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Like many who grew up in the '60s and '70s (and perhaps even '80s and later), Tim and Paul had the course of their lives changed by the 1966 Batman TV show, from the types of play they did growing up to their present-day interests.

In this series, they discuss the show's allure and its failures, the arc of the show from satire to sitcom, its influences (the '40s serials and the comic books themselves) and the things it, in turn, influenced.

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Sep 15, 2016

Marsha and Batman

Various other Bat-commentaries paint this arc in drab tones. What Carolyn Jones (apparently replacing Zsa Zsa Gabor at something close to the last moment) brings to the role of Marsha, Queen of Diamonds, is basically Morticia Addams with a different look, says conventional wisdom. The arc is full of filler scenes that don’t advance the story, say commentators. In this episode of To the Batpoles, Paul presents a much different view of Marsha, which sees these “filler” scenes as absolutely necessary to the theme of this arc. And what is that theme? Listen to find out — and pack your Coleman stove, because there WILL be camping!

PLUS: The Jam’s version of the theme; an intertextual reference in Marsha that you might have missed; Tim investigates the “bat-cave scene” from spaghetti western The Relentless Four that Adam West described in Back to the Batcave, and works to track down the original Jay Thompson script that was rewritten into The Impractical Joker; and your mail!