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Which title sequence is better?

The mysterious, black bat logo being revealed with the yellow text, or the journey of Oswald through the sewers?

My vote is for Returns. It's top stuff, one of the best scenes in the film I think.

I voted the B89 batcave. Though I do love the access to the Returns cave.

1. Quotes from both Burton Batman films are fair game.

2. You must post quotes that add to a coherent conversation. Try to use a quote that follows the "conversation", that actually makes sense in response to the previous post. There are times where this can get tricky, but try your damndest.

I'll start:

"That you, sugar bumps? "

??Superman? didn?t quite work as a film in the way that we wanted it to. It didn?t position the character the way he needed to be positioned. Had ?Superman? worked in 2006, we would have had a movie for Christmas of this year or 2009. But now the plan is just to reintroduce Superman.?

?Like the recent Batman sequel ? which has become the highest-grossing film of the year thus far ? Mr. Robinov wants his next pack of superhero movies to be bathed in the same brooding tone as ?The Dark Knight.? Creatively, he sees exploring the evil side to characters as the key to unlocking some of Warner Bros.? DC properties. ?We?re going to try to go dark to the extent that the characters allow it,? he says. That goes for the company?s Superman franchise as well.?
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The thing is, he?s literally Superman. There is little or no drama to a man that can?t be hurt. I?d have him still essentially Superman, but more vulnerable. Here are some ideas.

Have Kent having anxiety over his enormous responsibility of the Earth?s protector. Nightmares and bad dreams over worrying about the safety of his friends and planet. Haunt him with people he couldn?t save. Bring in other elements other than kryptonite. Have a bunch of super villains gang up and beat Superman to near death. Superman uses ALL of his powers to no avail. Dark in theme yet still noble and heroic.

Get some villains with psychological warfare that get into Superman?s self doubt. They play to his suppressed ego, bring him into an angry god that snaps to dominate and police the Earth. He could do this at any stage, just that when he is incorruptible and a ?goody two shoes?, he would never do it.

I?d have him in a black suit. A dark reflection of his self. Have it vaguely resembling the Kryptonian Regenerative Bodysuit with the silver S shield. You could throw in a red cape for some traditional flavour. Have the fortress of solitude even more bleak somehow. Have Superman stay there for extended periods of time even. Metropolis can be still bathed in light.

I wouldn't mind at all for our man Burton to take the helm and do his version. 

Eidos Interactive and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment on behalf of DC Comics announce Batman: Arkham Asylum, a dark, action-packed videogame adventure for Xbox 360(R) video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, PLAYSTATION(R)3 computer entertainment system and Games for Windows in 2009.

In Batman: Arkham Asylum, developed by Rocksteady Studios, the player assumes the role of Batman as he delivers The Joker to Arkham Asylum. There, the imprisoned super-villains have set a trap and an immersive combat gaming experience unfolds. With an original script penned by Emmy Award-winning Batman writer Paul Dini, the game brings the universe of DC Comics' detective to life with stunning graphics.

"In Batman: Arkham Asylum Eidos and Warner Bros. are building a true action adventure game experience worthy of gamers and fans," said Phil Rogers, CEO of Eidos Interactive. "Players become Batman, like he has never been seen before in a video game, as he fights through intense circumstances in Arkham Asylum utilizing his intuitive detective skills and aggressive melee attacks."

"Batman: Arkham Asylum offers players the chance to battle Gotham's worst villains with Batman's physical and psychological strength in a graphically distinct and story-driven game," said Martin Tremblay, President, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment. "We look forward to working with Eidos on expanding DC Comics' world-renowned character Batman in the game space with a noticeably different feature set in an incredibly dark interactive environment."

Eidos Interactive and Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment will co-publish Batman: Arkham Asylum in North America, Eidos Interactive will publish the game in all other territories.

I'm loving the sound of this. A dark, detective based Batman game.

The website is counting down to something:
http://www.rocksteadyltd.com/

I probably would have done it a little different, but I love what we received. It is very dark and mysterious. A very interesting take on the character.

Here?s an appreciation of DeVito?s Penguin.

The Penguin was re-imagined not as an articulate fellow of crime, but a physically deformed sociopath with a bloodthirsty bitterness against Gotham City. While DeVito?s Penguin retained a quantity of trademarks, such as a range of trick umbrellas and the use of a monocle, he was given a huge visual alteration.

Where the comic version had varied between a full head of hair and varying degrees of thinning, this Penguin was bald at the top, with his remaining length of hair long and stringy. His hands were now flippers, with a thumb and index finger, and the remaining three fingers fused together. An unidentified thick, dark green bile-like liquid sometimes trickled from his nose and mouth.

Instead of a tuxedo, he wore a more gothic, Victorian-style outfit, with a jabot as opposed to a bow tie. Other instances show him in black boots, a dickey, and something akin to a child's blanket sleeper, or the old long john-style underwear of the 1800s. However, Burton's design kept the top hat seen in the comics.

In the film, the Penguin is born disfigured and his rich parents throw their infant son into Gotham's sewers. The child survives, floating down Gotham's sewers and under the city zoo, where he is taken in by a group of penguins and later joins a circus freak show. At one point, when Batman is reading newspaper articles while researching Penguin, he speculates that the Penguin was responsible for the disappearance of children during his time in the circus freak show.

