Batman Returns (1992)
There's a version of Batman Returns that could've been one of the great superhero films. Tim Burton, coming off the back of his brilliant 1989 original, reunited with Michael Keaton and went darker, weirder, stranger. All the ingredients are there. And yet, sitting down to rewatch it, I found myself enjoying it considerably less than I expected to, and far less than Batman (1989). Something doesn't quite click, and it took me a while to put my finger on exactly what.
Here's the odd thing: the problem isn't the darkness, and it isn't the weirdness. I'm fully on board with Burton's gothic, expressionist vision. The production design is extraordinary, Gotham dripping with shadowy grandeur and that signature snow-dusted menace. Visually, this film is as sumptuous as anything Burton has ever put together. So it feels almost absurd to say this, but: Batman Returns isn't believable enough. And yes, I know how that sounds. This is a film about a man dressed as a bat fighting a man who looks like a penguin. But hear me out.
Suspension of disbelief is a fragile thing, even in fantasy. Burton's first film had a strange internal logic that made you go along with it. This one keeps snapping that thread. Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman is the most obvious example. Her transformation, sudden and almost supernatural, never gets any real grounding within the world the film's built. She goes from zero to acrobatic assassin without anything approaching a satisfying explanation, and that gap nags at you. It's a shame, because Pfeiffer is absolutely electric in the role. She's committed, magnetic, funny and genuinely dangerous. She deserved better material underneath her.
Danny DeVito, though. Good grief. His Penguin is a grotesque, tragic, utterly committed piece of work, and I'd put it right up there with the great villain performances in superhero cinema. He's repulsive and oddly pitiable in equal measure, which is a very hard balance to strike. Christopher Walken, meanwhile, brings his inimitable brand of slippery menace to the corporate villain Max Shreck, and there's real pleasure in watching him operate. What a trio of performers. The trouble is, the script doesn't give their considerable talents the solid ground they need.
The Penguin's political subplot is where the film really loses me. You're asking me to believe the citizens of Gotham would genuinely consider this man for mayor. That a PR team would sit across a table from him while he's drooling black bile and eating raw fish. I'm all for dark absurdism, but the film wants us to take the threat seriously, and I just couldn't. The logic keeps collapsing under its own weight.
The bigger structural issue is that the film is trying to do far too much at once. Two main villains plus Shreck means the plot is constantly juggling, and the person who suffers most for it is the one whose name is in the title. Michael Keaton's Batman ends up feeling like a supporting character in his own movie. He drifts through scenes reacting to everyone else's chaos. For a superhero blockbuster, there's also a surprising shortage of genuine action. The set pieces are spaced out, and the momentum between them sags.
And yet. And yet, I can't quite bring myself to dismiss it. It's entertaining in a way that few films from that era manage to be, packed with odd choices that only Burton would make, and performed by people who are clearly having the time of their lives. If you want to see what Burton does with complete creative freedom, this is a fascinating object. It has more imagination in any single frame than most blockbusters manage across their entire running time. It just so happens that imagination alone isn't quite enough to hold the whole thing together. You can admire the architecture while noticing the roof leaks.
Three stars. A wonderfully weird gothic spectacle, well worth your time, but don't be surprised if you spend half of it wishing the script had kept things a bit simpler and given Batman a bit more to actually do.
Rating: ★★★ | Year: 1992 | Watched: 2026-06-29
Where to watch
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