This week marks the return of Michael Keaton to the big screen as Batman in The Flash. So I thought it was an opportune time to revisit Batman (1989) with Blake Scott Ball. This is a large episode--the longest we've released yet, and for good measure. We get into why Batman is a necessary addition to the superhero pantheon, what happens if Gotham is in Mississippi, and finally, we rank all of the Batmen. This episode is so much fun.

About our guest:
Dr. Blake Scott Ball joined the Huntingdon faculty in the fall of 2017 after completing his doctoral degree. He has previously taught as an assistant professor at Miles College, as an adjunct professor at the University of North Alabama, and as an adjunct professor at the University of Alabama. He served as assistant director for the New Summersell Center Public History Initiative at the University of Alabama, and as a graduate assistant for the Alabama Historical Association. An avid writer, he served as editor for the Southern Historian graduate history journal and as a contributor and assistant editor for The Historian behind the History, a collection of oral stories documenting historians’ graduate training and insights into the historical profession, published by the University of Alabama Press in 2014. His book, “Charlie Brown’s America: The Popular Politics of Peanuts,” was published by Oxford University Press in 2021. You can find him on twitter at @bsb1945