SCENES FROM A BAT-LIFE — on ADAM WEST’s birthday and BATMAN DAY… — UPDATED 9/19/26: It’s the late Adam West’s birthday! He was born Sept. 19, 1928! It’s also Batman Day! Yeah, it’s a made-up corporate thing, but it’s still Batman — and it’s become a 13th Dimension tradition to reprint this fave from 2017. Dig it. — Dan — Over the years, I’ve written about Adam West, Neal Adams and Mego many times over in many different ways, but not quite like this. Why now? Why not! See, it’s all connected: Unlike a lot of people, I don’t really have a singular “secret origin” as a fan. There was no single day where it began. I actually remember a series of vignettes that have fused in my mind, a loose series of Scenes From a Bat-Life. But those memories are as stark and precise as if they came from yesterday. And it all began with Adam West… — Adam West was always there. I don’t remember the first time I saw the 1966 Batman TV show. It debuted a little more than a year before I was born and by the time I was of TV-watching age, it was in syndication on Channel 11 in New York. So I just don’t remember a time without it. I also don’t remember a time from childhood when it wasn’t my favorite show. I was as obsessed as any 5-year-old could be, acting out scenes in my bedroom and wearing my cloth Ben Cooper costume everywhere my Mom would let me. At the supermarket, the clerks would ask, “Hey, Batman, where’s Robin?” And I’d answer with all the authority I could muster, “He’s doing his homework.” And then some guy would ask me to fly, and I’d be quick to correct them, sternly: “Batman doesn’t fly.” All through the ’70s — except for those frustrating times when the show was off the schedule — Batman on Channel 11 was appointment television. The only time I would change the channel was when The 4:30 Movie was on Channel 7 — and they’d be showing the 1966 movie. Then I’d click back and forth and try to give myself commercial-free Batman. — So Adam West opened the door. Now, I was an A.M. kindergarten kid at Wayside School in Ocean Township, N.J. My...