The One About The R-Rated Batman

There's an R-rated Batman movie that could be coming into your living room later this summer. Is anybody ready for that?

What I liked about both The Avengers movies, Guardians of the Galaxy, Ant-Man, Iron Man and the rest was that they were fun. Even with that one thing that happened that we're not ready to talk about yet in The Force Awakens, the movie was still fun. They were six-year-old me - still in my jammies on Saturday morning with a bowl of fruit loops watching cartoons fun. The world could be mean and life could be unfair - but not until Monday.

The kind of fun where I'm not embarrassed, and it's not awkward, and I don't squirm in my seat when I watch it with my kids.

I didn't get that feeling from the Christian Bale Batman movies, that Man of Steel movie with Henry Cavill and I don't get that feeling from Dawn of Justice. But then, I didn't really get that from Michael Keaton, Val Kilmer or George Clooney either.

The last time I got that kind of fun from a movie was from Christopher Reeve. But then I grew up with Adam West as Batman.

I know, pretty ridonkulus, right?

That's a long way around the block to get to this: later this summer there's going to be an R-rated Batman movie. It's a cartoon - they're called animated movies - and it's not going to be in theaters, it's going to direct-to-dvd and Blu-Ray. It's based on a classic comic book story. Batman: The Killing Joke, with Luke Skywalker, actor Mark Hamill returning to voice The Joker. Hamill spent most of the '90's voicing The Joker on the cartoon series Batman: The Animated Series with actor Kevin Conroy as Batman.

The reason this cartoon adaptation is R-rated is for what The Joker does on his madcap spree through Gotham. In the comic book, he shoots and paralyzes Barbara Gordon, Commissioner Gordon's daughter. She's secretly Batgirl. He kidnaps the Commissioner and tortures him, using the pictures he took of Gordon's daughter. Oh, Batman saves the day, but the comic book story ends with what could be Batman and The Joker laughing hysterically, as the hero strangles the bad guy.

I ask you, WWWD? "What Would Adam West Do"? I think he would have just stopped with a stern lecture and taken Cesar Romero back to jail.

I'm just not sure I'm ready for that kind of graphic violence.

Just so you don't think I'm too weird, I like Stephen King. Stephen King's It is probably one of my favorite horror novels and adaptations. Harry Anderson, John Ritter, Annette O'Toole, Tim Reid and Richard Thomas all terrorized by Tim Curry's nutty Pennywise the clown. You know what it turns out to be in the end, right? Something that's just pretty over-the-top silly that really isn't as scary as the whole movie has been up to that point.

Without getting all philosophical, I'm not sure I want to watch something like that with my kids, where we need counselling or therapy afterward. My kids are unique in that they've seen how bad the world and life can be. I'd like them to see some of the hope that I saw from Christopher Reeve back in the day.

Looking at who's running for President, I kinda think we all need a little more of that - what do you say?