ed note: This article originally premiered on December 4th, 2018

The pre-Christmas Day season of Advent is upon us. Here at SeedSing we love the chocolaty goodness of getting a piece of candy once a day until we get to open our presents. As our gift to you we will present a great movie associated with the holiday season. Many will be awesome, some will be extra awesome. Enjoy.

Day 4: “Batman Returns”

Opened Doors: Day 1, Day 2, Day 3

The holiday season is filled with beautiful scenery and insane people. There is something magical about the look of fresh snow on late December night, but our boss at work may just kill us. The twinkle of the lights bring a feeling of festive joy, but we also know that some hideous looking forgotten son may arise from the sewer and try to take over the city. The sounds of children singing Christmas carols warms our heart, but a batman is out there having a sensual fight with a catwoman trying to keep the streets a bit more safe for the Christmas season. It is a weird time of the year.

In the summer of 1992 director Tim Burton and actor Michael Keaton delivered the promised sequel to their smash hit movie “Batman”. This time around Michelle Pfieffer and Danny DeVito joined Keaton’s Batman as Selina Kyle/ Catwoman and Oswald Cobblepot / The Penguin respectively. Christopher Walken even joined the action as the villainous Max Schreck, a wild haired character created just for this film. The movie split some critics with many for and against the movie pointing to the surreal atmosphere Tim Burton brought to his vision of Gotham City. The snow was a blueish gray, the lights twinkled against the large impressive Gothic buildings, and the film takes place during the holiday season. ‘Batman Returns” would be the last Burton/Keaton outing for the Dark Knight. The weirdness of the this particular summer blockbuster was not acceptable by the major Hollywood studios of the early 1990’s.

What “Batman Returns” has in strangeness, it pays the audience back with a great story for the holidays. Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle are insane, lonely, people. They find each other under a mistletoe in the midst of a struggle. The magic of the holidays takes over. Grotesque, and abandoned, Oswald Cobblepot comes back to a city who is willing to embrace the monster. The holiday spirit asks us to see the good in people. An army of penguins equipped with rocket launchers almost destroys a city, the first born son of every household is nearly kidnapped, but through the chaos and destruction Bruce Wayne and Alfred the Butler know to wish each other a Merry Christmas in the end. The holidays are too strong to let super villains, industrialists, and Catwomen bring it all crashing down. Batman knows this.

Every great holiday movie does not need to be steeped in the mythical figures of the North Pole, we can have a holiday lesson with the mythical figures of our comic books. Tim Burton saw the serene strangeness of the holidays, and he used it to tell a Christmas tale using the Batman. Chaos, quietness, destruction, and togetherness all have a place in every person’s holiday season. Embrace the gifts, and discard the negative. Batman and Catwoman learned this lesson in “Batman Returns”. Let us all bask in their victory.

RD

RD is the Head Editor for SeedSing. Hanukkah is different year to year. Tragedy does not care for respecting the holidays, but people do. See one of the best Christmas stories ever told by one of the best television shows ever. Check out “Death Takes a Holiday from “M*A*S*H”.

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