The 1950s saw a substantial elaboration of the Batman mythos.
“Batman lightened up a bit from his early days as the Dark Knight,” observed Batman producer Michael Uslan in Batman in the Fifties. “He underwent strange transformations, traveled through time, battled strange monsters and kooky aliens, and even tussled with a few old enemies. His second full decade as a hero was marked by more than one Bat-benchmark.”
Postwar America loved its late-model vehicles, so the Dynamic Duo began the decade with a new Batmobile (The Batmobile of 1950, Detective Comics 156) and a new Batplane (The Birth of Batplane II, Batman 61, Oct.-Nov. 1950).
“(A)fter the Batmobile has careened off a dynamited bridge during a high-speed auto chase and been completely demolished, Batman and Robin design and construct a new one,” noted Michael L. Fleisher in The Original Encyclopedia of Comic Book Heroes. “The new vehicle, dark blue and fully enclosed like its predecessor and retaining the distinctive bat-head front, features dramatically modern, streamlined styling; an enlarged, gently angular tail fin; a transparent ‘plastic bubble’ top instead of a windshield and a powerful roof-mounted searchlight.”
The car accelerated to 100 miles per hour within 100 feet and was “…ten years ahead of anything else on wheels,” Batman bragged.
“When crooks steal the original Batplane, Batman creates a vastly improved successor, Batplane II,” recalled comics historian Michael E. Grost. “This story has much in common with a virtually contemporary story, Untold Tales of the Bat-Signal (1950). Both focus on details of a well-established piece of Batman technology. Both contain diagrams, showing high-tech details of their construction.”
The old Batplane had been outfitted with rockets and jets in 1946 (jet planes were something new, the first turbojet aircraft having flown on Aug. 27, 1939, in Germany). But the new Batplane included a “…super-ramjet power plant, retractable autogyro with gyroscopic stabilizers, and retractable undercarriage featuring interchangeable wheels, skis and pontoons,” Fleisher noted.
Batman and Robin got additional aerial assistance from personal mini-helicopters, the Whirly-Bats, “whirlybird” being an early nickname for the helicopter. The Whirly-Bats, which are collapsible and can be made to hover in mid-air, were introduced in July 1958.
Batman became closer to Superman during the decade, sharing not only fantastic adventures, but also themes and trends.
Krypto the Superdog edged out Ace the Bat-Hound by a nose (Krypto first appeared in March 1955, and Ace in June 1955). But Batwoman predated Supergirl by a full three years. Batman even acquired his own Mister Mxyzptlk, a 5th-dimensional imp who called himself Bat-Mite.
One thing that didn’t seem to change, though, was Robin’s age — except in Alfred’s imagination.
In April 1960, Batman’s butler would begin writing “imaginary stories” in which an adult Dick Grayson became Batman II and Bruce Wayne Jr. fought alongside him as a red-headed Robin II.
The idea of Batman’s legacy and influence would also be explored throughout the decade in stories in which we learned that Batman had inspired other costumed crimefighters around the globe — the Knight and the Squire in England, the Ranger in Australia, the Musketeer in France, the Legionary in Italy, and the Gaucho in South America.
Even Batman’s gadgets were inspired by him. In October 1955, Batman and Robin completed the first in a long line of Batman robots. They would eventually act independently.
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