The Dark Knight It's time to once again. . .

[Stringer]

Or someone standing behind him could easily blow the front of his head off.

 

[Superwoman Prime]

The only thing I like about the fanfilm is Batman's suit.

 

[Mac_Hine]

Batman Returns. For the TDK voters, wouldn't you rather wait to see it in action?

Nope. That still picture's enough for me. Best suit yet!

 

[blind_fury]

Im sorry it just doesnt seem possible for Batman to whoop as much ass as he does in the 89 and Returns suit. Too stiff.

The Begins suit is no better. It looks just as cumbersome and rubbery.

Of course it helps that you can't see the fight scenes because they're all choppy and blurry. That way you can just shake the camera around without showing Batman execute his moves and defeat a dozen criminals like Tim Burton did.

 

[Stringer]

The Begins suit is no better. It looks just as cumbersome and rubbery.

Of course it helps that you can't see the fight scenes because they're all choppy and blurry. That way you can just shake the camera around without showing Batman execute his moves and defeat a dozen criminals like Tim Burton did.

Regardless of how the fight scenes were filmed we know that Bale could turn his head in the Batsuit, and we know Keaton couldnt in his.

And maybe the reason Batman 89 gets his ass stomped by the thug in the church is because he couldnt counter any attacks in that stiff immobile suit

 

[The Kid]

The only thing I like about the fanfilm is Batman's suit.

Yeah, now look at that. Body builder batman, not ninja turtle or buz lightyear batman.

some day someone besides fans will do this in theaters.

 

[Johnichi Chiba]

The Begins suit is no better. It looks just as cumbersome and rubbery.

Of course it helps that you can't see the fight scenes because they're all choppy and blurry. That way you can just shake the camera around without showing Batman execute his moves and defeat a dozen criminals like Tim Burton did.

Yes, I for one wouldn't mind seeing another "Let me stand here and wait for you to hit me so I can show you that it doesn't hurt and then I'll hit you back and you'll fall down" fight scene in TDK.

 

[Batman>all]

Yeah, now look at that. Body builder batman, not ninja turtle or buz lightyear batman.

some day someone besides fans will do this in theaters.

Looks like my friend in a Halloween costume a few years back. Not really scary looking to a man with a gun.

Batman better attack in the shadows and never be caught out in the open or he will get killed pretty fast with the type of guns we have today.

 

[Spade]

Let me just begin by saying I like Adam West, but...no. His suit's not even an option to me. I'm really torn over Michael Keaton's suit...I grew up with it, and it just screams Batman to me. I'm not a fan of "Burton's gothic touch", but the cowl has an almost organic air in how it connects with his cape, and the muscle definition definitely suggests that Batman isn't taking any backtalk (which he wasn't, in the '89 movie). The utility belt just looks dated, though. Too bland and too accentuated in color for my eyes to miss. But considering what was done with it in the movie, it's still high up there for me.

The suit Keaton wore for Batman Returns didn't do it for me in comparison. I have no clue why they went for a chinuous look to his abs, and whereas the last suit (while somewhat gaudy) maintained the air of muscular definition this one just looks too one-dimensional. The utility belt is an improvement, but that's about the only thing upped. The blue tones are less noticeable in the final cut (good to me), but whereas Batman's look in the first film looked bat-inspired this just looked like they went more for mechanical style than gothic substance. In the end, it just looked like Keaton in a suit. Not quite as menacing as the first.

Kilmer's suit is a big source of confliction to me. On one hand, the nipples make no sense. Even if you're taking the anatomical angle, there's no reason. The muscles were there in Keaton's suit because he didn't actually have them. Trying to validate the nipples by saying "it's a part of the human body" would mean that he needs some mold to show us his unmentionables, and that's almost as unnecessary. I can see why people are still offended over it. I also don't quite like the belt- nice luster, but too low-riding and too bulky. The gauntlets look like crud. On the plus side? I like the cowl- it doesn't diss the first film, yet it doesn't look like the endless Neck of Doom BR brought to the table. There's a nice division between the cowl and the rest of his cape without looking like Superman, and his bat emblem's luster is a bit more to my liking if the emblem had to be yellow. His muscles aren't bad either, though they bring me to the aformentioned addition that is his mammary glands. The Sonar Suit wasn't bad at all. It just needed some smoothing out, and it could have been a nice sequel suit.

