Batman Villains: Line Up One At A Time, Please

Back in 1989, we had Batman with Michael Keaton as Batman and Jack Nicholson as the Joker. Both of them were perfect in their roles, and the movie was great.

But it was followed by Batman Returns, Batman Forever, and Batman & Robin, each of which was worse than the one before it. The problem? They kept stuffing multiple villains into each movie.

The result was that complex characters were reduced to shallow clowns. There wasn't enough time to devote to any one villain, so they had to spread it around. There was too much going on, but not enough substance.

Batman Returns featured Penguin and Catwoman. This actually wasn't bad, but why use up two villains on the same movie? Why not keep the franchise going as long as possible?

Batman Forever featured Two-Face and the Riddler. I thought Tommy Lee Jones played Two-Face wrong (way too goofy), but done right, Two-Face was worthy of his own movie. So was the Riddler. This movie also introduced Robin, so the kitchen was pretty crowded.

Finally, Batman & Robin featured Mr. Freeze, Poison Ivy, and Bane. Robin was still there, and they introduced Batgirl. Way too many people. I still haven't recovered from what they did to Bane, reducing one of the best characters from the comics to a mindless thug. It was so bad that Warner Bros. cancelled their plans for the next movie, Batman: Triumphant.

You'd think they would have learned their lesson.

And yet, the new incarnation of the franchise is making the same mistake. Batman Begins features the Scarecrow and Ra's al Ghul. Although there were two main villains, it worked well. They were both great characters, and they weren't competing with each other for screen time.

But in The Dark Knight, they used both the Joker and Two-Face, and they even threw in the Scarecrow again for good measure. Sigh. Two-Face didn't play much of a part, and he died, so his character was wasted. Meanwhile, the Joker didn't get nearly as much screen time as he deserved. Still a good movie, but it could have easily been better.

I hope this trend doesn't continue. Please Warner Bros., learn from the past. Give us one deep villain instead of multiple shallow villains. You'll get much better stories, not to mention more movies. The new Batman is off to a great start. Keep it that way, and don't let history repeat itself.