Batman

The Joy of Sets: Holy Batwings, We've Got Adam West!

• Jul 8, 2008 06:12 PM ET
• by The DVD Team

Adam West by Bobby Bank/WireImage.com

Last week, 1966’s perfectly preserved Batman: The Movie hit Blu-Ray and the man himself, Adam West, was awesome enough to chat with me about life as the classic Caped Crusader and spill the beans on his greatest foe. — Damian Holbrook TV Guide: OK, so I have been a fan since I was a kid. You are the classic Batman…Adam West: Like Classic Coke. [Laughs] Makes a lot of people sick, ruins your teeth, ruins your stomach.TV Guide: But it’s so good! And I love that you haven’t turned your back on the past. A lot of actors dismiss their defining roles.West: Is that OK?TV Guide: Definitely.West: Good. [Laughs] I reasoned many years ago that not many actors get a chance, as you indicated, to play a defining role that kind of becomes their signature, if you will. And because I got that with Batman, I am one of the few, so why not embrace it? It makes a lot of people happy and that pleases me as well.TV Guide: And I am not ashamed to admit that I’m one of those... read more

Adam West's Batman on Blu-ray Disc? Yes!

• Mar 28, 2008 03:59 AM ET
• by The DVD Team

Batman: The Movie courtesy Fox Home Entertainment

Since the TV-on-DVD craze went mainstream around 2000-2001, one of the burning, unanswered questions has been "when will episodes from the Adam West version of Batman finally come to DVD?" The classic, campy series has a ton of fans, and lots of rumors surround the reasons behind its absence from the DVD market.One popular rumor (possibly the most popular, especially on the internet) is that the hold-up is between Fox and Warner Brothers. But in a June 2006 interview with members of the Home Theater Forum website, executives from Warner Home Video stated that they have nothing to do with any sort of hold-up for Batman episodes. "This is an issue between DC (Comics) and Fox. Fox owns the series."For their part, Fox has told us "We are continuing to work on participations issues and resolve, so that we might be able to bring it out. The issue is that there are several entities that have rights to this particular series. The contract language didn't clearly specify home entertainment.... read more

Movies Based on TV Shows: They've Been Around for a Long Time!

• Nov 22, 2006 07:54 PM ET
• by Maitland McDonagh
• be the first to leave a comment

Question Do you know what was the first TV show to have a feature length movie made about it while the show was still on the air Did that show see a bump in ratings because of the movie Ryan FlickChick This is an interesting question and I have to say up front that I have no way of answering the second part Im sure there is a way of getting ratings information for 1960s television shows and checking against the release dates of the appropriate feature films but it would involve physically sifting through archived network information that isnt readily available to outsiders And the more I think about it the less I am sure that the information is even there were talking about the same networks that regularly reused videotapes or dumped the only copies of early shows into catch-all storage facilities and forgot about them The first two Superbowl broadcasts were taped over and no-one knows what became of Johnny Carsons first appearance on The Tonight Show No read more

What's the Secret to Blockbuster Success?

• Jun 29, 2006 04:00 AM ET
• by Matt Webb Mitovich

What, if anything, do Star Wars, Mission: Impossible, and Jaws have in common?

What is the formula for blockbuster-movie success? And how does it differ from the recipe for disaster? Boffo! Tinseltown's Bombs and Blockbusters, an HBO documentary premiering tonight at 9 pm/ET — and based on the new book Boffo! How I Learned to Love the Blockbuster and Fear the Bomb, by Variety editor-in-chief and former studio exec Peter Bart — explores those much-asked questions by way of A-list talking heads and fantastic clips from films both great and... so-so. Bart says that  — especially as cohost of AMC's Sunday Morn read more

Got Garlic?
Some kick, but no bite, in vampire drama

• Jun 21, 2006 04:00 AM ET
• by Matt Roush

Normally I'm a sucker for a good bloodsucker, but I've seen paper cuts go deeper than Blade (Wednesdays at 10 pm/ET on Spike TV), the toothless new TV version of the comic-book-turned-film franchise about a hip-hop, Harley-riding, half-breed vampire who's bad news for his more evil brethren. Where Buffy the Vampire Slayer took a mediocre film and elevated it to TV art, Blade doesn't even try to improve on the loud, flashily hollow movies. It's just more of the same martial artlessness. I kept expecting to see Batman-style OOF! BAM! graphics on screen. "Sun's down. Time to make some friends," mutters Blade (Over There's Kirk read more

What's the Secret to Blockbuster Success?