...Then we have the Batman & Robin's rendition on Clooney. It's not nearly as bad as West's, but it's also second worse. The suit feels like they saw Batman Returns, tried to copy its look, and failed. The cape is now way too detached for my liking from his neck, the emblem is too raised even though it gets rid of the gold/ yellow look and the scallops are just in a disarray. Clooney's suit also had way too many blue hues for me. The gimmick suit he had on was even worse. White on Batman, even as a gimmick, isn't good at all for his character. There are better ways to signify a cold-resistant suit than just putting chrome grey and ridges all over.

The Begins suit really did it for me. It brought back the nostalgia of the Burton suit with it's rubber exterior without looking silly. The artificial abs look just fine to me, as Bale powerfully added a thickness behind it. Granted, the gauntlets have sort of a messy contrast from the suit. But for storyline purposes it made sense. The chest seems like body armor (which it was in the film), giving him a prepared look for a modern age. The emblem rocks...period. The cowl could do with some work, but the cape drapes over his shoulders perfectly. Heck, this suit even makes the low-rise belt work, and gives it a workman's appearance to add to that heightened realism. Overall, this was a finely-made suit.

The Dark Knight is where it's at, though. The chain mail harkens back to the comic bookish West suit without being silly in the least, and fixes the issue of the armor's bulkiness by segmenting things and making movement more practical. Does it make him lose his presence without the stiff look? A little, but then I look at the retractable scallops and find myself back in my comfort zone. Though I initially didn't like the biker look to his helmet it's grown on me, and now that the segmented neck is clear I can confidently say I like it. The rubber straps make it feel like he's armoring himself in a way a real knight of the round would have done back in the day, and don't conflict with the chain mail's space. The cape and emblem are done to my liking, and even though the belt is precariously low it doesn't detract from the final product.

Overall, my final scores:
Adam West's Batman suit: omitted
Michael Keaton's Batman suit: 8 out of 10
Michael Keaton's Batman Returns suit: 7 out of 10
Val Kilmer's Batman Forever suit: 7 out of 10
[The Sonar Suit]: 8 out of 10
George Clooney's Batman & Robin suit: 6 out of 10
[That Thing From Hell He Wore]: 5 out of 10
Christian Bale's Batman Begins suit: 8 out of 10
Christian Bale's The Dark Knight suit: 9 out of 10

Side note: It's a funny thing...people say on the threads that they revile TDK's suit, yet this poll has it ahead of 6 out of 7 possible options by 60%.

 

[Shoemeister]

Well, anything with nipples gets my vote.

 

[blind_fury]

Yes, I for one wouldn't mind seeing another "Let me stand here and wait for you to hit me so I can show you that it doesn't hurt and then I'll hit you back and you'll fall down" fight scene in TDK.

Better than bunch of quick blurry/choppy edits where you can't make out a foot from a fist or an head from a elbow.

And yes Burton's Batman preferred defensive counter attacks on goons. But at least you could make out what he was doing.

 

[Johnichi Chiba]

Better than bunch of quick blurry/choppy edits where you can't make out a foot from a fist or an head from a elbow.

And yes Burton's Batman preferred defensive counter attacks on goons. But at least you could make out what he was doing.

Honestly, Batman's fight scenes were the low points of both movies for me, so the B89 fight scenes and the BB fight scenes were pretty much equal IMO.

 

[The Mighty Wind]

TDK

BB


BR
B89




BF













B60s






















































B+R

 

[blind_fury]

Looks like my friend in a Halloween costume a few years back. Not really scary looking to a man with a gun.

Batman better attack in the shadows and never be caught out in the open or he will get killed pretty fast with the type of guns we have today.

That's the reason you put body armor under the cloth or use liquid kevlar.

And yes the Dead End costume looks cheap but that's because it is. Give the best costume designers in the world 1.5 million to do a cool interpretation of the Year One and Alex Ross cloth costumes and it will be 100 times better.

