Batman (the TV series)

[Slim]

2:45 Batman's Anniversary

The Riddler's back! Sort of. This time he's played by John Astin, of Addams Family fame.

The pernicious puzzler kicks off proceedings by stealing a golden calf full of cash, being presented at an anniversary celebration for Batman at the Gotham Plaza Hotel. He sets off some smoke bombs, then he and his men come and snaffle the loot dressed as firefighters.

His next caper is to flood a bank, then steal the cash from the vault. He and his men are kitted out in diving gear. Following a clue based on one of his puzzles the Dynamic Duo catch up with them there, wearing underwater respirators. There's an underwater punch up. It doesn't exactly look convincing, but that (of course) is all part of the fun. Using the underhand trick of pulling Robin's respirator out to distract Batman, the arch-criminal and his gang get away. Oddly there seems to be a manhole cover that leads directly to the bank vault.

It seems that The Riddler needs the cash to purchase a demoleculariser weapon from a wacky and unethical German professor, whom we meet later on. With this, the enigmatic egotist and his crew will have control of Gotham City. But he doesn't yet have the cash he needs. So far the proceeds of his crimes have netted him $1.5 million. He needs $3 million. It's a plot element we've seen a few times before, of course.

Highslide Image Viewer

First (and as usual), he plans to make sure the Dynamic Duo won't get in his way. They're due to visit Gotham City Bakery, to pose for two marshmallow figures to be placed atop a gigantic cake. They arrive there and obligingly pose at the top of the giant cake. But the pink icing is 15 ft of quicksand! The Riddler mocks them from the ground as they sink into the goo.

I have to say they're remarkable passive about it - either of them could easily make a dive to the edge of the cake when they're still only ankle-deep in the stuff. But no doubt there'll be some inventive escape at the beginning of the second part.

From the viewer's point of view - I don't think having John Astin in the role of The Riddler works very well. He tries hard to conjure up the same manic energy - actually he tries too hard - but it doesn't come naturally to him. He's not really sinister either. I think he could have been a decent arch-criminal. But not this one.

From the producers' point of view though, probably an excellent way of annoying Frank Gorshin, who was still holding out for more money.

Decent villainess eye candy, though we don't see much of her.

[Slim]

2:46 A Riddling Controversy

The two beleaugered crime-fighters escape a grim, gritty end by activating their experimental "heel to bat rockets". They fly upwards and out of the pink quicksand. You can see the strings, but hey. How do they land exactly? We don't find out.

The Riddler is of course incensed to find that they're still alive. His next caper is to steal from the safe of an Anthony Aquila, an exiled dictator from South America who's taken up residence in Gotham City. He looks a lot like Fidel Castro, probably not coincidentally. The Dynamic Duo find the pernicious puzzler and his gang there, but the crims have the upper hand - they've placed the unfortunate foreigner in a puzzle cage with a bomb! So the two crime-fighters have to decode it while they walk off with the loot.

It turns out that it's not a bomb at all, it's just a loudly ticking alarm clock in a box. With a puzzle of course. Can't help thinking that The Riddler would do a lot better if he could get out of the habit of leaving clues deliberately.

So along with $1m that he's stolen from a charity, the arch-criminal now has enough cash to persuade the unethical German professor to part with his molecular disruptor device. It simply makes things vanish into thin air.

I was fascinated to find that the device is rechargeable. I think of rechargeable things as having their origin in the 1990s, but they did exist, in a crude and much less efficient way, in the '60s.

Highslide Image Viewer

So the riddle-obsessed rascal makes a priceless statue disappear in Gotham Part as a demonstration. Then he demands that all criminal statutes are rescinded in Gotham City. Unless the authorities agree to this by 5pm, he'll make Gotham Police headquarters disappear. The sneaky villain has actually left the demoleculariser in Commissioner Gordon's office, on a timer.

Wouldn't it disappear with the building? Or at least clatter on the ground from a significant height? It's cost him $3m.

Batman and Robin foil the dastardly criminal's plan by seeding the clouds above Gotham City with sodium dichloride from the Batcopter - accurately enough to cause a lightning bolt to strike the building, and neutralise the effect of the fiendish weapon. Yeah.

Anyway they must have landed the Batcopter pretty quickly because at the very moment The Riddler's plans are quashed, the the two turn up at the arch-criminal's secret hideout, which they've found by following the usual contorted and incredibly unlikely logic from one of his puzzles.

There's a lively punch up - then it's Game Over. And a happy ending when a conscience-stricken unethical but brilliant German professor returns the $3m proceeds from The Riddler's crimes.

I'm afraid John Astin wasn't a good Riddler, but I guess he was compromised by having to, or trying to, reproduce some of Frank Gorshin's natural extrovert mania. They should have given him his own arch-criminal.

[Slim]

2:47 The Joker's Last Laugh

Not The Joker again so soon? But I suppose the TV audiences of the 1960s didn't watch Batman as frequently as I am at the moment.

In this one, the Clown Prince of Crime has developed some lifelike, super-strength robots to assist in his initiative to distribute counterfeit money that's only printed on one side. The first time Batman encounters one - at a bank, where it's been employed to distribute the fake cash - he destroys it by twisting its nose. The top of its head blows off and it emits copious quantities of smoke through the hole. It's very impressive. I would have loved that as a kid.

The Dynamic Duo take it to the Batcave in the Batmobile, but Joker follows them in his "Jokemobile". He's put a tracking device in the robot. Fortunately the two crime-fighters detect this, and deploy a Bat deflector to lead the giggling ghoul astray.

