"Luckily for us, she's an Egyptian bibliophile...
Oh. There I was, merrily criticising this season's poor start and diagnosing the single episodes as the cause, being far too rushed to demonstrate and of the high camp and winks at its own tropes that have always made Batman such a joy. So, naturally, the very next episode comes along and proves that it is indeed possible to squeeze lots and lots of high camp fun into twenty-four minutes.
It helps, of course, that Victor Buono is back as King Tut, this time posing as a soothsayer of crime as a successful plot to discover the location of the Batcave, and that Yvonne Craig, whether as Batgirl or Barbara Gordon, is showing herself to be every bit as good at deadpan, square humour as Adam West. But, essentially, the episode is a triumph because Stanley Ralph Ross' script simply sings.
Tut is back because he was "hit by a brick at a love in". There's a delightfully crowbarred-in reference to Alfie. Batman tries to ask Batgirl out on a date after she utters the sweet words "I was only doing my duty as a citizen". And many, many more, at last giving the whole regular cast some great material to work with so we can see yet again how well they deal with this kind of material.
So, yes- the new format can work. Let's have more episodes like this please.
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