Weaker Than the Original, But Still Not Bad

Rating: 7/10 (6 January 2009)

Roundly considered a disappointing follow up to Tim Burton's original "Batman," "Batman Returns" still has much to recommend it. Burton takes even more of a morbid funhouse approach to this film than he did the first one, and it's extremely dark in a way that I like.
The biggest problem is that neither the Penguin nor Catwoman is as compelling a villain as the Joker, and the two of them combined can't muster up the same level of energy and menace that Jack Nicholson's Joker created singlehandedly. Plus, I always thought Michelle Pfeiffer was miscast as Catwoman, though I liked the origin story they give her here.
Still, the film looks fantastic, as all Tim Buron movies do. The production design is a marvel.
Grade: B+