Careful forensic examination using the Batcave's integro-differential robot analyser leads the crimebusting duo to The Joker's secret hideout - a comic book printing business called Penthouse Publishers, that has recently changed hands. It's now owned, suspiciously, by a Mr Whiteface. The Joker, of course.

Highslide Image Viewer

But the two have insufficient evidence to go there and "pounce on the blighter", as Alfred points out. So the Caped Crusader concocts a plan. Instead, Bruce Wayne goes there. He's distraught. He's bankrupt, wiped out. Could Mr Whiteface please print him up a batch of counterfeit currency? He's foolishly succumbed to the temptation of speculation with the funds of the Wayne Foundation. The results were catastrophic.

Tomorrow is the annual accounting, and unless he has $1m in cash, he's up the river without a paddle. In return, he offers to make Mr Whiteface vice chairman of the Gotham National Bank (which he owns of course). But the distressed millionaire insists that Mr Whiteface runs off a sample of counterfeit cash first. The malevolent master of mirth gladly agrees.

But as he does so - who should burst through the window but the Boy Wonder, on routine crime patrol - he's caught The Joker in the act of printing fake money.

Highslide Image Viewer

The clever arch-criminal activates his robots. Robin has a punch-up with them, but loses. The hapless Boy Wonder ends up strapped to a conveyor belt, about to be stamped by a comic book press - and Bruce is helpless to intervene! Worse still, the two robots are going to force Bruce to operate the machine, to ensure against being double-crossed.

Will Robin be flattened?

Pretty good one this, the plot unfolds a bit more sensibly and coherently than most.

[Slim]

2:48 The Joker's Epitaph

Alfred, dressed as Batman, is on hand below The Joker's hideout, where Robin is about to be flattened by a printing press. The old boy manages a bat climb up the side of the building and throws Bat gas once he's in through the window. It's a sort of smoke bomb; clearly not the same Bat gas that the Caped Crusader uses to render people unconscious for a trip to the Batcave.

The mirthful malfeasant runs off with his robots down a secret elevator. But he has the document that makes him - officially, or at least as Mr Whiteface - vice chairman of the board of Gotham National Bank.

The Dynamic Duo investigate the giggling grifter's conduct at the bank once he turns up there, but it's flawless.

The arch-criminal goes to pay Bruce Wayne a visit. He's recorded their earlier conversation, in which Bruce confesses to speculating away the Wayne Foundation's funds and attempting to procure counterfeit cash. It's blackmail. The clownish crook demands that Bruce lures Batman into a trap, and kills him.

Highslide Image Viewer

But when Bruce refuses, he settles for Plan B. He demands that Bruce marries his villainous sidecutie, with a settlement of $3 million.

Back at the Batcave, the two crime-fighters ponder their options. They examine the dead robot they brought there in the first episode. If they can find out how it works, they can gain control of The Joker's other robots. And it's not long before they have the robot back to life. Holy Frankenstein!

But when Commissioner Gordon hears of this monstrous misalliance - Bruce Wayne is of course an upstanding pillar of Gotham City society, whereas his bride-to-be has an impressive criminal record - and on taking advice from a psychiatrist - he insists that Chief O'Hara has the millionaire arrested by Gotham Police's Anti-lunatic squad, to be committed to a mental institution in a straitjacket.

Highslide Image Viewer

Fortunately Alfred and Robin track down the Anti-Lunatic van and free Bruce using some remote control jiggery-pokery from the Batmobile. He's into a spare Batsuit in no time. Then it's off to Gotham City Bank, in time to see the reprogrammed robots causing a bit of mayhem.

The robot restored to working condition in the Batcave arrives there, claiming to be married to the cutie who's supposed to be getting hitched to Bruce. Bigamy! The other two start pointing guns at the customers. Just the pretext the two noble upholders of law and order need to nab The Joker.

Highslide Image Viewer

Well, the giggling ghoul orders his robots into action against the Dynamic Duo, overriding their previous instructions. As Batman wisfully reflects, robots lack even the most minimal sense of loyalty. And that, finally, is all the justification that's needed to send the loathsome arch-criminal back to the penitentiary - following the usual punch up, of course.

Bruce submits to a psychiatric examination, and happily a clean bill of mental health is declared.

This was actually a pretty good one with a decent plot - not just the usual sequence of ridiculous clues leading to repeated encounters. Interesting that the cutie sidekick in this one doesn't remorsefully change sides, or fall for Batman as some do. She looks as sweet as anything. But she's bad to the bone.

[Slim]

2:49 Catwoman Goes to College

Catwoman's appeal for parole has been granted - on condition that Bruce Wayne assumes the responsibility of being her parole officer. She's being given another chance.

She declares that she will immerse herself in education, and signs up for Gotham City University.

It's soon clear though that the vile villainess has no intention of going straight. I'd guessed that was probably the case. Her behaviour is highly suspicious.

She has Batman framed for a supermarket robbery by having him impersonated by one of her henchmen. Of course the Caped Crusader extricates himself from that situation in no time at all, but she organises a huge student demo in Gotham City's 'Chimes Square'.

Highslide Image Viewer

With a bit of help from the technology in the Batcave, the two crimefighters identify a number of potential crimes that she might be plotting. As it happens she's planning to steal some priceless cat's eye opal jewels, and the Chimes Square demo is intended as a massive diversion.

