Batman Forever is the most underrated Batman movie — and it’s streaming now on Paramount Plus

The general consensus on Batman Forever has come a long way since Joel Schumacher gave the Caped Crusader latex nipples in 1995. At the time, the film and its 1997 follow-up were viewed as a campy bastardization of the franchise that failed to capture the gothic darkness of Tim Burton’s adaptations. Three decades later, however, most fans are willing to admit that Schumacher’s take on the genre has its place in the pantheon of great superhero filmmaking. However, I’d like to take this re-evaluation one step further with a bold statement: Batman Forever is far more faithful to the spirit and mythos of the comics than it’s ever been given credit for, and Schumacher probably understood the Dark Knight better than Burton ever did.