Why do we get so excited about film adaptations of comics?

[brendan1]

Batman holds a pretty unique place in popular culture though - he's probably one of the most adaptable characters in modern fiction. His personality can range from likeable buffoon (Adam West) to almost psychotic (Christian Bale) and he's still recognizable as Batman. This gives film makers far more scope to present their own vision than for a character like Dredd (must be serious hard-ass) or Spider-man (must be likeable nerd).
I can't think of character other than Batman that has no real definitive version (possibly Bond has no definitive screen version but the Flemming novels would be the definitive version cross-media).

I disagree. The Adam West Batman is an anachronism.

His character is very much defined for me as the brooding, disturbed, borderline psycho of the comics from the 80s onwards, and very well recreated by Bale in the Nolan films.

I think it's no coincidence that when Schumacher took Burton's typically dark vision (not that I liked those films much either) and decided to reintroduce the absurd campiness, the franchise tanked.

[JamesC]

Batman holds a pretty unique place in popular culture though - he's probably one of the most adaptable characters in modern fiction. His personality can range from likeable buffoon (Adam West) to almost psychotic (Christian Bale) and he's still recognizable as Batman. This gives film makers far more scope to present their own vision than for a character like Dredd (must be serious hard-ass) or Spider-man (must be likeable nerd).
I can't think of character other than Batman that has no real definitive version (possibly Bond has no definitive screen version but the Flemming novels would be the definitive version cross-media).

I disagree. The Adam West Batman is an anachronism.

His character is very much defined for me as the brooding, disturbed, borderline psycho of the comics from the 80s onwards, and very well recreated by Bale in the Nolan films.

I think it's no coincidence that when Schumacher took Burton's typically dark vision (not that I liked those films much either) and decided to reintroduce the absurd campiness, the franchise tanked.

I think Batman and Robin tanked for lots of reasons - but not specifically to do with its interpretation of Batman himself (he was pretty much marginalised by all the extra characters thrown in to the mix anyway).

As for Adam West's Batman - the 60's series was heavily inspired by the Dick Sprang era of Batman which is currently a major influence on the highly successful 'Batman-The Brave and The Bold' cartoon (if you haven't seen it, it's totally camp and has stories about Batman going into space or being replaced by robots and stuff).
The fact that DC are putting out TBATB cartoons and comics alongside the more traditional Bat titles and the Nolan films sort of proves my point about the character.


MODIFY: Just to be clear, I'm not suggesting that TBATB would necessarily work as a feature film but it proves the adaptability of the character and shows that there is a looseness to interpretation that film-makers could potentially use to their advantage.