THE DARK KNIGHT RISES Batman, Bane and Catwoman Invade NYC Times Square!

Yesterday we posted some wonderful photos from a BAT-BLOG Fan named "BatMatt" who recently made a trip to New York City, NY. Now, of course, THE DARK KNIGHT RISES Batman Movie is promoted there like crazy and he said he saw cool stuff everywhere! Like, for example, the pics we posted previously were ones he shot in Chinatown. 





Well, these photos here are the ones he documented from Times Square! This must have been totally amazing to see & we wanna thank him for sharing these great pics. Also, please be sure to CLICK HERE to see the "Chinatown" pics. They're really fun too!

THE DARK KNIGHT RISES Batman and Bane Invade Chinatown!!

Check out these extremely cool photos shot by our Friend "BatMatt" who lives in Marietta, GA. ( Be sure to click on them for larger HD versions ). He recently made a trip to New York City around the 4th of July and said that THE DARK KNIGHT RISES Batman Movie is promoted there like crazy!! To prove it he got some excellent pics in Times Square ( which we're gonna share in a future post ) and then here are some he took in Chinatown. These Ad Banners and Billboards are totally insane, I love them!! Readers, please stay tuned because in a few days we will be posting some more of these ( Thanks BattMatt! ).

THE DARK KNIGHT RISES - New Billboard Ads Spotted in New York City!

In our ongoing coverage of all THE DARK KNIGHT RISES advertising efforts here are 2 really cool photos submitted by our friend Chip Kidd. He recently spotted these really awesome BATMAN/BANE advertisements for the new Batman movie while walking around NYC. The 1st one is a painted wall mural on the side of a building and the 2nd photo shows a Transit Bus Billboard Banner that flew by!! Have YOU seen any cool new ads? If so then please send us your photos, Thanks! ( Also, Thank You Chip )

VIDEO - THE DARK KNIGHT RISES New York City Billboards and Street Ads

Yesterday we posted some photos here at the BAT-BLOG.COM showing some of the crazy advertising stunts performed by Warner Bros to promote THE DARK KNIGHT RISES Batman movie. Well, then a friend on Facebook named Yuji sent us a link to a cool YouTube Video that shows some of that stuff "live". Check it out, it's way more cool! ( Thanks Yuji )

Vintage 1960's BATMAN TOYS Advertising!

OK, as a Major Batman Toy Collector I'm usually obsessed with finding good reference material showing the older vintage toys & items. Scanning through old store catalogs, newspaper ( and comic book ) ads, & wholesale pamplets you can discover a treasure trove of items you have never seen before. Shown up above are 2 great examples. One is an old ad for a Batman Yo-Yo from the 1960's called the BAT-YO! It was manufactured by the PLAY-MORS Toy Company. It looks like they used some Carmine Infantino-inspired artwork, cool! The next picture is another ad, this one is from an old 60's comic book ( exact issue unknown ) showing a special "Life-Size Batman poster" you could order...for one dollar, ha ha! Now, I've seen the actual poster before & it's really nice. Sadly, I have not found it for my personal collection just yet but someday IT WILL BE MINE!!

Strange BATMAN Advertising From Argentina!

Here's a really weird piece of Batman history I came across the other day. It's a picture of an advertisement that might have appeared in a vintage comic book. I'm pretty sure that it is from Argentina. It features Batman, Robin, & Jim Gordon. It looks like they are trying to sell Strawberry Yogurt??? It's made to look like a comic book page & it's titled "El Acertijo", which means, "The Riddler". But, the Riddler character is NOT in the ad...yes, very strange. If anybody can read this, or knows about its origin, then please let us know.

THE DARK KNIGHT Batman Movie Ad Banners in Taipei City!

