Posted By Dan Greenfield on Jan 12, 2025 | 8 comments

BATMAN ’66 WEEK: The celebrated Mr. K pays tribute…

—

It’s BATMAN ’66 WEEK! Click here for more Batgrooviness! — Dan

—

By PAUL KUPPERBERG

I’m not one of those people with Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory (or HSAM, also known as “autobiographical memory,” or ability to recall specific dates and details of events). Far from it. In fact, if you asked me what I had for dinner yesterday or the title of the series we’re currently watching on Netflix, I’d have to really work at it to remember. But there are a few dates and the events associated to them that I will always recall with great clarity, usually tied to some traumatic (a death in the family) or celebratory (the birth of my son) event.

Or as was the case at 7:30 pm (Eastern Time) on January 12, 1966, the premiere episode of Batman on ABC-TV!

Remember, in 1966, live-action televised superhero fare was a rarity, pretty much confined to afte-school reruns of the 104 episodes of Adventures of Superman starring George Reeves. Batman was a much anticipated event in my world, as I’m sure it was in the world of every other comic book fanatic, not that I knew of any of them at the time, but even the non-comics reading kids in the neighborhood were excited about it.

I was 10 and a half years old and the comic book crush that would soon blossom into a full-blown love affair obsessed my every waking hour, all focused on the coming Batman series. The show may have started as a midseason replacement in a “family hour” time slot, but it quickly exploded into everything comics fans knew it deserved to be, if not always for exactly the right reasons. (A subject I ranted on at length in a 2010 essay for the Sequart Research & Literacy Organization book, Gotham City 14 Miles: 14 Essays on Why the 1960s Batman TV Series Matters, edited by 13th Dimension regular Jim Beard, “Pow! Zap! Blam! Some Days You Just Can’t Get Rid of a Bomb.”

So, not only do I remember what I was doing on Wednesday, January 12, 1966, at 7:30 pm, but where I was, and how I managed to finagle my way into staying after I’d worn out my welcome at my friend Barry Podber’s house with a story about a lost house key and my parents not yet being home so I could watch Batman there because they had a color television and we didn’t.

I lay on the floor in front of the set, absorbing every gloriously primary colorful flicker of the screen, too dazzled by the sets and costumes and characters to really follow the story, but who cared about that? The mere fact of Batman and Robin and Commissioner Gordon and the Riddler in living color on TV sets across the country was satisfaction and redemption enough. Enough, even, that though I recognized they were making fun of Batman, it was OK. Adam West managed to portray a Batman who struck a balance between stoic seriousness and parody. So what if the rest of the world was off kilter and goofy? So what if the stories didn’t always make sense? Batman kept his dignity even as he played straight man to it all.

It would have been impossible to imagine in 1966 that films and TV series based on comic books would one day make the superhero genre as mainstream as cop shows and rom-coms, but Batman gave us a taste of what could be. It would take time for technology and audience sensibilities to catch up to the potential offered films and television in the pages of comic books, but once Hollywood figured it out, the masks and capes were on and all bets were off. Superheroes are here to stay!

Here then, MY 13 FAVORITE BATMAN ’66 EPISODES, in chronological order:

—

Hi Diddle Riddle/Smack in the Middle (Season 1, Episodes 1 & 2, aired January 12-13, 1966). It might be the only time it was referenced in the series, but I remember the thrill and surge of hope for the show when Bruce Wayne tells a visitor, “Perhaps if they’re had been anti-crime centers of the type you now propose when my own parents were murdered by dastardly criminals…” Also, could there be a better Riddler than Frank Gorshin? I’ll save you the trouble: No, there could not be. Bonus Points (Budding Puberty Division): Jill St. John in the Robin costume. Poor, deluded girl!

—

The Joker is Wild/Batman is Riled (Season 1, Episodes 5 & 6, aired January 26-27, 1966). Cesar Romero’s Joker appeared in 19 of the 120 episodes of Batman and the Batman ’66 movie, making him one of the most popular of the Caped Crusader’s guest villains. And rightly so! The veteran actor squeezed every ounce of evil glee from the character and for my money, owns the role of the Clown Prince of Crime.

—

The Purr-fect Crime/Better Luck Next Time (Season 1, Episodes 19 & 20, March 17-17, 1966). Bonus Points (Budding Puberty Division): Two words: Julie Newmar. Two more words: Spandex catsuit. ’Nuff said.

—

The Bookworm Turns/While Gotham City Burns (Season 1, Episodes 29 & 30, aired April 20-21, 1966). While my preference for Bat-villains tended toward those from the comics, some of the ones created for the show did strike my fancy, including Roddy McDowell’s Bookworm, maybe because his m.o. was based on books and printer’s lingo… or maybe because his was the first episode to feature a guest-star popping their head out a window as Batman and Robin climb past it on the Bat-rope. Bonus Point (Comedy Nerd Division): That first guest-star was Jerry Lewis who I loved almost as much as comic books. I wrote about this episode at length for ZLONK! ZOK! ZOWIE! The Subterranean Blue Grotto Essays on Batman ’66 – Season One, edited by Jim Beard.

—

Fine Finny Fiends/Batman Makes the Scene” (Season 1, Episodes 33 & 34, aired May 4-5, 1966). Burgess Meredith is back as the wickedly waddling Penguin, who I believe holds the record for appearances on Batman. Meredith — a member of the Actors Studio and the first American ever invited to be a member of England’s Royal Shakespeare Company; who had appeared on radio and TV as well as film (may I direct you to his portrayal of journalist Ernie Pyle in 1945’s The Story of G.I. Joe and as George in 1939’s Of Mice and Men?); was later twice nominated for an Academy Award and lauded for stage roles in plays by Samuel Beckett, Eugene O’Neill, Shakespeare and others; was nominated for one Tony Award and awarded another Special Tony — appeared to delight in the over-the-top, scenery chewing role.

