48 Years Ago Today: Batman’s Final Bow

There's a new movie coming in a couple weeks, maybe you've heard of it: Ben Affleck as Batman versus Henry Cavill as Superman. Batman's come a long way in the last 48 years.

So Adam West appeared as himself in the 200th episode of CBS' The Big Bang Theory. Sheldon doesn't celebrate his birthday because he was promised Batman would be at his birthday party as a kid, and the promise turned out to be a lie.

48 years ago tonight, ABC aired the final episode of Batman, starring Adam West, and Burt Ward as The Boy Wonder, Robin.

It may be hard to imagine that super-heroes weren't part of Prime Time.

Agents of SHIELD is in it's third season on ABC, Agent Carter in its second. The CW's Arrow, The Flash and Legends of Tomorrow were just renewed for another season apiece. That's a fifth season for Arrow, a third season for The Flash and a second season for Legends of Tomorrow. Supergirl is enjoying its first season on CBS. Gotham is coming near the close of a second season. Smallville currently holds the record for longest running super-hero television series with ten seasons. Before that it was The Adventures of Superman with George Reeves in the '50's with six seasons, followed by the late Bill Bixby and Lou Ferrigno and CBS' The Incredible Hulk with five seasons.

Batman was before all that. Batman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man, The Man From Atlantis, Green Hornet, none of them could stand up against cop shows, detective shows, doctor shows and westerns.

West's Batman was a pop culture phenomenon, from January 1966 to March of 1968. Amazingly that version of Batman has endured for fifty years.

Legend has it that NBC was interested in picking Batman after ABC cancelled the show, unfortunately all the sets were torn down and the network wasn't interested in the huge expense of rebuilding the iconic Batcave for a fourth season.

Zsa Zsa Gabor was the final guest-star villain on the Batman series. She played Minerva, who used mind control to steal from millionaires like Bruce Wayne.

There's been a rumor floating around that Adam West and Burt Ward are reuniting for an animated sequel to the 1966 feature film. It's due this year to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the series.

Aside from Adam West, who's your favorite Batman? How would you rank them? Are you excited for Ben Affleck to play the character in the new film?