Batman: The Devil's Fingers & The Dead Ringers

The Devil's Fingers

"The moment we've dreaded for years has arrived. This time, we're going to have to solve a case... ourselves..."

I am, to use a great understatement, not one for easy listening.  Give me Sunn O))) or Merzbow over anything "smooth" any day. Likewise, I'm not one for light entertainment as a whole. So, much as Liberace here is charismatic in two roles, a superb pianist, splendidly camp in an era where that was subversive, and is bloody good here, his world is not one I have any affinity for. I'm afraid I see the whole world of pre-rock 'n'roll popular music, from Frank Sinatra to Max Bygraves, as a dragon that desperately needed slaying. Yet, I'm told, these episodes of Batman were the most highly rated. This stuff was popular amongst people who hated rock music.

So I shouldn't like these episodes. I really shouldn't. Yet the on-form script by the returning Lorenzo Semple Jr, and a charismatic performance by a brilliant Liberace, have really won me over. I don't care about the silly twin brothers plot. What matters are the amusing details- most of all the comic genius of Neil Hamilton as he tries to cope with the fact that the Dynamic Duo are on holiday, ultimately resorting to pills before the Batphone rings. I'm also amused to see how Alfred, who a few episodes earlier claimed to be a Liverpudlian lad, now waxes lyrical about the Highland heathers of his childhood. Cue the bagpipes of doom, which seem to be the most fearful weapons of our baddies throughout.

Of course, Batman and Robin are on their hols at the start- in Dick's case hilariously wooing a young lady. This allows the other regulars more screen time and, as a bonus, allows the plot to progress a bit before the Dynamic Duo appear. There are amusingly subtle acknowledgements that Chandell may be a friend of Dorothy throughout, of course. In 1966, very much the Dark Ages, that was brave indeed. Part of me is amused by the fact Liberace once won a libel case based on the outrageous suggestion that he might be gay, but there's also a truly appalling side to a deeply homophobic society where that can happen.

This isn't an episode I was particularly looking forward to. But, much to my surprise, I loved it.


The Dead Ringers

"Nice singing, Robin..."

This is one of the most hilarious cliffhanger resolutions ever: about to be slashed to bit in a piano music cutting machine, they survive by singing the exact notes to avoid being cut into. As you do.

We then move on to the actual plot- Chandell plans to murder Bruce and Dick and marry the besotted Aunt Harriett for her money. Nicely, it gives the wonderful Madge Blake something more to do, and isn't the kind of story that would have been possible until we had come to know and adore Aunt Harriett. And she deserves that medal she gets at the end.

This two-parter, incredibly, without being my sort of thing at all, has managed to become one of my favourites. Top stuff.