WOW! Last week I met a Batman Fan all the way from Egypt & now one from Taiwan...how cool is that? Last night I got a very nice email from a new friend named Jerry who lives there. He wrote to say how much he loved the Bat-Blog ( I never get tired of hearing that, ha ha! ) & he sent these wonderful photos he took awhile back in Taipei City. As you can see, THE DARK KNIGHT Batman movie was a very big deal there. In fact, they posted these HUGE mural-size billboards advertising the film. I totally love that! Taipei City is a great place I would like to visit. For awhile it had the tallest building in the world until when Dubai recently completed their latest skyscraper & stole the title. But regardless, it's one of the world's greatest cities & a very beautiful place. I want to thank Jerry for sending these fun pics & also want to invite all other Bat-Blog Readers to do the same. Remember, please send us ANY Batman-related stuff you come across...thanks!!

1966 TV CATWOMAN & NEW BATMAN MOVIES Desktop Wallpapers

Since today is "Wacky Wallpaper Wednesday" I thought, this week, I would post 2 backgrounds with something vintage 60's Batman & something that's modern, but looks vintage. Does that make sense? Please let me explain. The 1st Wallpaper is a wonderful glamor-fashion photo of Julie Newmar as Catwoman from the 1966 TV Series. It's the "vintage one". The 2nd Batman Wallpaper was sent in by our good friend Sean Hartter who made this amazing background that totally looks like an old vintage newspaper advertisement for a "Special Screening of 2 Batman Movies", a Double-Feature! The great thing about this graphic is that, if you're familiar with the "look" of these old ads, then it totally fools you for a minute. Then, you realize, "Hey, This is BATMAN BEGINS & THE DARK KNIGHT! They're very recent movies, ha ha!" I wanna thank Sean for the wonderful artwork, it's great! I also wanna say Hi to Julie Newmar & let her know that I'm sincerely sorry I forgot it was her birthday recently ...Happy Birthday Julie! You know I love ya!

Hostess Fruit Pies Advertising: Batman and The Corsair of Crime!

Anyone who read comic books in the 1970's or 1980's has got to remember all the Hostess Cupcake, Twinkies, & Fruit Pie ads starring some of their favorite Marvel & DC Superheroes. They ran these all the time & I totally loved them! First, it wasn't like a regular advertisement. They made it look like another page of the comic book to trick you into reading them. Second, they were always such fun because the hero would use Hostess Treats as a way to confuse the criminals. Apparently, if you throw packaged Fruit Pies at crooks or bank robbers their brains just totally short-circuit & they go nuts for the fruit filling! But, I mean, who can blame them? At the time they had Cherry, Apple, & Peach! My personal favorite was Cherry. As a little kid I used to completely love them & I would beg my Mom to buy some at the store, ha ha! ( Be sure to click on the ad up above for a more readable version. You'll be glad you did because it is quite the adventure ).

Video: THE DARK KNIGHT Batman Movie TV Commercial Promos on HBO

HBO has started to run a few TV Commercial Promos advertising the release of THE DARK KNIGHT Batman movie. Look for it to air on June 13th, 2009. Be sure to check your TV Guide for time & local listings. Oh yeah, the music they use is "Where Is My Mind" by The Pixies...very cool!

HOLY CUPCAKES BATMAN! The PENGUIN Vintage Hostess Fruit Pies Comic Book Ads

Do you remember these really great Hostess Fruit Pie Ads from the older comic books of the 1970's and 80's?? The ones pictured here feature THE PENGUIN Batman Villain. They used to crack me up the way they "tricked you into reading the ad"...they usually had some decent artwork & a silly story, but at the end they always sales-pitched Hostess Snacks, funny! The weird thing was, as a little kid, I used to totally love these Hostess Fruit Pies ( cherry was the best, my #1 choice ). As always you can click the small photo for a larger, more "readable", picture ...and also please remember to CHECK OUT THE BAT-ARCHIVES for way more vintage toys & advertisements!

Video: Vintage Batman Toy TV Commercial with Catwoman - Zellers Spot

Here's another Vintage TV Commercial from Zellers' Department Store featuring the Dynamic Duo, Batman and Robin! This one has the Catwoman villain as a special guest. I seriously love the animation in this TV spot, it's great! Be sure to check out my other videos for more toy commercials from this series. I have more posted with The Joker, Riddler, etc...

