By LARRY GETLEN
Posted: 2:00 am
July 6, 2008
ADMIT it: With the July 18 release of "The Dark Knight" so close - and yet so far - you're breaking out in night sweats.
With Christian Bale in that tight suit, Maggie Gyllenhaal taking over for Katie Holmes as the official Bruce Wayne eye candy and, of course, the one we've all been waiting for: - Heath Ledger in his final (and, based on early word and trailers, perhaps greatest) role as The Joker - the suspense is enough to send you off the Bat Ledge as you scream into the dark of night.
Well, with B-day still a week and a half away, the good news is that you can placate your Bat jones with the release of four separate Batman-related DVDs until the Dark Knight finally emerges from his cave.
"Batman: Gotham Knight," from the producers of "The Dark Knight," is an original film out Tuesday documenting differing visions of the Batman mystique in six animated segments, including some that give Batman powers greater than live action has ever offered him. The film's two-disc special edition also includes a documentary on the life of Bronx-born Batman creator Bob Kane, who invented Batman over the course of one weekend based on drawings by Leonardo da Vinci, and a documentary on Batman's notorious villains called "A Mirror for the Bat."
For another animated but slightly lighter take, there's the kids' series "The Batman," the fifth season of which also hits DVD on Tuesday. This final season pairs Batman with many of his Justice League cohorts, bringing the Green Arrow, Green Lantern, Flash and even Superman into the fold.
But for a much lighter approach, check out the recent re-release of "Batman: The Movie," the film version of the '60s TV show starring Adam West as Batman and Burt Ward as Robin. Spun off from the show that launched "Pow!" "Bam!" and "Splat!" into the national lexicon, "Batman: The Movie" pairs the four greatest villains from the show - Cesar Romero's Joker, Burgess Meredith's Penguin, Frank Gorshin's Riddler and Lee Meriwether's Catwoman - in a series of truly ridiculous battles against our dynamic duo.
The slew of extras on the Blu-Ray version include commentary by West and Ward, six separate featurettes and isolated score and trivia tracks.
Finally, Bale's first take on the Caped Crusader, "Batman Begins," sees two Blu-Ray releases and a two-disc re-release of the standard edition on Tuesday. To rev up for "The Dark Knight," get one of the Blu-Ray versions - they contain the first six minutes of the new film.
