HBO Max Streams Tim Burton's Four Batman Films — A Weekend Binge

Before the corporate superhero era took hold, Tim Burton offered one of the early, influential takes on comic book cinema. The gothic director behind Beetlejuice and Edward Scissorhands delivered a Batman that embraced the medium’s campy roots and launched an explosive four-part action series.

Michael Keaton’s casting was controversial at first, but he quickly became a beloved Bruce Wayne before passing the mantle for the final two films. Burton’s version sits far from the darker interpretations by Christopher Nolan and Matt Reeves, trading grim realism for heightened visuals and unabashed genre fun.

These movies introduced a moody Gotham and memorable, larger-than-life villains. Batman Returns revels in camp with Danny DeVito’s sewer-dwelling Penguin, while Batman Forever leans into comic origins with Jim Carrey’s radical Riddler and Tommy Lee Jones’s comic-accurate Two-Face.

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