loydstuff: Fond memories of 'The CAPED CRUSADERS'!!!

As I promised / threatened a while back, this post concerns my LIFE-LONG ,first love, then hate, then love again relationship---with the (what I now consider CLASSIC) 1966- 1968 'Batman' TV show!!

Take a spin with me, if you will, in the 'ol way-back / time machine. To a time when the Loydster was a wee little tot! The first run of this show, was when I was only not quite 3 years old. No doubt, from what my parents have told me, seeing Batman and Robin 'live', zooming out of the Batcave, roaring toward Gotham city, probably blew my little toddler-sized mind!!

'Atomic batteries to power, turbines to speed!', Robin would say in the earliest episodes, just before flame would shoot-out the back of the Batmobile, and the 'Dynamic duo' would rocket toward another adventure with that week's 'special guest villain'!! The 'wee little me' was hooked, right then and there, into a LIFETIME of 'caped crusader fandom'!!!

Unlike older kids (especially high schoolers, AND college-aged-types), and adults (of course!!) the wide-eyed 'little Loydster' took EVERYTHING in the TV adventures of Bats & Robin DEADLY-serious!!! Even a few years later, when the series was in CONSTANT, daily reruns on weekday afternoons--- I was 8-9 years old then--- It was STILL a serious adventure program to me!!!

Fast-forward in our time-machine journey, to encounter the now late-teen-aged Loydster---MAN, I sure was in a LOT better shape, and had a LOT more hair!!! Anyhoo, at that point.... I had grown to become more of a 'Dark knight detective'-type of Bat-fanatic!!

By my late teens / early 20s, I'd become a fan of the Batman comics, and by that point (in the comics, that is!)---- the character had been developed into a LOT more serious-type guy!! Robin grew up and went off to college, and for a time, 'ol Bats even moved OUT of the Batcave, and set-up his hide-out in the basement of a swanky office building in downtown Gotham!!

THIS was the Batman I enjoyed as a young adult. A serious, brooding character. Like a LOT of fans of my same age-bracket... the old TV show was something that I was almost embarrassed about!! It was looked at as something to ridicule and even condemn--- 'the 60s show 'ruined' the character for YEARS'!!--- is what MANY fans, myself included for quite a while, constantly moaned & groaned about!!!

So---- for a good CHUNK of my adult life, I had 'mixed feelings' about the 'TV-caped crusaders' from my childhood!! Finally---- one more ride in our time machine--- back to the 'here and now'!! Loyd has reached his middle-aged years (GASP!!), seen NUMEROUS versions of his old friends Bats and Robin--- in comics (of course!), several movies, the also CLASSIC animated series of the early 90s, on and on!!

AND--- the middle-aged me has come to realize something.... a character like Batman is the type of character that, according to LONG-time Bat-comics-writer / editor, Denny O'Neil, does NOT have a 'wrong' version!!! He's SO durable a character....so extremely simple and straight-forward in not ONLY his visual-design, but in his character, that no one version of him can EVER permanently 'ruin' or destroy him! He's pretty much indestructible!!

The other thing I can do now, in these more mellow, thoughtful middle-aged years of mine, is watch the old show--- and place my mind into the state I was in at 8 or 9 years old!!! Watch the adventures of the dynamic duo from my childhood, JUST like I did then!!! Enjoy all the WAY-COOL 'Bat-gadgets', boo & hiss the bad-guys,yell-out with all the comics-type 'sound-effects' plastered over the fight-scenes!!! But, along with all of that, this time don't worry about laughing out loud once in a while!!

I received the 'complete series' on DVD last year from my daughter for Christmas---and found that I was able do EXACTLY like I just described above!! Just sit back, and have a nostalgic, all-around GOOD TIME--- episode after episode!!

Oh---- and ONE MORE thing!!! Along with the ABSOLUTELY most FUN and just out-right COOL opening credits sequence of ANY classic TV show, PERIOD----- the OTHER thing that is STILL, no contest, a factor in making 'Batman' the CLASSIC that it indeed is--- probably THE most famous custom car in the history of TV and movies!!!!---- THE BATMOBILE!!! Hands down, just about one of my FAVORITE vehicles, period!!