 

[DocLathropBrown]

The 89 suit. Why? mostly because I prefur the muscle look as opposed to the armor look. The cowl was intentionally odd and foreboding to really cast big shadows across his face, among other things. That, and Keaton really used the suit to shape how he played the character. The isolation of being in the suit helped him to understand the isloation Bruce himself feels from the rest of the world, in some ways. Bale used the way the suit made him angry to make Batman angrier, and the Batman I read growing up was cool as a ice.

I don't vote for the Schumacher suits because they're ruined with nipples and crotch-descending belts, which I've never liked on Batman... ever. Why they couldn't just go back to a Keaton/Comic styled straight belt is beyond me.

BR comes in second, because if you're going to go with an armored look, make it sleek, for God's sake, the new suit in TDK is too damn "busy."

I do, however, like the TDK suit. I've my problems with it, but I'm looking forward to seeing it in action.

 

[Spade]

While I love Batman Begins, Batman '89's fight scenes were so much easier to make out. Keaton validated the physique in that costume with his fists and feet, the way any male actor should. And that's considering that Burton loves to use darkness so much in that film that there are many sequences where even Batman's mouth and emblem are obscured into shadowcasted blots on the screen.

 

[The Kid]

Looks like my friend in a Halloween costume a few years back. Not really scary looking to a man with a gun.

Batman better attack in the shadows and never be caught out in the open or he will get killed pretty fast with the type of guns we have today.

I'd say anyone following me at night wearing something like that would be considered scary.

yes, batman uses shadows to conceal himself before striking of course. He does this quick dissapearance thing too that ninjitsu masters do too so he'll have no problem.

 

[Paste Pot Pete]

There's something to like about all of them, for me.

West's has the hilariously slavish "straight out of the comic" look, complete with drawn-on eyebrows.

Keaton's (89) looks really tough, like he could take ten bullets point-blank. I've always hated the cowl, though. Either Keaton's face is too small or the mask is too big. He seems to be being swallowed up by it.

Returns' suit was always my favorite. Simple, stylish, and fit Keaton much better than his first one.

Kilmer's first suit is pretty traditional, it's basically a slimmer, more elegant (and nippled) version of Keaton's first suit.

The sonar suit is a cool toy for the big final action piece.

Clooney's first suit actually has one of my favorite cowls; it's perfectly cut to Clooney's jaw, and just looks like comic book Batman. My only issue with it is that the eyeholes are way too big. Coupled with the large mouth opening, you can easily tell it's Clooney under there.

His ice suit...Okay, I lied. I can't find something good about all of them, heh.

Actually, the Begins suit was just okay for me. I guess I was expecting more, what with the fresh start and all. Too cut from the same cloth as the old ones, for me.

But that's why I dig (at least from the first picture) the TDK suit. It's what, I think, the Begins suit should've been in the first place. I love the militaristic approach to it, he really looks like a soldier in a deadly war on crime. Which, like it or not, seems to be the approach Nolan's taking with this new movie. Despite being busy and overly detailed, the shape of the suit is beautiful. Much slimmer than "teh puffy" with a pitch-perfect head sculpt, from what I can tell.

 

[dark_b]

obvious TDK for me.
but its hard because wed dont know how the suit will look under different angles?

 

[Batman>all]

I just want to see him move in motion in the new suit.

 

[StorminNorman]

The only thing I like about the fanfilm is Batman's suit.

That suit looks horrible.

Like "throwing random Aliens and Predators in a Batman Fan Film" horrible.

 

[screena]

what is adams cape actually made of? i think the material looks fantastic, i´d like to have underwear made of it. t:

i know, some of you don´t like the dead end look, but i would still love to see them going for it in a movie. hell, they could make it look fantastic with all this money they have. and maybe it would be the right look for a batman TV show (someday).

 

[Paste Pot Pete]

I totally had these pajamas as a kid.

 

[Shoemeister]

I totally had these pajamas as a kid.

I'm wearin' em right now!



... your pajamas that is...

 

[The Kid]

Honestly, Batman's fight scenes were the low points of both movies for me, so the B89 fight scenes and the BB fight scenes were pretty much equal IMO.

One was made in the 80s back when batman's fights consisted of Biff Boof and Zop! and the other... hmmm.

Well I just hope the fight editing techniques have improved is all. It'd be a shame to add more flexibility to the suit yet have its entire fights edited like mtv vids.