But… spoiler: He did and he didn’t. The actor would would later tell a reporter for The Buffalo News, “Ah yes, the villainous Penguin. It pursues me. It may have done me more harm than good, but it made an impact.”

—

Batman (20th Century Fox, premiered July 30, 1966). Not technically an episode of Batman ’66, but the difference between this movie, filmed during the hiatus between the first and second seasons, and the show itself are negligible. This production was hastily convened to take advantage of the program’s explosive popularity and was in theaters by summer, less than three months after the final episode of Season One aired. Batman made use of the same cast and crew, including screenwriter Lorenzo Semple Jr., except, famously, for Catwoman Julie Newmar, who was unavailable. She was replaced, quite ably by Lee Meriwether, whose take on the role featured no less slink and sensuality than had Ms. Newmar’s. And Bonus Points (Budding Puberty Division): Ms. Meriwether wore the catsuit with distinction!

—

Hot Off the Griddle/The Cat and the Fiddle (Season 2, Episodes 3 & 4, aired September 14-15, 1966). Not to be a Donny Downer here, and I say this with love, but let’s be real: Batman wasn’t about the story or the mystery or crime solving. Show producer William Dozier said in more than one interview at the time that being seen by a friend reading some Batman comics for research on an airplane made him feel like an “idiot.”

On a 1966 episode of the Canadian interview program Telescope, Dozier told host Fletcher Merkle (really), “The fairly obvious idea, it seems obvious now, at least, was to make it so square and so serious and so cliché-ridden and so overdone and yet do it with a certain elegance and style that it would be funny. That it would be so corny and so bad that it would be funny. That appealed to me, and I began to enjoy it.” I picked apart this two-parter featuring Catwoman (and guest-starring a young James Brolin) by Stanley Ralph Ross in another essay for the ubiquitous Mr. Beard in BIFF! BAM! EEE-YOW! The Subterranean Blue Grotto Essays on Batman ’66 – Season Two.

—

An Egg Grows in Gotham/The Yegg Foes in Gotham (Season 2, Episodes 13 & 14, aired October 19-20, 1966). What’s almost as good as Cesar Romero’s greasepainted-over mustache? Could it be Vincent Price’s bald wig to play Egghead? Egg-zactly! Few actors portrayed evil delight better than Price, no egg-zaggeration!

—

The Contaminated Cowl/The Mad Hatter Runs Afoul (Season 2, Episodes 35 & 36, aired January 4-5, 1967). Another Hollywood veteran takes a turn as the guest villain of the week, this time second banana and character actor David Wayne as the Mad Hatter, a second banana bad guy from the comics.

—

Enter Batgirl, Exit Penguin (Season 3, Episode 1, aired September 14, 1967). Come Season Three, Batmania was running out of steam and ratings, so Batman was cut back to just one self-contained episode a week, and in the hopes of getting eyes back on the show, the producers introduced Barbara Gordon, aka Batgirl, played by Yvonne Craig.

She definitely earned Bonus Points (Budding Puberty Division) for her glittery purple Bat-tights, but the show would have been better served by instead sewing up stories that didn’t hinge on such plot elements as the Penguin planning to gain permanent immunity from the law by becoming Commissioner Gordon’s son-in-law (?) after coercing Barbara into marrying him (!).

—

Louie, the Lilac (Season 3, Episode 7, aired October 26, 1967). For every actor who signed on to be a guest villain on Batman for the giggles and grins of camping it up, there was probably another old Hollywood star who hoped it would help bolster or reignite their career. Milton Berle, once the comedic king of TV, had long since been dethroned and was probably hoping his turn as Louie the Lilac would give him a boost.

The usually broadly slapstick Berle gave a surprisingly sedate performance, not that it did much for his career or the episode, which despite the presence of Batman, Robin, and Batgirl, is resolved without any help from the heroes. The episode was the subject of my essay in OOOFF! BOFF! SPLATT! The Subterranean Blue Grotto Essays on Batman ’66 – Season Three and this is the last time I’ll mention Jim Beard in this column.

—

Surf’s Up! Joker’s Under! (Season 3, Episode 10, aired November 16, 1967). A decade before the Fonz jumped the shark on Happy Days, Batman put on a pair of baggies and rode the (green screen) wave against the Joker. Cowabunga!

—

I’ll Be a Mummy’s Uncle (Season 3, Episode 23, aired February 22, 1968). How do you talk about Batman without including Victor Buono’s King Tut? Buono was no stranger to playing over-the-top cartoonish characters in such fare as TV’s The Wild, Wild West (as Count Carlos Mario Vincenzo Manzeppi) and Tung-Tze in the Dean Martin Matt Helm movie, The Silencers, and he doesn’t disappoint in the role of a deluded Egyptian scholar who believes he’s the reincarnated king.

—

MORE

— The Complete BATMAN ’66 Index of Features. Click here.

— The TOP 13 BATMAN ’66 Episodes Ever — RANKED. Click here.

—

PAUL KUPPERBERG was a Silver Age fan who grew up to become a Bronze Age comic book creator, writer of Superman, the Doom Patrol, and Green Lantern, creator of Arion Lord of Atlantis, Checkmate, and Takion, and slayer of Aquababy, Archie, and Vigilante. He is the Harvey and Eisner Award nominated writer of Archie Comics’ Life with Archie, and his YA novel Kevin was nominated for a GLAAD media award and won a Scribe Award from the IAMTW. He also wrote an essay for DC’s Aquaman: 80 Years of the King of the Seven Seas. Check out his new memoir, Panel by Panel: My Comic Book Life. 

Website: https://www.paulkupperberg.net/

Shop: https://www.paulkupperberg.net/shop-1