Batman and Robin catch up with her and her stooges atop the Chimes Building, where she's just given an address to the assembled huge crowd of students. There is (of course) a punch up. But the defeated Catwoman feigns tearful remorse. She dabs her teary eyes with her catkerchief (then wrings about 100ml of tears out oif it - hilarious). But when she extracts her atomiser, she aims it at the Dynamic Duo - not herself! And they collapse in a sort of drunken stupor.

Highslide Image Viewer

Next thing you know - the two crime-fighters have been tied up and dumped in a huge cup that's part of a coffee advertising display. Normally a massive coffee pot dispenses coffee into it every minute. But she's substituted sulphuric acid!

Really a very good one. Any Catwoman episode is a good one. Interesting that she's in prison at the beginning of the episode - last time we saw her, she was missing presumed (possibly) drowned. Bit of a discontinuity.

Highslide Image Viewer

I especially like a scene in which Catwoman and Batman share a soda with two straws. She steals his straw. He grabs it back.

The crowd scenes at Chimes Square (third pic) are actually Piccadilly Circus, I suspect taken on VE night.

[Slim]

2:50 Batman Displays His Knowledge

With the first trickle of sulphuric acid, before the spout tips and pours the lot onto himself and Robin, Batman manages to burn through the rope tying his hands. He then uses a Batarang to operate the lever controlling the power supply to the coffee cup display.

"I don't know how we do it, Batman. The way we get into these scrapes and get out of them. It's although someone was dreaming up these situations .. guiding our destiny", Robin observes. But the Caped Crusader reminds him that things like that only happen in the movies. This is real life.

Catwoman and her criminal gang turn up at the premises of the Forever Jewel Company where the sale of the cats-eye opals is taking place, and of course they steal them. The feline feloness takes them to her favourite fence, French Freddy.

Freddy is a fence not merely in the sense that he knowingly offers money for stolen goods. He's a fencing instructor. He also loves spaghetti in huge quantities, which he strains through a fencing mask. A nice touch that. No bearing whatever on the plot, but a bit of colour.

Anyway he declines to accept the precious jewels from Catwoman. There's a $3 million reward for their return. Too hot.

Batman visits Commissioner Gordon. Awkwardly, he wants to call Bruce Wayne for a moment while Batman is present. Bruce is, after all, the catty criminaless' parole officer.

Fortunately, Batman has an answer to the problem. He discreetly calls Alfred in the Batcave and has him use the Bat syllable device.

When Gordon calls Bruce, Alfred is on hand to type out responses, which are then heard as Bruce's voice over the phone. It is what we would called a "text to speech" facility in the present day. Commonplace now, but pure sci-fi in the 1960s of course.

Highslide Image Viewer

The actual Bat syllable device prop looks a lot like an electric typewriter next to a reel-to-reel tape deck. I love that.

Next, Batman has Alfred consult the Batcave's Well Known Criminals File. It comes up with French Freddy as a likely recipient of the stolen goods.

After a brief, good-natured fencing match (Batman wins of course, cleverly flipping his opponent's sword into the ceiling), the two crime-fighters leave, none the wiser.

Highslide Image Viewer

But Freddy has another idea. He suggests they turn the jewels in for the reward money. But on closer inspection of the goods, it turns out that they're fake! Near-worthless replicas!

An enraged Catwoman, realising that Batman must have anticipated her theft of the priceless opals, vows revenge. She has a letter delivered to Commissioner Gordon. She proposes to give herself up, promising to come alone to a model house (I think a "show home" in British English) at a new housing development - providing Batman comes alone as well.

Batman agrees to her terms. He goes there. The feline villainess is delightfully cutesy and seductive, once he arrives. I never get over how brilliant Julie Newmar was. She should have been a household name. Bigger than Brigitte Bardot. More popular than Raquel Welsh. More legendary than Sophie Loren.

Catwoman offers to become Batman's partner in life. What about Robin? Batman wants to know. Well she'll have him killed. Painlessly. He is after all a bit of a bore with his holy this.. holy that. But it seems her sentiments are a tad insincere. She's put on some poisonous perfume, and she's surprised the Caped Crusader isn't dead already.

Highslide Image Viewer

Of course the masked crime-fighter has taken the precaution of wearing Bat plugs up his nose. Unfortunately Catwoman has taken the precaution of bringing along her gang. They spring out of hiding. But Robin has taken the precaution of following Batman there! So there is - of course - a punch up. She tries to get away, but it's to no avail. And there's a hint of tragedy as she regretfully laments that they're fated to travel in different directions. He on the straight and narrow .. she on the crooked and wide.

As she's carted off to the pen, she confides in her parole officer - Bruce Wayne, of course - that her heart belongs to Batman. Odd that she's tried to kill him twice over the course of a single episode, then.

Very, very good. Odd location though for the punch up climax, a show home. No particular reason for it in the plot. Maybe just a spare set from a sitcom or something.

Sadly, this was the final appearance of Julie Newmar as Catwoman. Next time we see the feline feloness (in the third series), it'll be Eartha KItt.

[Slim]

2:51 A Piece of the Action

The Green Hornet and his trusty sidekick Kato are in town. A bit complicated, this one. The Green Hornet was a TV series broadcast at the same time (and on the same channel) as Batman; 1966-67. Similar thematically to Batman in that the titular hero is a crime-fighter with a secret identity. But dissimilar in that he and his trusty oriental sidekick Kato, played by Bruce Lee (no less) are - to the police - wanted criminals. In reality it's a pretence, so that they can infiltrate criminal gangs.

