It's not often that sequels surpass the original film. Empire Strikes Back, yes. Star Trek 2: Wrath of Khan, of course. The Road Warrior, you bet. A case could even be made for Terminator 2. Most sequels just aren’t as good as the original, and we really don’t expect them to be. But abysmal? Yep, that’s what we got going today.
I have already chronicled how DC was the Master and Commander of live-action superhero films in the 70s and 80s. Superman took the film world by storm in 1978, and Batman did it one better in 1989. Both films were spectacular examples of what superhero films could, and should be. Superman continued the excellence in Superman 2 with Terrance Stamp giving us a peerless example of a live action Zod. And then Tim Burton decided to get ‘artsy’ with Batman Returns.
Burton had a lot to live up to. With Superman 1 & 2 and Batman’89 setting the standard, he had some serious hurdles to get over. So he decided to borrow from the classic horror flick “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” and give us a deformed, mutated, malignant sociopath Penguin, put Michelle Pfeiffer in a black, skin tight body suit, pull Christopher Walken from wherever he was hiding after the James Bond train wreck that was “A View to a Kill” and – what could go wrong? Except everything.
I have discussed this before- when you have a take on someone else’s Intellectual Property you have to maintain some standards. The creations are not yours, and you cannot do with them what you want. For example, Daredevil 2003 was a absolute casting and characterization nightmare, not because Ben Affleck did a bad job as Daredevil (he was in fact one of the only good parts of the movie, along with Erick Avari and Jon Favreau), but because the film’s villains were such bad adaptations of the source material, and you gotta have good villains to have good heroes. Colin Farrell was an absolutely abysmal Bullseye and Michael Clarke Duncan (an actor that I usually enjoy) did a terrible spin on a gangsta, gang-banger ghetto Kingpin. I don’t care that he was black, I care because he was not Wilson Fisk. Ugh.
The same thing happened when Burton tried to re-imagine Oswald Cobblepot as a deformed, abandoned, freak of nature who wanted to take his angst out on Gotham. The premise is so far from who Penguin is in the comics, its not even the same character. And it marred the film. With quality lines like “that’s the p**** I have been waiting for” uttered by Danny DeVito when Catwoman showed up, you know your are in for a Galactus size poop fest, and on that front, we aren’t disappointed. Artistic license yes, but completely remaking a character’s origins, physical representation, motivation, even entire back story, is inexcusable.
You cannot do what you want just because you want. You can't have Donald Blake summon Thor (a completely different person) by holding Mjolnir and screaming "Odin!", which actually happened in 1988 BTW. You can't have Danny Rand as a pretentious, petulant kung-fu millionaire, and then hope everybody loves Iron Fist. They won't. They didn't.
Lots of folks hated the spin that Marvel did on Deadpool in Wolverine:Origins, because it was a character violation in the worst way. I didn't mind it because I don't care about Deadpool; so call me a hypocrite (although I do understand why they were upset), I don't care. Which is probably why people didn't care what Tim Burton did to Penguin- he just wasn't important enough for them to care. A lot of folks love Batman Returns. I ask why, and it’s usually guys who say “well, Michelle Pfeiffer.” So the plot, the characters, the writing? And they just repeat, “Michelle Pfeiffer.”
IMDB gives this travesty of comic book movies a 7.1/10 putting it in the “good” film category. It’s not. It’s not a good re-imagining, it’s not a good artistic take. It’s not a good film. It’s a 3.1/10 at best.