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Batman ’66 Reading Order

In January 1966, the American TV Network ABC launched a live-action Batman show starring Adam West as Bruce Wayne/Batman and Burt Ward as Dick Grayson/Robin. It soon became a massive hit which had a big impact on pop culture, influencing other TV Shows but also the comic book it was based on.

It was created by William Dozier, a man who, before starting work on the project, had never read a Batman comic in his life. Not knowing how to adapt the character, he tried multiple approaches and the one that worked was to make Batman a pop-art campy comedy. For the kids, it was a colorful action/adventure series. For the adults, it was a fun time.

This Batman show lasted for three seasons and a movie as ABC decided to milk this success to the max, ordering 60 episodes for the second season, emptying at a fast rate its creative juice. The public grew tired of Batman and Dozier tried to save the series by introducing Batgirl/Barbara Gordon (played by Yvonne Craig) and asking DC Comics to develop the character in the Batman comics. This was not enough to make the ratings go up–Dozier also flirted with surrealism at one point and tried to be more topical.

In 1968, ABC canceled Batman. NBC was interested in taking it over, but the sets had been destroyed and it was too costly to rebuild them. And with that, the adventures ended.

For a long time, the 1960s Batman series was seen more as a stain on Batman’s legacy than anything else. Because of this, it took three decades to have a new live adaptation that was made and perceived as a serious endeavor–Tim Burton’s 1989 Batman movie. But at that point, the nostalgia for the TV show was already working at giving back some of its due. Nowadays, it is considered a beloved artifact in Batman’s legacy, the product of a different era that gave joy to millions of kids who grew up loving the Dark Knight.

Through animation, Adam West and Burt Ward got the opportunity to reprise their roles, but the real continuation of the show came in 2013 with a comic book.

Titled Batman ’66 and introduced as a follow-up of the 1960s television series, this series was written primarily by Jeff Parker, with cover art by Mike Allred–however, each issue was penciled by a different artist. From the start, it was only all-new stories, not an adaptation of episodes.

Parker used characters that were created for the TV series (and introduced others that didn’t exist in the 1960s), the likeness of the actors was also preferred, and the colors and other distinctive visual elements made a comeback. The spirit and humor of the original material were on display.

Published digitally and on paper, the original run of Batman ’66 lasted 30 issues (73 in digital), publication stopped in 2016. But once again, it was not the end as the comic book series continues to regularly come back with crossover miniseries.

 

Batman ’66 Comics Reading Order

The Batman ’66 Ongoing Series

The comic book series is set after the TV Show ended.

  • Batman ’66 Omnibus
    Collects Batman ’66 #1-30, Batman ’66: The Lost Episode #1 and Solo #7’s “Batman A-Go-Go!”

Those comics were also collected in paperbacks:

The Batman ’66 Crossover Mini-Series

The magic of comic books in action! Beyond timelines and other logical explanations, Batman and Robin from the 1966 series meet characters from other TV shows.

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