Ah the smell of freshly baked bread is such a brain massage, much like freshly brewed coffee.
However, that freshness can turn into staleness quite fast.
A fresh concept like Batman in 1966 took the nation by storm and by the time the first season of 17 two-part stories was over, the public was wanting more.
Well, they got it. A whole new season going from fall of 1966 to early spring 1967. And by the time that season was done, the freshness, the novelty, was gone.
It wasn't right away, though.
In the summer of 1966, a Batman movie had been released to theatres. I have that movie on disc, it's pretty good. They got Frank Gorshin, Cesar Romero, Burgess Meredith and, because Julie Newmar was not available, Lee Meriwether together to form a quartet of villains to fight. Some new music was produced that would be used in the new TV season, not to mention some new tech like the Bat boat ant Bat copter.
Some new things with the new season not associated with the movie as well. With the sound effect words, instead of a yellowish word in the foreground of the scene, now the words were in various colors against various colored backgrounds, which was apparently cheaper. This is the first season:
This is the second season:
Midway through the season the producer replaced the recap of the first part episode with a short scene showing the dilemma Batman and Robin were currently in before the opening animation. It actually helped to make a little more time for the plot to unfold.
Also, a device introduced in season 1 was highly expanded: the celebrity popping out of the window to speak to our heroes for a moment. Dick Clark, Sammy David Jr., Santa Claus, Colonel Klink, and Edward G. Robinson among others showed up.
And then came the villains!
I have to say the winner of the best season 2 stories has to go to Julie Newmar as Catwoman. She occupied a sixth of the season, even teaming up with a new villain, Sandman (Michael Rennie) for one story. My favorite story with her, however, was when her assistant Pussycat (Lesley Gore) drugged Robin to be evil. In pretty much all of the Catwoman stories, there is some flirtation between her and Batman, giving both characters some more depth. By season three, with Newmar being replaced with Eartha Kitt, that dynamic was completely gone.
Another repeat is the Penguin. One of my all time favorite stories of the series had Penguin and Batman campaigning for mayor of Gotham City. Another good one was Penguin trying to go back to prison to get in contact with an expert forger. He tried everything, but when he finally succeeded, the forger was paroled! He was later more of an assistant to the Joker in two parts of a 3 part story. Then he got his own 3 part story teaming up with Marsha Queen of Diamonds. That was not one of his better stories and he closed his involvement in season 2 after that.
Then we have the Joker, who made only 1 story in fall of 1966 but then got that 3 parter mentioned, in early 1967, a story involving signs of the zodiac as the basis of his scheme.Two other stories with the Joker came, one getting control of the Gotham National Bank and the other involving opening an art school. During the last story, Joker was becoming less of a master criminal and more of a spoiled whiner, a theme that would continue into the final season.
Oh, and then there was the one Riddler story, with a catch. Frank Gorshin was not available so the producers snagged John Astin to play him. He fit the Riddler outfit well, and actually did a good job in my opinion, the one flaw being that he couldn't do the high pitched laugh. As I'm a John Astin fan anyway, I'm prejudiced. As his role as Gomez Addams had been finished in 1966, Astin was expanding into villain territory. He also did a turn as a Russian villain on The Wild Wild West at about the same time.
Another repeat was David Wayne as the Mad Hatter. In this one, he manages to radioactively contaminate Batman's cowl, then trap him and Robin into a fluoroscope chamber. The second part fist fight climax is my favorite in the series. Batman and Robin climb a water tower to meet up with Mad Hatter and his men for a fairly long battle with the fight music from the movie playing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNl8fEJm684&list=FLUaz0NExtmJa9dRMXNWBvEg&index=142
This particular music piece would serve as the fight music for 6 more stories, though not consecutively, before reverting back to what I refer to as "Batmusic".
Of course, Victor Buono returned for 2 more King Tut stories. These were always a hoot to watch. The second story also starred Lee Meriwether as a love interest of Bruce. Meriwether had played Catwoman in the previous summer's theatrical film.
Now, one more repeat in terms of character happened, though 2 different actors played him in season 2. Mr. Freeze, brilliantly portrayed by George Sanders early in season 1, was either not available or chose not to repeat the role. In came famous director Otto Preminger with a bald head and red thick eyebrows. For some reason he kept using the word "wild" as a responsive interjection to a comment or situation. Not my favorite Mr. Freeze by any means. However, in the last story of the season, Eli Wallach stepped into the role. If you're fond of the mustache-twirling villain type, Wallach pulled it off quite well, and he was clearly having a good time with it, even though he had no mustache.
With that, we have a lot of new and one-time villains in season 2. A few we can be grateful showed up for just one story!
First up is Art Carney as the Archer, a Robin Hood-themed villain claiming to fight for the poor but really aiming to enrich himself and his gang. Now, I love seeing Art Carney's work. Aside from his fame as Ed Norton, he put in some great dramatic roles later on, particularly in Harry & Tonto(1974). A Batman villain, he was not.
Second is Walter Slezak as Clock King. This one worked, a European villain obsessed with anything involving time. There was something about European actors as Batman villains that just clicked. The cliffhanger had our heroes in a giant hourglass with sand coming down to drown them. Clock King had a pretty cool rhythmic theme made for him, too bad he did not repeat!