Anyway - The Green Hornet and Kato are investigating a postage stamp counterfeiting operation at the Gotham City premises of a legitimate businesswoman named Pinky Pinkston. She has pink hair, and a pink dog.

But their presence in the city comes to Commissioner Gordon's attention. Since he knows them as criminals, he soon has the Dyanmic Duo on the case.

Highslide Image Viewer

It's a complicated one this, with a few interwoven strands. For one thing Pinky is well acquainted with both Bruce Wayne and Britt Reid, the Green Hornet's secret identity. They appear to be rivals for her affection, but they've known each other since they were kids.

For another, Bruce seems to have an interest in collecting stamps, and he's bought a counterfeit rare stamp from a stamp dealer who's also the foreman at Pinky's stamp factory, and essentially the villain of the piece. Colonel Gumm. I think he's supposed to be British.

Batman wonders if the Green Hornet is after a famous, priceless stamp that mysteriously disappeared years earlier.

In any case, Pinky discovers that Gumm is making hooky stamps. So she gets kidnapped.

Highslide Image Viewer

The Green Hornet and Kato turn up at the stamp factory just before Batman and Robin, on the pretext that they want to be cut in. A "piece of the action". But they get thrown into an Enlarged Perforating and Coiling Machine. The Dynamic Duo wade in - there's a punch up, of course - but they end up stuck to an Undetachable Glue Pad, mounted on the wall - soon to suffer the same fate as the other two apparently-criminal-but-not-really crime-fighters.

Gumm is played by Roger Carmel, who (perhaps) more famously portrayed Harry Mudd in two episodes of Star Trek. The first would have aired a few months before this Batman episode.

The Green Hornet / Britt Reid is played by Van Williams. Didn't recognise him at all but he certainly was a handsome devil.

I think the Enlarged Perforating and Coiling Machine was repurposed, with minor alterations, from a similar contraption from a Penguin episode.

[Slim]

2:52 Batman's Satisfaction

So - believing that The Green Hornet and Kato have already been disposed of by the Enlarged Perforating and Coiling Machine, Colonel Gumm and his goons remove Batman and Robin from the wall-mounted Undetachable Glue Pad, so that they may suffer the same fate. But as soon as they're freed, the two crime-fighters simply start a punch up with the villains and overcome them. Probably the simplest (ok, dumbest) get-out from a cliffhanger that we've seen so far.

Next, Batman frees The Green Hornet and Kato from the machine. The reason they're alive is some of the most preposterous technobollocks imaginable, involving a "high velocity spectroboscopic range reflector mini unit" in the machine's internal workings.

Anyway, lacking tangible evidence, Batman lets them leave. The crims have got away as well, while Batman was freeing the other two masked men, with Pinky as a hostage. Fortunately, Pinky has left a clue in the bowl of alphabet soup she was eating. Batman realises this when he notices that the Js, Qs and Zs are missing. Holy uncanny photographic mental processes, as the Boy Wonder observes.

Highslide Image Viewer

When fed into the Bat Computer, the message becomes clear: "if anyone can decode this message, Gumm is taking me to warehouse as hostage. Watch stamp exhibition tonight". Unfortunately before the computer can be used to determine the location of the warehouse, it dies. Aunt Harriet's hair dryer has taken out the power to the half of the electricity in the whole house and Bat cave. This gives Batman a bit of a crisis. But Robin perks him up, and comes up with a few ideas. Lovely moment. Hilarious, especially when Robin puts a reassuring hand firmly on the Caped Crusader's shoulder with a "chin up, old chum".

Britt Reid (Green Hornet of course) visits Bruce to mention that he's worried about Pinky. They have an amusing competitive discussion about Batman and The Green Hornet. In any case Pinky escapes from the warehouse, once the villains have left for the stamp exhibition, by instructing her dog to bite through the rope round her wrist.

So the Dynamic Duo arrive at the stamp exhibition. They find Gumm (in disguise as a stamp collector) and his criminal gang there, as well as The Green Hornet and Kato. There's an almighty punch-up. Eventually only the four crime-fighters are left standing, throwing punches (or in Kato's case, Kung Fu kicks) at each other. Impressively, Robin decks Kato (Bruce Lee of course) a couple of times.

Highslide Image Viewer

But Gumm manages to take Pinky hostage (again), this time at gunpoint. Batman and Robin save the day by sneaking round behind him and disarming him, while the other two masked crime-fighters sneak off.

There's a bit of hilarity involving Pinky believing that Britt is Batman. And it's a wrap.

Interesting one. Gumm isn't a particularly interesting villain though he's a larger than life character. His only gimmick apart from being pompous and adopting disguises is that he likes alphabet soup. But this two-parter is more about the dynamic between The Green Hornet and Batman, and of course Britt and Bruce. Neither knows of the other's secret identity. One curious thing: there's a plot error. Late on in the episode, Gumm is assumed to believe that Batman and Robin are dead, along with The Green Hornet and Kato. But in fact they escape before Gumm and his gang flee the scene.

I recognised one of Gumm's henchmen, Alex Rocco. He was Moe Greene in The Godfather.

My favourite line from the whole episode, maybe the whole series, perhaps all of popular fiction: "I never knew there were no punctuation marks in alphabet soup" - Robin.

[Slim]

2:53 King Tut's Coup

Yale University's distinguished Professor of Egyptology is strolling through the grounds of that distinguished educational establishment with two prospective students. He humbly explains to them that he suffers from a unique combination of amnesia and identity transference. When he suffers cranial concussion, he's liable to imagine himself to be King Tutankhamun.