For Your Consideration...

Well, it appears that Warner Bros is totally sucking up to all the people who can vote for Oscars. In many of the Hollywood Trade Magazines ( Variety, Hollywood Reporter, etc..) they have placed full-page ads to remind the voters that THE DARK KNIGHT Batman movie deserves a lot of Oscars. Shown here are just a few but there are a lot more! The 1st nomination that I think needs to be honored is for Heath Ledger as The Joker. He truly did an amazing job & I'm not just saying that to be nice because he passed away. He really deserves it & he will be missed. It's kind of sad to think about all the future performances we will be missing out on. He's seriously a great talent. Of course there are many other Best Supporting Actors who should be included too. The list would be Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Aaron Eckhart, & Morgan Freeman. The whole cast did an incredible job! The Dark Knight easily deserves Best Movie of The Year while Christopher Noland should get Best Director. Also, let's not forget Best Supporting Actress Maggie Gyllenhaal, she's wonderful. I also think we should even mention Christian Bale for his contribution. The movie deserves a lot of "technical awards" for stuff like Art Direction, Film Editing, Best Make Up, Best Costume Design, etc...we'll have to wait & see. Because of The Dark Knight Batman movie this year's Oscars Award Show should be pretty fun to watch, & kind of nerve-racking too, ha ha!

NEWZ FM 98 RADIO Series of Funny Foreign TV Commercials Featuring Batman!

Here's a few really short, but extremely clever, Foreign TV commercials for NEWZ FM 98, a Morning News Radio Show. I forget the name of the country that they are from but I'm guessing Brazil or Peru! They all feature Batman in some humorous way & are pretty good quality!

Vintage BATMAN TOYS and COLLECTIBLES Reference Material

As a very serious toy collector I can't express the value of good reference material. What I mean by that is good information on the items you collect. Some main sources are websites ( hopefully this one, ha ha ), ads out of vintage magazines, price guide collectibles reference books, & old store catalogs. Look through a 1966 "Christmas Wish List" Sears Catalog & you'll see what I mean, they are like "p0rn for toy collectors". In some cases they can show you what the original box looked like or what it looked like when complete. I've even seen items in those books that I have never ever seen in real-life & I've been a pretty serious vintage toy dealer for 20+ years. The price guide reference books used to have four full-bookshelf sections at your local bookstore but are now regulated to one shelf, if you're lucky. You can thank eBay for killing off that industry. But, they are still great for reference & real collectors still publish/buy them, thank God. Here's a few examples of some great reference photos. Regular readers to this blog know we publish stuff like this all the time. It's practically the whole reason for this site. I think sharing information about your hobby is like a gift that inspires people to be more dedicated & focused to their "hunt", that's cool. If anyone has some pics to share then please send them in. We're always trying to make the site better & always looking for more bat-memorabilia!

Advertising: FAT BATMAN For POWER HOUSE HEATH CLUB Magazine Print Ad

If you read some of the main stream magazines you might have seen this advertising already. There's a new series of print ads for the POWER HOUSE HEATH CLUB using parody illustrations of fat obese overweight superheroes. Here's one of FAT BATMAN & they have also done Superman & Spiderman too. The concept was created by the EURO RSCG Advertising Agency from New Delhi, India. The Creative Director: Satbir Singh, Art Director / Copywriter: Gurdev Singh Sidhu, & Illustrator: Gurdev Baljeet. OK, These ads have got a lot of flak because a few crybabies are upset about comic book heroes being fat...DUH! That's the point, ya morons! The idea is to get you to think about being out of shape & joining a health club! Personally I kinda like these ads & think they're both effective & kinda funny. I bet the people in message boards that are crying about these ads are over-weight losers who live in their grandparents basement. Whattya think about that? Whew! Sorry to vent but while researching this story I came across a ton of these whiners who did nothing but nick-pick about all the tiny micro-details of what is wrong with these ads & not praising them for their "advertising quality". They need to get lives. I bet most of them have NEVER kissed a girl, ha ha!