• Jun 20, 2006 04:00 AM ET
• by Matt Webb Mitovich

What, if anything, do Star Wars, Mission: Impossible, and Jaws have in common?

What is the formula for blockbuster-movie success? And how does it differ from the recipe for disaster? The new book Boffo! How I Learned to Love the Blockbuster and Fear the Bomb, by Variety editor-in-chief and former studio exec Peter Bart, explores those much-asked questions, as does an accompanying HBO documentary, Boffo! Tinseltown's Bombs and Blockbusters, premiering June 29 and featuring almost as many A-list talking heads as fantastic clips from films both great and... so-so. Bart says that  — especially as cohost of AMC's Sunday read more

Before I tell you what you'll...

• Mar 10, 2006 03:00 AM ET
• by Michael Ausiello

Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel

Before I tell you what you'll find in my exclusive interview with Gilmore Girls CEO Amy Sherman-Palladino below, let me tell you what you won't: Any mention of the growing (at least based on the Ask Ausiello feedback I've been receiving) fan backlash involving a certain long-lost "turtle" named April and the tension her presence is creating between Luke and Lorelai. Judge me and my interview skills all you want, but I just didn't go there. That heated discussion would have hijacked the entire interview and, as a result, compromised my primary mission: to seize as much prattle as I could about this season's final six episodes, the show's future on CW and Team Palladino's highly publicized contract talks. Also, in the spirit of full disclosure, as much as I worship the ground AS-P read more

Was My Living Doll a show in ...

• Mar 9, 2006 03:00 AM ET
• by TV Guide News

Question: Was My Living Doll a show in the '70s?

Answer: Yes, My Living Doll was indeed a series, but it ran on CBS a decade or so earlier than you guessed, starting in September 1964. It starred future Batman Catwoman Julie Newmar as a fetching experimental robot left in the care of psychiatrist Robert McDonald (Robert Cummings) after her inventor was reassigned to a post in Pakistan. McDonald named her Rhoda, told everyone she was his niece and set about training her to be an appropriately subservient woman. Of course, nothing's ever that easy, and hilarity ensued when McDonald's neighbor, Peter (Jack Mullaney), fell in love with the mechano-maiden and came ever closer to learning her secret.

Of course, it wasn't all that funny when Cummings read more

Rene Auberjonois: From Benson to Boston

• Feb 28, 2006 03:00 AM ET
• by Matt Webb Mitovich

Rene Auberjonois, Boston Legal

Before "snark" was even a word, Rene Auberjonois was wonderfully full of it as Clayton Runnymede Endicott III, the fancy-speaking foil to Robert Guillaume's titular manservant-turned-civil servant on the '80s comedy Benson. These days — and a sci-fi-fabulous run as Deep Space Nine's Odo later — the veteran actor is sharing a set with fellow Star Trek universe alum William Shatner on ABC's Boston Legal (Tuesdays at 10 pm/ET). In fact, Auberjonois' prickly Paul Lewiston recently embarked on a juicy new story arc, one of the many topics covered in this Q&A with TVGuide.com. TVGuide.com: Long before there was The West Wing, befo read more

Las Vegas I don't even know what...

• Nov 22, 2005 03:00 AM ET
• by TV Guide News

Las VegasI don't even know what to freakin' say. I'm speechless, stupefied even! So Moth Woman Monica (Lara Flynn Boyle) — complete with wings and a hideous outfit — goes flying off the Montecito rooftop to what I presume is her death. I just knew the girl should have spent more time snacking on sandwiches. Still, I feel like I stepped into Crazy Land watching all this too-silly-for-words Sin City stuff play out. That's Sin City in the Robert Rodriguez does Frank Miller kinda way. Although at times, I thought I was watching a Batman rerun — POWs, KABLAMs and all. Just a few thoughts: The Montecito Jingle: When the autistic savant kept going over to the monitor to hear Monica's jingle, I thought the song sounded a lot like Rockwell read more