Nora Clavicle, a women's rights activist, uses her influence to have Commissioner Gordon, Chief O'Hara, and the whole police force fired and replaced with women. She cuts ties with Batman and Robin, then launches her plan to blow up Gotham City with explosive-packed mice and collect on the insurance. The Terrific Trio look for a way to neutralize her mechanical hordes before it's too late. During a luncheon honoring Commissioner Gordon for his many years of service as police commissioner, Mayor Linseed shocks everyone when he announces that he is terminating the Commissioner and replacing him with women's rights activist Nora Clavicle. Miss Clavicle's first act is to fire all the male police officers, including Chief O'Hara and replacing them with mini-skirted policewomen, including Mrs. Linseed, who is named the new police chief. Batman becomes suspicious and when he, Robin and Batgirl investigate they are captured by Miss Clavicle and her henchwomen and ties them into lethal Siamese human knots. She then reveals that she purchased an insurance policy against the destruction of Gotham City. She then unleashes mechanical mice, which are armed with explosives and are set to go off at sundown. Can the Terrific Trio untie themselves and get rid of the mice before it's too late? Most 1966 Batman episodes are still campy fun, but this episode is hard to watch. The 60s sexism and satire don't age well at all. Feel free to skip this one unless you want to cringe and feel uncomfortable.<br/><br/>The Pied Piper bit is the only thing worth watching. The rest of the episode makes both men and women look bad. Okay, we'll forego discussing the rampant sexism and condescension in which this episode wallows. It's the main reason this episode has aged so badly, but not the only one. Taken in and of itself, this is still a poor episode, with plot holes up the wazoo and a lot of filler to pad it to twenty-two minutes.<br/><br/>The big problem is setup for the bat-deathtrap. Batgirl has held her own against trained fighters. She's even gone toe-to-toe with Catwoman, fer cryin' out loud–even if all she had to do was toss the Princess of Plunder into Chief O'Hara's waiting arms. But the second she's grabbed by Nora Clavicle, who has no fighting skills to speak of, she might as well be one of Nora's decorative henchwomen for all the fight she puts up.<br/><br/>There are lots of shots that seem unnecessary, usually of mice going all over the city–maybe the writers didn't think they had enough for a full episode? And then you have the usual third season problems–the low budget sets, the writing that was less phoned in than it was attached to a blind, arthritic turtle and aimed in the general direction of the studio, the lack of wit or genuine humor–and you have an unholy mess of an episode that is truly painful to watch.<br/><br/>All of these were problems throughout the season, but some of the episodes were still salvaged by old stalwarts Cesar Romero, Frank Gorshin, Victor Buono, or especially Burgess Meredith (who could always be counted on for a good ad-lib or three), or by series newcomers like Eartha Kitt or Joan Collins. Unfortunately, the usually stellar Barbara Rush delivers the most uninspired performance of her career, partially because she's working with arguably the worst script in the series.<br/><br/>OK, OK, I lied. Let's talk about the sexism and the condescension. It's rampant, it's ridiculous, it's even worse than most of the series (and that's going some), and it turns the episode from painful to watch to impossible to watch. All in all, this was the low point for the series, and even with Penguin, Shame, and King Tut on the way, pretty much the kiss of death.
Jaymiflann replied
295 weeks ago