the rights to make Batman merchandise, some of the most well known include:

• Ideal - Captain Action
• Mego - Action figures and dolls
• Corgi - Die-cast metal vehicles
• Remco - Playsets and roleplaying toys
• Toy Biz - Action figures
• Ertl - Die-cast figures & vehicles and model kits
• Applause - PVC figures and dolls
• Hasbro - Action figures
• Monogram - Bobble heads
• Mattel - Action figures and jigsaw puzzles
• Lego - Building bricks and minifigures

Lego Batman statue, Javits Convention Center

Batman has appeared as a HeroClix figure along with other Batman characters in the following HeroClix sets:

• Hypertime
• Cosmic Justice
• Unleashed
• Legacy
• Icons

For April 2006, Lego introduced a Batman line which also includes characters such as the Joker and Two-Face, at American International Toy Fair.

Theme park attractions

The Batwing Spaceshot tower is 61 metres (200 ft) tall.

Several Six Flags theme parks, formerly owned by Warner Bros., opened live-action "Batman Stunt Shows" as the movies increased in popularity. Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, Illinois is home to a looping, suspended roller coaster named "Batman: The Ride" Six Flags Mexico in Mexico city, Mexico has also a looping, suspended roller coaster named "Batman: The Ride" (Six Flags Saint Louis has the same ride, as does Six Flags Great America in Gurnee, Illinois) as well as twin roller coasters named "Batman and Robin: The Chiller." On the latter attraction, riders may ride on either the Batman or Robin versions of the coaster. But unfortunately in the 2007 offseason, the ride was removed after a long history of technical difficulties and occasionally breaking down. Six Flags Over Georgia contains a Gotham City area that contains the same "Batman: The Ride" and also features a looping coaster called "The Mindbender" that was adapted to fit the color tone of The Riddler after Batman Forever came out to fit the Gotham City section of the park it shares with "Batman: The Ride". Six Flags Magic Mountain in Valencia, California has two Batman-themed coasters, the suspended coaster "Batman: The Ride," and "The Riddler's Revenge," a stand-up type roller coaster. This Six Flags park also features an entire themed area called "Gotham City" complete with architecture to match that of the fictional Gotham City. Warner Bros. Movie World in the Gold Coast, Australia, also has two Batman-themed rides. Batman Adventure - The Ride, revamped in 2001, is a motion simulator style simulator ride while Batwing Spaceshot is a vertical free-fall ride. In 2008, Six Flags Great Adventure,and Six Flags Great America, will receive The Dark Knight Coaster, based on the newest Batman film coming out in July. They will be Wild Mouse roller coasters, indoors, heavily themed, and give you a feeling that you are being stalked by The Joker. They will all be expected to be open by Memorial Day weekend. Six Flags New England was originally going to receive this Roller Coaster, however due to problems with building permits, the park scratched the project.

References

External links

• Warner Bros. official Batman.com
• Warner Bros. official Batman Shop
• Batman Begins official site
• The New Batman Adventures — Official Warner Bros. site
• Batman: The Animated Series — Official site
• Batman Beyond — Official site
• Dark Knight of the Soul (Batman: The Musical Memorial) — Collects all known information about this canceled project, as well as Steinman's demo recordings
• Batman Films and TV series at The Internet Movie Database
• Encyclopedia of Television