By a bizarre, uncanny coincidence, two plant pots fall onto the young students' heads from an upper storey window ledge, and it seems that they both suffer from a very similar condition. What were the chances? In the next moment, they're on their knees, transformed into Egyptian slaves. Another moment later, a plant pot falls on the professor's head! King Tut is back!

And no bad thing, because Tut is definitely one of the better Batman villains. In this one, he's determined to claim the daughter of a wealthy socialite called Lisa Carson as his queen, apparently because she's attending an Egyptian costume ball dressed as Cleopatra. Bruce Wayne is escorting her (of course).

The Dynamic Duo and Gotham City Police Department are already onto the pernicious professor, because of a theft of a valuable Tut-era sarcophagus.

Highslide Image Viewer

There's a pleasingly surreal scene when Batman and Robin go to interview a pantomimist who's been assaulted and left hanging from a noose in a hotel with his hands tied. Neither the Dynamic Duo or the police bother to untie him until he asks nicely. Also, they arrive at his room by climbing up the side of the building. On this occasion, I can't imagine why the elevator wouldn't have been easier.

But anyway the purpose of this crime appears to have been to leave Batman a message, on an ancient scroll. The best villains always offer a clue, don't they?

So on the assumption that Tut would want to attend an ancient Egyptian ball, the Caped Crusader has Commissioner Gordon assign a cordon of police to the event, attired as Egyptians. Alas, it's to no avail. Using a clever deception involving the Deputy Mayor attired similarly to Tut and a number of the dastardly delusionary's men masquerading as undercover police, Lisa gets kidnapped anyway.

Highslide Image Viewer

Fortunately Batman (or Bruce) has taken the precaution of installing a tracking device in Lisa's clothes, which leads the Dynamic Duo to Tut's lavishly appointed hideout. Where does a university professor get the cash for all the Egyptian paraphernalia? Anyway of course the two masked crime-fighters rush there. But Robin gets captured, and Batman is defeated in the obligatory punch-up.

He's placed in the stolen sarcophagus, which is slowly lowered into a large tank of water. Will Gotham City's noble defender suffer a death worse than Fate? What will happen to the Boy Wonder??

Didn't realise this until I just looked it up but Lisa Carson, whom we see attired as Cleopatra, is Lee Meriwether, who played Catwoman in the 1966 Batman feature film.
I recognised Tut's sidecutie immediately though - Grace Lee Whitney, best known as the delectable Yeoman Rand in Star Trek, made at about the same time. I also recognised the dangling pantomimist though I wasn't sure from where. Not a household name by any means, just one of those bit part actors who turns up in a lot of TV shows. Kojak, The Rockford Files, Charlie's Angels, Hill Street Blues, The Partridge Family among many others. Richard Bakalyan.

[Slim]

2:54 Batman's Waterloo

In the Batcave, Alfred receives a morse code signal. It seems that Batman, entombed within a sarcophagus submerged in water, has managed to reach his Bat transmitter. It seems to me that the obvious thing would be to call the police, perhaps anonymously - but no, Alfred makes his way over to Tut's hideout himself, makes his way into the room with the large water container via the skylight, and rescues the Caped Crusader himself. Tut and his gang have already left the premises.

It turns out that Batman was able to put himself in a sort of trance while submerged, to slow his heart rate and respiration to a crawl.

Tut has a sort of mobile palace in the form of a gold van - we saw it in one of the earlier Tut stories, although presumably it's not the same one. And he's off to some other location to oil Robin in oil. His queen, the kidnapped Lisa Carson, insists that he call her dad. So he does, and he demands $8,300,487.12 in cash in return for her safety (bit of a plot flaw this, since the intention to this is for her to become his beloved queen, not a hostage). Why $8,300,487.12? Well it's the amount he needs to pay off the mortgage on the pyramids.

Highslide Image Viewer

Then there's a really odd plot device in which the Caped Crusader and Tut communicate with each other by phoning in to a radio show. Just a bit strange. Admittedly it's a bit of fun, but it has nothing to do with the rest of the script. In any case - Tut wants Batman to meet him alone with the cash from Lisa's father at the oil-boiling location, an abandoned boiler works. It's a trap, of course. But Batman has a trick up his sleeve. He's concocted a substance that has the effect of transforming boiling oil into foam rubber instantly.

Lisa and Robin have been tied up there, but they have an unexpected ally - Tut's sidecutie is jealous of the attention his "queen" has been receiving, so she wants to help her get away. After all - Tut may be fat, lazy and extremely rude - but he's all she has. She surreptitiously unties the two captives. Unfortunately this doesn't go unnoticed. They get recaptured immediately, and for her treachery, the cutie gets condemned to the boiling oil as well.

Highslide Image Viewer

But first, it's Robin's turn. Luckily, just as the Boy Wonder is about to be hurled into the oil, Batman arrives. Through the wall, courtesy of a Bat-tering ram mounted on the front of the Batcycle. He hurls the substance he's concocted into the huge vat of oil, transforming it immediately into foam rubber. Robin bounces off it and the two noble crime-fighters help themselves to a punch up. They're necessarily victorious of course, because there's only a couple of minutes left. And Tut gets knocked on the head, neatly restoring his mental faculties. When he comes round, he's a mild-mannered and contrite Egyptology professor, once again.

I was amused to see a large pink box labelled STAMPS at the second hideout, supposedly an abandoned boiler works. Clearly a prop left over from the previous story, involving Pinky Pinkerton's stamp factory.

