Batman Returns is a Christmas Miracle

Spending Christmas in Gotham City is an annual tradition for diehard fans of Batman Returns (1992). I have to watch the movie sometime in December—and often several times this month—and nothing brings me more Yuletide spirit than the most gloriously bizarre and unapologetically kinky superhero movie ever made. Tim Burton and screenwriters Daniel Waters and Wesley Strick packed the film full of fun and sexy innuendo—and even some more hardcore stuff uttered by Danny DeVito’s Penguin, like “I’d like to fill her void.” Heyo!

In terms of frisky remarks, many of the sexiest lines are delivered with sultry flair by the sexiest woman on the planet, Michelle Pfeiffer, as Selina Kyle, aka Catwoman.

Michelle and Michael Keaton, as Bruce Wayne/Batman, have sizzling hot chemistry—the two used to date in real life—in a series of memorable scenes, but especially in the masquerade ball sequence. You know, the scene with Selina talking about Bruce’s boner:

Bruce: No hard feelings, then?

Selina: …semi-hard, I’d say.

She follows that up by purring seductively in Bruce’s ear, “There’s a big comfy California King over in bedding.” Seriously, Michelle’s voice is pure sex here. Yowza.

Scenes and dialogue like this offer tangible proof that Batman Returns is a true Christmas miracle. For decades now, Batman comics have plundered a variety of subtextual, or even overt, sexiness and kink—often times unintentionally—and none of the movie adaptations have leaned into it quite as gleefully as Burton’s second Batman film. It’s the sort of bonkers movie, featuring a major corporation’s financially lucrative intellectual property, that would never get made today. Batman Returns is the kinky Christmas classic that I can’t believe exists, but I’m eternally grateful that it does.

Merry Christmas, and good will towards men…and women.