Why the Universe Owes 'The Dark Knight' a Frickin' Oscar

by Glen Weldon

Comic book fans, like most species of geek, treasure our outsider status. The fact that said status is largely self-imposed and self-perpetuated isn't so much important — we're all about the treasuring, over here. And the brooding.

Thus, as a species, we're given to snottily rejecting anything that smacks of the popular, of the cultural mainstream. You can always count on us to find a way to prize even the most ham-fisted tale of four-color adventure over, say, Gossip Girl. And to be kinda jerky about it in the process. It's reflexive and reductive and not remotely fair, but there it is.

So why, you may ask, are we comic book geeks now pulling so hard for The Dark Knight to receive an Oscar nod, of all things?

(Especially when we're the kind of schmucks who ruin your Oscar party by gobbling up the Funyuns while opining to all within earshot that the Academy Awards are an empty exercise in feeding the nation's collective middlebrow sensibility. And that, further, they certainly have nothing whatsoever to say about artistic merit.)

So why do we suddenly care so damn much about a stupid Oscar? Why do we feel we are owed one?

Four words: Legends of the Superheroes.

And, okay, five more: Charlie Callas in a bodystocking.

After the jump: The live-action superhero abomination that still haunts our unquiet dreams. (And no, it's not Elektra) ...

In the summer of 1979, a televisual crime was perpetrated against comic books and those who loved them.

It lasted only two episodes, but such was its dread power that it seared itself into the memory of those luckless few who tuned in.

It was called Legends of the Superheroes. Watch it, if ye dare.

It was notable for several reasons:

1. More than a decade after the demise of the '60s Batman TV hit, Adam West, Burt Ward, and Frank Gorshin reprised their roles as Batman, Robin and the Riddler, respectively — and managed to squeeze into their old costumes. (West was a bit pudgier, Ward a little beefier, and Gorshin ... well, just as Gorshin as ever.)

2. It fulfilled its fan-service quota by spotlighting little-known characters straight from the comics (and the Super Friends cartoon). Among them: the Huntress, Giganta, Dr. Sivana, Sinestro, and Solomon Grundy.

3. In keeping with its time period, it guest-starred the redoubtable Jeff ("Buttsteak") Altman, the unavoidable Ed ("Haw!") McMahon, and the .... the .... ....

And Charlie Callas.

4. It was just frickin' awful. Seriously, people.

5. Ghetto Man (see 4, above.)

A sizable portion of these two shows, divided into discrete chunks to keep them from reforming into one terrible whole, is available on YouTube. If you think yourself possessed of the requisite intestinal fortitude, you may be able to make it through much of the "Celebrity Roast" episode.

I do not recommend this.

The video quality is particularly terrible, but that's really just as well. Trust me. Gaze upon this abomination directly and it'll EAT YOUR VERY SOUL.