The History of the Batman and Superman Movies; Chapter 1: Age of No CBMs

CHAPTER 1:
AGE OF NO CBMS

So some stuff happened with my "Quick1029" account, so I had to come back as "Quicker", and I've been planning on doing this "History of" for months due to the release of Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. However, some stuff happened with my account, then I had exams. BUT ALL THAT IS DONE!

So here I am ready to talk about the World's Finest on the big screen (I could have done one on Batman and one on Superman, but putting these two together would mean that the last chapter would focus on Dawn of Justice). So to start things off, let's go to ye olden days. Back when comics were simpler, there were no movie universes, and the only comic book movie at the time was some 1944 Captain America serial.
 

BATMAN

Let's go back to the early 1940s where everything sucked. It was 1943, WWII was still going on. Life was terrible. It was four years after Batman made his debut in Detective Comics, which is was the DC in DC Comics stands for.
 

1943 saw the first appearence of Batman on film. The characters of Dick Grayson and Alfred appeared. There are a a lot of changes from the source material like how Batman was a government agent in this. However, it's worth bringing up due to introducing some elements to Batman lore. For example, it introduced the Batcave, the secret entrance, and thin Alfred. Because in the comics he looked like this:

However, there were a few things about this serial that aren't very fondly remembered. The serial was made during WWII when Japanese were considered the enemy. So Batman was a goverment agent fighting an evil Japanese scientist. This was back at a time when every beloved character was racist, even Bugs Bunny.

Anyway, the serial ran for 15 episodes in 1943. However, this led to a sequel serial in 1949 called Batman and Robin. This had characters like VIcki Vale and Commisner Gordon appear. Plus, the war was over so any japanese-fighting was gone and Batman had to fight the Wizard. 

But enough abouts serials, let's talk about the thing that introduced Batman to mainstream and general audiences... Adam West.

This version of Batman was made as a juvinile adventure show to cash in on the old Lone Ranger tv show from the 50s. The show was supposed to have football player Mike Henry as Batman but he dropped out. 20th Century Fox managed to get the rights to the show along with ABC. Both companies hoped the the show would be a fun,but slightly serious show, similar to (as they said) The Man Form U.N.C.L.E. (a show which would get a movie adaptaion starring Superman and a guy who almost played Batman). However, the developers of the show never read a Batman comic and instead wanted a fun, comedic show.

When the show premeried, it was a major sucess among general audiences. However, fans of the comic were not a fan of the bright, campy Batman. However, the show was popular enough to get a movie.

1966 saw Batman: The Movie. With Adam West, Burt Ward, Ceaser Romero, and more returning. Julie Newmar couldn't return as Catwoman, so she was played by Lee Meriwether. The movie did okay, but was still not well-recieved from Batman fans.

After the series ended, many people tried to get a Batman film off the ground, CBS pitched "Batman In Outer Space" which would have featured the darker Batman, despite such a title. However, this never came to be because of how successful campy Batman was.

Another dark Batman fiilm was pitched, this one being Return of the Batman, which was written six years before Frank Miller's The Dark Knight Returns. After the sucess of the 1978 Superman, fourproducers (including Barbra Streisand's hairdresser) signed on to produce. They all pitched it to Universal, but they turned it down. After problems with getting the project picked up, two of the producers left the project and went to Warner Bros, who had just got the film rights to Batman.

Tom Mankiewicz, who wrote the 1978 Superman, wrote a Batman script in 1983, which would focus on the origins of Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson, feature Joker and Rupert Thorne as the villains, and have Silver St. Stone be the love interest. The project was announced in 1983 with a planned release date of 1985. The script went from director to director with Ivan Reitman and Joe Dante wanting to direct before the project went into the hands of Tim Burton.
 

But before we talk about that let's talk about...

SUPERMAN

Like Batman, Superman's first live-action screen appearence was in the form of two serials. The first was a 15-part serial simply called Superman. The second was called Atom Man vs. Superman and featured Lex Luthor. Both starred Kirk Alyen as Superman, and unlike Batman's serial, did not feature dead Japanese people. 

1952 saw a Superman TV series called Adventurs of Superman starring George Reeves. The show was a big success, but a year before a film starring Geroge Reeves as Superman, Superman and the Mole Men was released, and itserved as the pilot for the tv series. The only two characters from the comic to appear from the movie were Superman and Lois Lane. Unfortunatly, Reeves died from a gunshot in 1959, thus beginning the superstition known as...

THE SUPERMAN CURSE!!!!!!!!!!

In 1973, Ilya Salkind tried hard to make a Superman movie, however, with the help of his father, he manged to get the film rights to Superman after a whole year of trying, thus leading the way to Dick Donner's Superman.

 

TO BE CONTINUED...