9) Batman Forever
Though not as poor as its follow-up Batman & Robin, Batman Forever should be held responsible for turning the clock back thirty years and reverting the Batman franchise to the level of the campy 60s TV show. However, the Dark Knight’s darkest hour could have been avoided if director Joel Schumacher’s original plan was followed through.
According to Schumacher, when he was first asked to take over from Batman Returns’ Tim Burton he wanted to do an adaptation of Frank Miller’s seminal Batman: Year One graphic novel. Unfortunately, Warner Bros. vetoed the idea as they didn’t want to restart the franchise.
The irony is that due to the failure of Schumacher’s take on the character, they had to go back to reboot it anyways a few years later.
8) The Dark Knight
From the ridiculous to the sublime. Batman Forever and The Dark Knight don’t exactly have much in common apart from sharing the same superhero, but they both went through some changes between the original concept and the final product.
Initially, screenwriter David S. Goyer’s plan for the Batman Begins sequel was to make it part one of a big two-part story. In the initial idea, the first part would have ended with the Joker disfiguring Harvey Dent with acid when on trial, mirroring the character’s origins from the comics. The second film would have then been a protracted version of The Dark Knight’s final act, as Dent becomes Two-Face.
Someway into writing, however, the narrative was tightened and it became just the one film, and the result is cinematic history.