There's a rather suggestive closing scene in which Bruce walks Lisa to her door after a date, and she seductively asks him to come in for "milk and cookies". Bruce breaks the fourth wall, explaining to the viewer that "man cannot live by crime-fighting alone".

Victor Buono (as Tut) is always good value. Very funny one.

[Slim]

2:55 Black Widow Strikes Again

An old bird has been going round Gotham City's banks, stupefying their staff with a "cerebrum short circuitor" which critically impairs their judgement, and asking nicely for them to hand over large sums of money. Commissioner Gordon recognises the modus operandi immediately - it's The Black Widow!

Following a rather obvious clue (she seems to be going through the banks in alphabetical order), Batman and Robin catch up with her just as she's attempting to rob the Gotham General Bank. She turns the cerebrum short circuitor on the Caped Crusader - but to no avail. He and the Boy Wonder are wearing anti-short-circuiting brain bat electrodes. So she resorts to a nerve paralyser spray. That works nicely. Batman is rendered incapable for a few minutes while she strolls out of the bank. Oddly, Robin just looks on, dumbfounded.

But once he recovers, they follow her in the Batmobile. The arachnid arch-criminal gets around in the sidecar of a motorbike driven by one of her wicked henchmen. There's some agreeable techno-nonsense about the Bat-radar being attuned to the exact oil and gas mixture of her exhaust.

So the Dynamic Duo follow her to a suburban house, but find nothing there except two old folks on the porch. The old folks haven't seen anything. But the old folks are rubber dummies fitted with speakers and remote-controlled lip activators, being controlled by The Black Widow from the basement as she watches on via a periscope (I love that Batman villains always use periscopes instead of CCTV).

Highslide Image Viewer

So the two crime-fighters return to the Batcave empty-handed, but when the Caped Crusader goes to the trouble of analysing a tape he's made using the Batmobile's ultrasomic recorder, he realises they've been duped.

They return there, make their way into the basement lair - there's a punch up with her henchmen of course, in which the Dynamic Duo prevail easily - but then following a bit of sinister dialogue, the mad old bird presses a floor switch and a large spider's web descends to trap them. Her henchmen recover from the beating they've received at their hands, and, at her bidding, release two black widow spiders the size of cats to climb over them.

I really liked The Black Widow. Something a bit different. I wasn't familiar with Tallulah Bankhead, the actress who plays her and I was alarmed, after doing a bit of reading, to find that she was younger than myself when this was filmed. But perhaps this, from Wikipedia, explains her frailty:

"Bankhead was an alcohol and drug user; she reportedly smoked 120 cigarettes a day and talked candidly about her vices". She died in November 1968, this was one of her last TV appearances. She seems to have been a bit of a character; Wikipedia also remarks that "she had a series of sexual relationships with both men and women".

[Slim]

2:56 Caught in the Spider's Den

Batman manages to free one hand from the super-adhesive spider web and he reaches the mini-charge (why not the Bat mini charge?) in his utility belt. He zaps the spider's web with 5,000 volts, killing the two spiders that by now have nearly climbed up to their necks. The Dynamic Duo themselves are somehow unharmed.

So they go to confront Black Widow, who's counting ill-gotten cash in her vault. She responds by giving Batman another zap with her Cerebrum Short Circuitor. He's still wearing his protective anti-short-circuiting brain bat electrode. But she's reversed the polarity of her device, rendering hsi countermeasures useless. In seconds, he's a pliable, compliant schmuck.

Robin is tied up while the old bird has a chat with Batman. She wants to use the Bat computer, to suggest a bank she could rob. The Caped Crusader gladly operates it for her by remote control, and it suggests the Heritage First National bank.

Then she comes up with a clever scheme. She gets one of the decoy dummies from the first episode made up as Batman - the Caped Crusader somehow has a spare Bat costume on him - and she has herself made up and clothed as Robin. The transformation is uncanny. She looks exactly like the Boy Wonder. Then she's off to rob the bank in the Batmobile, which she's worked out how to drive from the passenger seat. The dummy in the Batman suit is placed in the driver's seat.

She gets away with $40k and, fearing that the Dynamic Duo have broken bad, Commissioner Gordon orders their arrest. A plucky young police officer tries to apprehend the two - really the dummy and Black Widow disguised as the Boy Wonder - and ends up using his weapon. The poor lad believes that he's shot Batman!

Highslide Image Viewer

I must say it's hilarious hearing Talullah Bankhead's croaky old voice (bless her) dubbed over Burt Ward's lip-syncing.

While Black Widow and her gang are out, the real Robin manages to free himself. He makes a modification to the Cerebrum Short Circuitor, which she's left lying around her hideout, to make it work in reverse. And he uses it on Batman, to restore his partner's mental faculties to normal.

When the bad guys return, of course there's a punch up. The Dynamic Duo prevail. And Batman uses the Short Circuitor on Black Widow - which I thought was a bit unethical, given that she's already bang to rights. Gotham City's finest turn up - Alfred having traced the source of the Bat computer remote control signal to the precise address (somehow) and tipped them off.

In the final scene we see the criminaless and her gang in prison, having their brains decriminalised by rewired Bat brain analysers. I'm sure a human rights lawyer would have something to say about that nowadays, but hey - it's the 1960s.

Well - the second part was a bit of an anti-climax but overall I found old Talullah quite endearing. But really the only spidery thing about The Black Widow is the decor at her hideout.

