You ever dance with the devil in the pale moonlight?
On today's episode of Deep Thoughts About Stupid Shit, Emily delves into Tim Burton's 1989 film Batman. This pop culture phenomenon was controversial prior to its release, as comic book purists objected to the casting of Michael Keaton as Bruce Wayne/Batman. They assumed his acting would make the film a comedy rather than gritty storytelling. While Emily agrees that Keaton brings a level of gravitas and pathos to his depiction of Wayne, she finds something unsettling about how pop culture gives us a billionaire who spends his time and money beating up purse snatchers rather than fixing the infrastructure of Gotham City. That said, Batman--or at least this iteration of the Dark Knight--is ultimately a mafia movie, which is not at all interesting to Emily, until you add a psychopathic clown to the mix. And of course, casting Jack Nicholson as the Clown Prince of Crime (with serious mental health issues) was inspired.
Keaton's Batman may not be the pop culture hero we deserve to overthink right now, but he's the one we need to spend too much time overanalyzing. Throw on your headphones and overthink the caped crusader along with us!
We are Tracie Guy-Decker and Emily Guy Birken, known to our extended family as the Guy Girls.
We both have super-serious personas in our "day jobs." No, really. Emily is a Finance writer who used to be a classroom teacher. Tracie writes and consults on social justice and mindfulness and works as a copywriter and project manager for non-profits. If you really need to see the bona fides, please visit our individual websites: tracieguydecker.com and emilyguybirken.com
For our work together, what you need to know is that Tracie is older (3 years), Emily is funnier (by at least 3 percent), and we're both hella smart, often over-literal, and completely unashamed of our overthinking prowess. We love movies and tv, science fiction and murder mysteries, good storytelling with liberal amounts of dramatic irony, and analyzing pop culture for gender dynamics, psychology, sociology, and whatever else we find there.
Learn more about Tracie and Emily (including our other projects), join the Guy Girls' family, secure exclusive access to bonus episodes, video version, and early access to Deep Thoughts by visiting us on Patreon.
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