Batman: Descent Into Mystery

It's hard to say how much better this film is than the original. The pacing is tighter, the tone is darker, yet you still get a cackling maniacal Joker, a tormented Bruce Wayne, and a brooding Dark Knight. What's missing is everything that wasn't Batman - every moment that made you think "Wait, would Batman do that?"
Ironically I had just watched Tim Burton's original Batman, listening to Kevin Smith's analysis from his "Fatman on Batman" podcast. Every point he made against the original is fixed here. If you loved the original, as I do, you owe it to yourself to check this out. You'll end up loving it twice as much.

Like many reviewers, the 1989 Batman is a special one to me. It's the first superhero movie that I remember getting swept up in the marketing campaign for, and feeling crazily excited to see 'the real' Batman at last. I had the t-shirt, the making of book, the comic book (as featured on the cover of this edit!), and the toys, all before being allowed to actually see the film. The batwing was particularly cool. So, in short, I loved and still love Batman '89, flaws and all. It may even be my favourite Batman movie, although I certainly acknowledge many aspects have dated.

As for this fanedit, it is edited superbly. Dwight Fry's fine eye for detail is at work here, and it is clear that an enormous amount of thought and effort went into creating an extremely professional edit. There were no jarring cuts, and the whole thing flows smoothly. But overall, I missed many of the parts that were cut for a couple of reasons.

First, I think the movie has suffered in terms of character development and depth of relationships in this edit. Dwight has successfully removed the aspects he wanted to (vale/bruce relationship, joker killing bruce's parents etc), but to me this left the film feeling more hollow rather than more streamlined. I can buy that Vicki would be attracted to an intelligent, mysterious and dark Bruce Wayne - Remember she is no ordinary girl, and has been out in war torn areas as a photographer. She's attracted to darkness, hence her desire to learn more about Batman in the first place. And of course Knox is the everyman, who clearly has no chemistry with Vale whatsoever. So I don't agree that the love story feels shoehorned in to this movie.

Did Vicki need to see the Batcave? No. But again, it's an important character moment for all three of them in Burton's story - Especially for Alfred, who is really short changed in this edit. I missed the levity of their date scenes, particularly the scene in the kitchen between Bruce, Vicki and Alfred. I am pleased that you cut Bruce sleeping upside down though... That was always ridiculous.

Secondly, many of the scenes felt too rushed to me, particularly the climax in the church. While I understand the reasoning behind most of the cuts, this scene no longer felt worthy of the 'final battle' scene. It was over in a couple of punches. More true to the character? No doubt. More enjoyable? Not really.

If I was able to relate more to the understandable Bat-fan desire to see batman a) become more recluse/mysterious and b)not murder anyone, I think I would have enjoyed the edit more. As it was, I missed seeing Batman blow up the goons in the factory, and throw that guy down the stairwell at the top of the church. And I missed the lovely character beats that have been cut which may have strayed from Batman's origins as a character, but are essential to this particular telling in my opinion.

Overall, I commend Dwight Fry on his fantastic editing skills, and completion of his vision. He has accomplished his goals, and I would happily recommend this to anyone who wants to see a version of Batman closer in line with the comics, and anyone who doesn't have such a nostalgic connection to the original ;)

PS. Blueyoda's The Killing Joke is yet another masterpiece from the best editor I know. A beautiful and mesmerising work. Thank you for including it!

Well, I just watched the best version of Batman '89 tonight. Guess which one it was? Oh, ok, this one! Not only was the romance removal a good decision, but Bruce (who is used quite sparingly!) is no longer a "reclusive, asocial, insecure-acting creep." Sounds good to me. He's supposed to be far removed from the Batman persona, not slightly less Batman-ish! ;)

Overall, the story is nice and tight and loses nothing from the cuts, which were all perfect. The movie looks and sounds great. Give it a whirl! :)

P.S. I was happy to contribute to this project, even if it wasn't with the edit itself, but with the supplements. Heh.

So I watched the original Batman just to refresh my memory before I watched this. I avoided the cutlist before watching the edit. I have to say I like the majority of Dwight's choices here. Excellent job on the opening credits. No silly love story (why does every movie need to shoehorn in a love story?!). Drastically cut down Prince music! My only gripe was the cutting of "Ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight" but i don't miss it, i just didn't mind that in the original.

I'll have to look over the cutlist to see what changes I didn't notice, the editing was seamless so I'm sure I missed some things.

Overall an excellent firstling. Audio and video quality was good and you clearly accomplished your goals with the edit. Nice work Dwight!

I don't consider Tim Burton's "Batman" a bad movie, or even all that badly flawed. There are a few things that I don't like (Prince's songs, the hasty way the Bruce/Vicki romance starts out, and a few others), and a few things I think could have been done better (The 1930s/1940s and 1980s elements of the movie's style and sensibility seem to clash at times; I would have preferred that the overtly 1980s elements be toned down or even non-existent). But those are just nitpicks. Overall, I like "Batman", and don't really have all that many gripes with it. A lot of the things that many people consider flaws with it (Batman killing, Joker being the killer of Bruce's parents, etc) don't bother me. And I like Kim Basinger. So, to me, a lot of the items on the cutlist seemed like unnecessary changes.

Despite all of this, I watched "Batman: Descent Into Mystery" with an open mind. And I thoroughly enjoyed it. A lot of moments and lines that I like are removed, but the cuts were made so well that I kept forgetting that anything was missing. Had I never seen "Batman" before viewing this edit, I wouldn't have known that anything had been cut. And even though I have seen "Batman" multiple times, and practically know it by heart, I found myself somehow not noticing some of the changes, and taking a few minutes to notice others. I also was impressed by how well the movie works without the romance. Surprisingly, I found myself preferring "Batman: Descent Into Mystery" to the original movie in many ways, although I still like the original movie, including quite a few of the things that you removed. To me, "Batman: Descent Into Mystery" is more "perfect" than the original movie, but misses a few of the original's greatest moments. All things considered, it's different, but about equally good, perhaps even a little better. It doesn't replace 'Batman" for me, but it's a great alternate version.

I consider this edit mostly perfect, but there a few things I didn't like. One is that without the Bruce/Vicki romance having come before it, the scene with Vicki walking down the street as the Bat-signal shines into the sky suddenly seemed like it was missing something, but having thought about it, that might be just me. The other is something that I consider a jarring and sloppy flaw. At the end, the music rises to a crescendo, the camera pans up over the buildings of Gotham, we see Batman, standing up, looking at his symbol projected into the sky.....then, in big, yellow letters, the words "To Bill, we know better" pop up. I know what the phrase means, and the sentiment is a nice one. But sticking it up on the screen, in big yellow letters, during one of the most iconic shots in cinematic history, comes across as a joke. It takes me right out of the moment, and takes away from the great visuals of the shot. Still, you did such great editing and color-correction work that I decided not to take any points off.

"Batman: Descent Into Mystery" is a great fanedit. I highly recommend it.