Batman: Matthew Vaughn wants the Adam West version to return
Director Matthew Vaughn wants to bring back the Adam West-esque Batman.
Recently Matthew Vaughn noted his idea for a Superman film. It would just be a modern remake of the Richard Donner film from 1978. Now, he introduced his approach to Batman, if given the opportunity.
"“If I was going to do Batman, there’s no point doing the Dark Knight, because it’s been done to perfection — if I was doing Batman, I’d go ‘Christ, let’s bring out the Adam West version,’” […]“I’m not interested in copying somebody else’s take on the genre.”"
A Batman director?
It is fine if you are a fan of Matthew Vaughn and his comic book films. Unfortunately, I do not think this is the man to be approaching the material from DC Comics. It is safe to say he will never do Batman, or at least no time soon. A director already exists with Matt Reeves. Ben Affleck recently spoke about his desire to still direct a Batman film. I would not doubt Warner Bros. would still leap at such an opportunity with Affleck.
Matthew Vaughn not interested in copying?
One can understand why he would not do The Dark Knight so to speak. It already exists and there is no need to retread it. He is also wary of the “dark superheroes” as well. Yet, he speaks of not wanting to copy somebody’s else take on the genre. The Adam West Batman is Bill Dozier’s take on the genre though. If he wants to bring that out of the closet, he is hardly being original. Plus, you can argue Joel Schumacher attempted, but failed with Batman and Robin. Audiences see it as a camp fest that makes a mockery of the hero. Even fans of the original television series do not defend this film.
Off topic for a moment, his Superman pitch is basically copying. His idea sounds like the comic book movie equivalent of Gus Van Stant’s shot-for-shot remake of Psycho.
The numbers don’t show love for this
Yes, Batman ’66 is receiving something of a renaissance. The complete series came to DVD and Blu-Ray in 2014, the limited comics run and the animated features. Batman: The Complete Television series release was hardly a huge success. It failed to make the top 100 selling for the year.
The comics had high praise, but wielded low sales. Not including the team-ups like with Green Hornet for example, the comics’ entire run sold only 600,000 plus copies. This was a series that ran for over two years, yielding an average of 19,000 copies sold per issue. With the title being Batman, this is quite sad.
Batman: Return of The Caped Crusaders is no huge financial success. It had a small run in theaters, but did not make the same kind of money as Batman: The Killing Joke. So, it is safe to say the market could care less for the Caped Crusader of yesterday. The Adam West version has a relatively small, niche crowd.
A reinvention?
What is unusual is how Reeves spoke of reinventing and saving a franchise. When was Batman ever in dire trouble as of recently? Yes, Dawn of Justice was not a critical darling but it still turned a profit and Affleck has a wide arrange of praise as the Dark Knight. People still love the dark, brooding vigilante. This shows still in the comics, video games and animated adaptions.
Next: 50 greatest super heroes in comic book history
Matt Reeves’ idea for the Dark Knight consists of noir, not camp. Warner Bros. and the fans are not lashing out against this direction.