[Slim]

2:57 Pop Goes the Joker

Alfred is browsing an art gallery, with a view to purchasing some tasteful art for Wayne Manor. Alas, who should turn up but The Joker, armed with two impressive looking paint weapons? The mirthful miscreant proceeds to ruin a number of valuable paintings by splattering them with brightly coloured paint. Holy Just Stop Oil!

But .. are they ruined? One of the notable artists present at the gallery thinks that he's improved them. He's delighted with the arch-criminal's work (I think this is supposed to be a satire on modern art).

Batman and Robin have already turned up for a punch up having been tipped off by Alfred, but they're forced to let The Joker go when they concede that he's increased the value of the paintings he's attacked.

The Joker is invited to join an international art contest, to compete against such luminaries as Jackson Potluck, Leonardo Davinsky and Vincent Van Gauche. It's to be hosted by a wealthy young socialite named Baby Jane Towser.

Highslide Image Viewer

Each of the artists has three minutes to create a work of art, from the moment Baby Jane (literally) fires the starting pistol. Bruce and Dick are attending, discreetly. Apart from The Joker, all of the competitors create ridiculously abstract and vulgar splashes of random paint, apart from Leonardo, who has his pet monkey throw fruit at the canvas. But The Joker leaves his canvas entirely blank. Symbolism, you see. The emptiness of modern life. His creation is called Death of a Mauve Bat.

Baby Jane is incredibly impressed by this and The Joker is announced the winner. Satire!

The arch criminal's next move is to open art classes for millionaires at the Joker Art Institute. Only the filthy rich need apply. Baby Jane signs up immediately. And so that he can keep an eye on him, so does Bruce.

Needlessly to say, at the giggling ghoul's art classes, the students' various efforts are hopelessly inept. Bruce starts an argument with the arch-criminal. Enter two of The Joker's henchmen, to tie all of the millionaire students up, including Bruce. Ransom notes have already been sent to their families.

Robin gets wind of this via Commissioner Gordon and heads over to the laughing larcenist's art studio. Evidently he can't drive the Batmobile. He tells Alfred he'll catch a bus. And yet he seems to turn up there in about a minute. He enters through the window, and he and Bruce have a punch up with the villains.

Alas - it's only the first part, after all - the two are overcome. Bruce is tied to a chair. And Robin is strapped to an articulated art exhibit decorated with rotating razor sharp pallet knives, while a helpless Bruce watches on. A really elaborate prop, this. Quite a feat of engineering.

Highslide Image Viewer

One really nice moment, typical of the occasional comic touches that make Batman special - in this one, when Bruce and Dick leap to the Bat poles, the usual signs labelled BRUCE and DICK are absent. They pause for a moment at the top of the poles. "What happened to the signs, Bruce?" asks Dick. "Alfred removed them to put a new coat of paint on the Bat poles", Bruce replies.

Interesting that Joker has no cute villainess sidekick in this one. Presumably Baby Jane, one of his victims of course, is this two-parter's eye candy. Works for me. Also, why The Joker is vandalising paintings in the first place is not established.

Joker's appearance here elevates him to equal first place with The Penguin in the appearances table. Seven each.

[Slim]

2:58 Flop Goes the Joker

Bruce manages to overturn the chair he's tied to, crawls over to the base of the spinning apparatus that's about to chop Robin to bits and manages to bring it to a halt. Simultaneously, Robin works a hand free from his bonds. He disengages one of the apparatus' knives and disconnects the drive belt with it.

Shortly, The Joker and his goons re-enter the room, to check the machine's handiwork. The Dynamic Duo are of couse expert knife-throwers, so they hurl four of machine's knives at two of the villains who happen to be standing in front of a wall, pinning them to it by their clothes.

Highslide Image Viewer

There's then a punch up with the remaining henchman. Bruce is careful not to throw too many punches himself, so that no-one works out that he's Batman.

The two then confront The Joker. Baby Jane, still inclined to believe that the cackling criminal is a misguided artist despite having been bound and gagged, tries to defend him. She's going to refuse to press charges. Her filthy rich father is influential enough for her to persuade the other victims not to complain either.

Not to dwell on a legal technicality here, but surely having attempted to murder the Boy Wonder with a spinning knife contraption renders that a bit moot?

But anyway to Robin's surprise, Bruce also refuses to press charges. He takes the view that it might invite suspicion that he's Batman.

Highslide Image Viewer

The Joker goes to the Towser family mansion with Baby Jane. To the horror of the family butler, he wrecks a priceless antique dinner table and covers it with several colours of paint in the name of art. Then he reveals his plan. Using Baby Jane's dad's museum key - he's a patron you see, so he has a key to the "Towser Wing" - he's going to visit the museum late the same evening and replace the art there with his far superior modern creations. Baby Jane is completely supportive. It's clear that she's thicker than Angela Rayner.

So - the giggling ghoul and his gang do that. Baby Jane finally works out that he's a crook when he has her tied up. Friendship ends when real felony finally takes over, he tells her.

But Batman has taken the precaution of replacing the priceless art exhibits there with some rather amateurish efforts that he's had Alfred knock up. At the very moment the arch-criminal realises what's happened, he also finds that the Dynamic Duo are already on the scene. There follows a highly entertaining punch up, in which some of Alfred's paintings are used as weapons. Naturally (this is the second part) The Joker's gang are beaten to a pulp.