The next one was for one word unique: Van Johnson as the Minstel. I'd seen him in other roles, particularly as Steve Maryk in The Caine Mutiny. He was not generally a villainous sort, so this role was surprisingly fun. The Minstel's goal was to extort a thousand a week from each member of the Gotham Stock Exchange to ensure the stock prices were correct. He also love to play the lute and sing short songs to taunt his foes, especially Batman and Robin.
And then there was Ma Parker, played by Shelley Winters, just her type of villainous role to relish. Modeled after famous criminal Ma Barker, Ma Parker led her sons and neglected daughter on a crime spreee, designed to get them into prison so they can run a crime empire form behind bars. This story was written by famous mystery scribe Henry Slesar, famous for penning many soap opera storylines, particularly on my favorite show The Edge of Night from 1968-83.
Probably the most famous creation from season 2 was Vincent Price as Egghead. Egghead prided himself on being quite intelligent and had a high bald dome of a head. His scheme was to kidnap all of the rich men of Gotham City so that they would not be able to deliver pelts as "rent" to Gotham City's true owner Chief Screaming Chicken to renew the city lease. Kind of convoluted, but by then so was the series already. Vincent Price would make 3 more appearances as Egghead in season 3, though as more of a sniveling coward.
All right, here come two really convoluted baddies! And they are played by the same man! Liberace was tapped to play brilliant concert pianist Chandell, as well as his mobster brother Harry. As Chandell, he was playing himself really, while donning a harsh (and forced) voice to play Harry. The scheme was for Chandell to woo Aunt Harriett and then kill Bruce and Dick so that he could pay off Harry, since Harry was blackmailing his brother for using an automated player piano as a White House Dinner due to an injured hand. What is also weird about this story is that the usual Batpole gimmick was not used. Bruce and Dick were off doing separate things (Bruce camping and Dick dating). Plus, in this part of the season, there area few episodes where Commissioner Gordon is lamenting that they seem to be calling on Batman a lot. If I did not know any better, I'd think it was a signal that the bread was getting stale.
Holy off-type role, Batman! There was also Cliff Robertson as the bad yet cowardly cowboy Shame. Definitely a western theme to this story, albeit quite cheesy. Not one of my favorites. Yet, he returned for season 3 in a two-parter. Liek Art Carney, I really like Cliff Robertson, he was an amazing actor, but not exactly a Batman villain type. Now, a real western villain on a show like Gunsmoke I could see.
Carolyn Jones as Marsha Queen of Diamonds was a bit off as aconcept, though she did a great job playing a not quite evil female charmer aiming to marry Batman. The byplay between her and Marsha's hag aunt played by Estelle Winwood was fun to watch.
The next one I have some fond memories of: Maurice Evans as the Puzzler. It was originally going to be a Riddler story but as Frank Gorshin was not free to do it, the producers created a new bad guy. If you enjoy Maurice Evans on his Bewitched appearances, then this one is even more enjoyable. The window celebrity in this one is Santa Claus, as it aired close to Christmas 1966. I remember first seeing this one in Michigan in 1980 while we were there for Christmas, so it fits. The puzzler was devious and not above trying to kill the Dynamic Duo using a never-landing hot air balloon, but he also possessed humility when defeated. He was also fond of quoting (and misquoting) Shakespeare.
Michael Rennie as Sandman was supposed to be a stand-alone villain. Actually, the producers had another villain and actor in mind, but as Julie Newmar was supposed to be up in the rotation, so that actor (Robert Morley I believe) bowed out and Michael Rennie came forward. Rennie was a fairly stiff and stoic actor, but the story was fairly fun, though not one of the season's strongest.
The 1966-67 season premiered a one season wonder featuring crusading hero the Green Hornet, aided by his butler Kato.In reality the Green Hornet was Britt Reid, a wealthy newspaper publisher. THe show was produced by the same folks who made Batman so it was decided they had to be together once. The solution was to have Green Hornet and Kato on Batman as "Visiting Heroes" Great, so who is the baddie? Well, it seems both Batman and Green Hornet are after a mssing valuable stamp called the Gotham Gothic, minted by the father of Bruce and Britt's love interest Pinky Pinkston (Diane McBain). PInky owns the stamp factory, but it is run by the corrupt Colonel Gumm, played by Roger C. Carmel. This was quite the crowded story with a lot going on, but the irony was that since Green Hornet and Kato were viewed as villains (as they associated with criminals to take them down), there would have to be a showdown. Sure enough, in the part 2 climax, all 4 fight Gumm and his men and each other...Batman and Green Hornet trade blows as do Robin and Kato...as Kato was played by Bruce Lee, it was unlikely that Robin would actually win, and indeed both battles were a draw, though Gumm and his men were arrested.
The final original villain in season 2 was Miss Tallulah Bankhead as Black Widow, an older woman who did not come off so mcuh as evil but velvety and clever and entering some senility. A charming performance, actually. Black Widow's MO was robbing banks and hypnotizing bank tellers into giving in to her gentle demands. This was Miss Bankhead's final performance.
Aside form the regulars, we had a lot of original villains, some of whom clicked and others did not. Whatever the result, by the end of the seaosn, the Batmania was wearing off. Plus, it was a lot of work making 60 episodes for one season.It was costing a lot of money as well. The solution? Cut the show to once a week for season 3, but add one more hero...
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