The TV series most mentioned when “why isn’t that on DVD” is finally going to be issued. The 1966-68 TV version of “Batman” will be released this year. Will you get it? And what are your favorite episodes/memories?
I took a look at it again on the local retro channel. It was lame then, hasn’t improved with age.
I was a kid when it was first on. Even then, I thought it sucked.
Wow, finally! I met Yvonne Craig at a con about a year ago, and she said that Batman on DVD was the thing she was still most asked about.
I don’t have any specific favourite episodes, but I always loved Batman chiding Robin whenever Robin veered slightly off boy scout mode. It was comedy gold!
And Frank Gorshin’s Richard Widmark-inspired Riddler was the best part of the series.
IMHO, the show wasn’t “lame”–it was witty and featured great tongue-in-cheek humour. It was just a lot of fun.
I thought that it already was on DVD, but maybe that was just the old Batman movie. Star Trek TOS also lasted only three seasons. Maybe you could watch alternate episodes of each series to see who had the most idiosyncratic acting style, Adam West or William Shatner.
There have been unofficial releases of the show on DVD, mostly taken from VHS recordings from channels like TV Land.
For the first year and a half, I was a big Batman fan, but I could feel the series going downhill after that even at the tender age of twelve.
The first half season was by far the best. My favorite episode is the first one with Catwoman—Julie Newmar in that skin-tight black suit really turned me on even then.
I remember watching that episode in March 1966, when the Gemini 8 mission went haywire and Neil Armstrong had to end the flight prematurely. The network kept breaking into the show with news bulletins (the first one came just as the Dynamic Duo had driven into the alley behind the Gato and Chat Fur Company), and TV station switchboards lit up all over the US!
Definitely on my list of What Will Be Watched. Adam West will always be the only REAL Batman. Those other guys always seem to take the concept WAY too seriously.
Adam West and Burt Ward had a wonerful cameo on an episode of Futurama this last season.
Fry and Bender are climbing a rope up the outside wall of a tall building- holding the rope, leaning back “walking” up the wall. As they pass by a window, Adam West and Burt Ward peek out the window and Fry and Bender pause in their climb to have a brief conversation.
Fans of the original Batman series know why this cameo is hilarious and one of the most perfect cameos ever.
(Though nothing will top Suzanne Pleshette’s cameo on the final episode of “Newhart”)
My favorite memory of the show?
Catwoman has captured Batman and Robin, and they are tied up, suspended over a pit of hungry tigers. Robin looks up at her, and in an aggrieved voice says “Catwoman, you are NOT a nice person!”
My first introduction to the very concept of Batman was via my dad showing me reruns of the Adam West series on (IIRC) TBS back in the '80s. Sure, it’s cheesy, and more so than Star Trek TOS and Wild Wild West were.
But it’s still fun, and I still watch the reruns on my DVR now and then.
It was fun, but the joke grew old. It’s still being run on MeTV, so I catch it from time to time; a little goes a long way.
Two of my favorite moments:
Robin points out something bad that happened. Batman says, “That’s all water over the . . . embankment, Robin.”
Because Batman would never say “dam.”
I also liked the names of Mayor Linseed and Governor Stonefellow.
At the time, John Lindsay was mayor of NYC, and Nelson Rockefeller was governor.
I knew the series was going downhill when John Astin (Gomez on The Addams Family) substituted for Frank Gorshin as the Riddler two-thirds of the way through the first (and only) full season. I used to think Frank was probably off playing Commissioner Beale on ST: TOS, but this was much too early for that.
I had both the Corgi cast-metal Batmobile with the chaincutter and fireworks and the Batmobile slot car with racing slicks. Jesus, how fast that thing could go around a track! Slot car racing is one fad of the '60s that I wish would make a big comeback. 
I liked it when she told one of her minions to make sure he brushed her pussy willows. 
Not the series, but the 1966 movie has been available for streaming on Netflix for a while. If you’ve never seen it, I highly recommend it. Funniest movie I’ve seen in years.
“Some days, you just can’t get rid of a bomb!”
Squee! I’ve come near buying the bootlegs now and then, and I’m delighted to hear that it’s finally coming to DVD. I shall be watching on my Bat-Screen, with Bat-Shark-Repellent handy just in case.
It will be bought.