But the Clown Prince of Crime escapes. He heads straight to Wayne Manor, to thieve some cash so he can hide out for a few months - and get even with Bruce, who of course helped foil his initiative to kidnap a number of wealthy would-be artists. He takes Baby Jane as a hostage, turns up at Bruce's home and demands some cash from Alfred, at gunpoint.

But Alfred manages to disarm him with a poker, after distracting him by drawing his attention to an imaginary safe behind a painting over the fireplace. The giggling ghould picks up another poker and they have a bit of a fencing match. But after 30 seconds or so of it the arch criminal runs off, into Bruce's study. He stumbles across the switch for the Bat poles! He operates it! The bookcase slides away, revealing the Bat poles!

And now we know why the signs were removed in the first episode. The Joker doesn't realise he's found the entrance to the Batcave. He just thinks he's discovered a secret passage to Wayne Manor.

Highslide Image Viewer

He slides down one of the poles, but Alfred catches up and activates the emergency bat pole elevator. As he shoots back up the pole, terrified, he exclaims "I can't breathe!", beating George Floyd to it by 53 years.

And that's more or less it, except for a scene in which we see that Alfred's impromptu paintings are being displayed at the museum. A nice touch of comedy.

Must admit I wasn't really keen on seeing yet another Joker two-parter but I liked the way this one leans into satire and the plot is cleverer than most. And the girl who plays Baby Jane does the extrovert dumb blonde thing to a T.

Jut did a bit of reading and it looks like her character is based on a real life person called Baby Jane Holzer, an art collector and real estate investor. Diana Ivarson, who plays her, seems to have disappeared without trace after 1973. She does have an X account with 63 followers interestingly, although she's only ever posted four or five times. I suppose it might be fake.

[Slim]

2:59 Ice Spy

That ice-blooded arch-criminal Mr Freeze is back. He's created a giant iceberg with a below-water-level hideout, and he uses it to kidnap an Icelandic professor named Isaacson who's created an instant ice formula. It's an incredibly elaborate kidnap plan. He lures the SS Gotham Queen onto the iceberg using ice magnets. Then as soon as his henchmen have grabbed the eminent scientist from the ship, he dismantles and abandons his secret iceberg base, then releases the ship. Then he takes the professor to Gotham City in his ice sub.

Sadly we don't actually see the ship being lured onto the iceberg, or released. Or indeed the ice sub. I guess the special effects budget was a bit tight that week.

Freeze's villainess accomplice is the world-renowned ice-skating star Glacia Glaze, who's appearing at the Bruce Wayne Ice Arena in Gotham City. Bruce takes Aunt Harriet to meet her backstage there. He's already worked out that she's working with the frosty felon with the help of the Bat Computer. Freeze's Gotham City secret hideout is right under the ice arena.

Freeze sends a seal (yes), to Commissioner Gordon's office along with a note outlining his demands. He wants Bruce Wayne to appear on a TV broadcast at midnight, to confirm that a large sum of money will be paid to him, by Batman and Robin in person. He'll only deal with the Dynamic Duo in person.

Gordon sets up a telephone call between Bruce Wayne and Batman. He holds the Batphone against another phone in his office. So while the commissioner and O'Hara listen in, Bruce and Batman talk to each other, by means of Bruce holding his own Bat phone and his regular phone to his ear alternately. It's very funny.

Bruce agrees (of course) to Batman's suggestion to prepare a package of dummy money, and to tape the TV broadcast an hour early.

Freeze's attempts to get Isaacson to talk come to nothing. Eventually he injects him with dry ice (we don't actually see this thank heavens, I was getting flashbacks from my COVID jabs watching him wield a large syringe). Curiously, the professor doesn't seem to suffer any ill effects from this, at least outwardly.

So Bruce tapes the announcement that he's entrusted a large sum of money to Batman and Robin, for delivery to the cold-blooded criminal. He urges Freeze to return Professor Isaacson once the transaction takes place. It's broadcast an hour later, at midnight.

Highslide Image Viewer

To Freeze's surprise, the Dynamic Duo turn up at his hideout as soon as the broadcast announcement ends. How did they know where his hideout is? It's not clear from the script, perhaps we'll find out in the next one. They hand over the money. Freeze inspects it and realises it's fake. Cue the punch up.

Alas - this is the first part after all, so the two valiant defenders of law and order are overcome, and locked in a sub-zero temperature vaporising cabinet as the villainous ice-skater cutie looks on, delighted.

I'm assuming that the way they discovered the location of the hideout will be revealed next time. Bit of a plot hole otherwise, or maybe something was lost in an edit. Usually it's a hint provided by the Bat computer, or a Bat tracking device or something. But the dummy money makes no sense at all. Hey ho.

So this is the third appearance by Mr Freeze, and Eli Wallach is the third actor to portray the frozen fiend. Much, much better than Otto Preminger, who did the honours last time. Eli injects a sense of fun into the role. Otto just came across as unpleasant (of course the script in which he'd kidnapped a young woman for his own, er, purposes didn't help). Also the orange caterpillar eyebrows on Otto's version seemed somewhat incongruous.

I'm convinced some of Freeze's comic touches in this one are ad-libbed. Eli was definitely having fun with the part. Also the (literally) ice-cold Germanic Mr Freeze is something like a polar opposite of the role he's probably best known for, the swarthy Mexican bandit Tuco from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly which was made only a few months before this Batman episode.

We do actually see the seal a few times. Definitely a real one. Cute. I recognised Professor Isaacson immediately - couldn't have put a name to the face (Elisha Cook) but the list of films and TV shows he's been in as transcribed by IMDB is a mile long.