Like all operatic monsters, his death is quite tragic and I actually felt a little sorry for him. The Penguin is my favourite Burton villian.

Discuss what you love about this portrayal.

I consider Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale collaborations modern classics: The Long Halloween and Dark Victory. They are both my favourites.

The Long Halloween is a noir, near perfect genre piece that should thrill anyone looking for a Batman thriller. The story has Batman, early in his career, taking on the mob and a serial killer who strikes on holidays. The story is taut through thirteen issues (350+ pages), set from Halloween to Halloween, with poetic pacing and tension found only in top notch graphic novels. Harvey Dent is greatly featured along with a young Jim Gordon. For Batman fans, Dent's presence alone provides an environment of premonition.

The standard rogues gallery weave through the book, including an envious Joker, a cornered, fearful Riddler, and a distant, sensual Poison Ivy. Along with a little more mayhem from the Scarecrow and Mad Hatter. What I appreciated most about these villains, is that they are reduced to their essential symbols, where a gesture or a glance conveys as much as a panel of narrated text. The clues are faultless red herrings in the grand mystery fashion.

Tim Sale's art is compelling. Noir's a difficult effect to convey in comics, and it comes through beautifully in a shadowy, mostly gray and earth tone palette behind strong inking. This cool, hushed ground provides the perfect foil against which to contrast the costumed villains, ratcheting up the tension another mark. This is my favourite Batman artwork by far.

The tone of this story arc is gloomy, without being overbearing. This suits Batman especially well. Batman spends more time trying to work out the identity of Holiday than fighting villains, so you truly get a sense of Batman as a detective. There are however, plenty of chances for Batman to use his muscle.

"I believe in Harvey Dent", is a recurring phrase. It is featured in The Dark Knight, being Harvey Dent?s political campaign slogan. In that film, Dent becomes a murderous vigilante, rather than an outright criminal to emphasize the differences and parallels between him and Batman. This is also keeping with his origin in The Long Halloween, where he only kills criminals after his scarring before allowing Batman to arrest him.

Like I said at the start, this is my personal favourite. I am very excited to hear that Dan DiDio, Senior Vice President / Executive Editor at DC, has said there is a possibility for an animated adaptation as part of the DCU Animated movies.

If you have yet to read it, I recommend this for all Batman fans and is a must have. I will cover the sequel, Dark Victory, at a later date.

[If you have read this graphic novel, feel free to add your thoughts.]

Here's a review of one of my favourite graphic novels.

Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on a Serious Earth. That title says it all. There are no heroics here. This tale is bleak indeed, forged in the pitchest of black. "Suggested for Mature Readers" is placed on the back cover for good reason.

This is not a super hero story. It is instead a psychological graphic novel with such great intensity. It includes probing and thought provoking representations of well known characters. This graphic novel may well and truly have gone a little overboard in the sombre mood of this piece. It most likely is one of the most unnecessarily violent and ghastly graphic novels ever published under the Batman title, although, I definitely think - regardless of it being at times disgusting ? it is also one of the most original and beautifully illustrated narratives ever created for the genre.

In this groundbreaking graphic novel, the inmates of Arkham Asylum have taken over the detention centre for the criminally insane on April Fools Day. They demand Batman to be enter the Asylum, and be taken into their possession, in exchange for their hostages. Accepting this demented challenge, Batman is forced to live and endure the personal hells of the Joker, Scarecrow, Poison Ivy, Two-Face and many other sworn enemies in order to save the innocents. During his run through this absurd gauntlet, Batman has his own sanity in jeopardy.

The villains are not the black-and-white, impossible to think as real men, villains of old. They are re created, as real people who suffer from some horrible physical and psychological violence or disorder. So horrific that the only possible mental, human response is insanity.

It is a dual story, told in interwoven parallels. It explores the asylum?s past and also focuses on Batman's present day task to go inside the asylum and, while confronting the insecurities about his own sanity, regain control of the facility.

The book uses confusing tricks, like Joker's dialogue written in a jumbled red font that means it is, literally, hard to read - and it even spills off the page at times, losing words. Small things such as this create an almost dream like quality, a haunting feel. The artwork itself is murky and confusing. It can be extremely hard to pick characters out, who they are and what they look like. Some pages use the splatter effect, creating the feel of somebody walking through dark hallways in confusion. In a panel, Batman cold-bloodedly kicks a man in a wheelchair down some stairs. He doesn?t know what is going on either, he just wants to get through this alive.

Interestingly, this makes Batman question whether the treatment inmates like Two-Face have been receiving is really helpful, or even humane in such an environment.

If you have read this graphic novel, feel free to add your thoughts.

Batman Returns is a very good score indeed, although it doesn't connect with the character of Batman like in the 1989 film.

Batman (1989) has the best arrangement of the main theme, "Descent into Mystery," and "Up the Cathedral," all three of which provide the perfect musical snapshot of the character.

I'll agree the Returns score is focused more on the Penguin and Catwoman. Strangely enough, for me it is somehow a million times superior because of that for me personally. The tracks particularly for Selina Kyle, and also the outstanding opening cue. It is haunting and operatic, I love it. Definitely my favourite of all the Batman soundtracks.