During a long and illustrious career across all forms of live-action, animated and print media, Batman has been called many things, but hilarious is very rarely one of them.
Adam West’s 1960s TV series can generate plenty of mirth, but it was always more of a kitsch product of the time rather than an out-and-out comedy, while Joel Schumacher’s approach saw Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jim Carrey throw out a rapid-fire succession of puns while Val Kilmer and George Clooney dropped more than a few thuddingly bad one-liners.
Not every major comic book property has to adopt the tried and trusted Marvel Cinematic Universe formula for peppering almost every scene with a pithy quip or two, with insider Daniel Richtman now intimating that Robert Pattinson doesn’t want any comedy whatsoever throughout his tenure as Matt Reeves’ rebooted Dark Knight.
Of course, the former Twilight star didn’t write the script and he’s not the one calling the shots, so he’s hardly in charge of the words coming out of his mouth onscreen. That being said, there’s been a near-constant stream of rumor and speculation that he’s either pushing for increased creative control in the future or already got it a long time ago, so he might well end up having a much bigger say in the creative direction of The Batman than other contracted talents to have suited up for superhero epics.
Last summer’s trailer hardly painted The Batman as a barrel of laughs, but it’s a difficult balance to strike between treating the material with the utmost seriousness and respect without sucking every ounce of fun out of it, something that we hope Pattinson and Reeves have managed to pull off with aplomb.
