best tv batman villian?

[PNGwynne]

Favorite Freeze: Sanders by a mile, all suave sang-froid and vengeful. Cool effects, too. Preminger was too stiff.

Favorite Catwoman: Merriwether, hands down! Lovely, classy, the best actress of the three. (I know, she was in the movie, not the show.)

Gorshin is a perfect Riddler, he did a great job of revitalizing the character. Very tightly wound, & it works.

Original villains Bookworm, False-Face, & Tut were excellent, could picture them in '50s comics. And other posters here have rightly pointed out Cliff Robertson's great Shame.

But (surprise!), the best Bat-foe for me was Buzz Meredith's Penguin.
He's largely the reason for my avatar. Just spot-on perfect--both a caricature come to life and a character in his own right.

[SlipperyLilSuckers]

My favourites would have to be Catwoman and King Tut.

[thunderbolt]

And I think The Puzzler was created as a last minute fill-in because Gorshin was unavailable to play the Riddler....

You are correct sir!!!

[Airdave817]

^^ Reginald Denny wasn't the Sandman or Klaatu. It was Micheal Rennie.

Oops! That's right. He was Commodore Schmidlapp and King Boris.

[Hector]

I always preferred Eartha Kitt as Catwoman myself.

[The Toyroom]

And I think The Puzzler was created as a last minute fill-in because Gorshin was unavailable to play the Riddler....

[The Toyroom]

Didn't really care for Maurice Evans' The Puzzler, either. Wasn't he a Superman villain, anyway?

The Puzzler was a Superman foe but he was nothing like the Maurice Evans' character....that was more of a mix of Toyman and the Prankster IMO.

[thunderbolt]

^^ Reginald Denny wasn't the Sandman or Klaatu. It was Micheal Rennie.

[Airdave817]

Okay if we're talking about the worst Bat-villains now - not sure if Reginald Denny was dry, serious, flat or wooden or if that was The Sandman. It's been a while since I saw his Klaatu, he seemed kind of dry and serious there, too. Maybe he just didn't get the memo about it being light-hearted camp. It just seemed an odd combination of Catwoman and The Sandman. Maybe that was what they were going for...

Didn't really care for Maurice Evans' The Puzzler, either. Wasn't he a Superman villain, anyway?

Of course toward the end of the run, Batman became a lot like Lost in Space - just plain out there. A surfing competition with The Joker?

[goldenryan]

i agree with all that's been said, i can't think of a vilian i didn't like, even Joan Collins as siren

what about sandman. the actor was ok but the script writen for him was terrible.

[VintageMike]

The big 4 as well and King Tut and Egghead. A different version of Tut was also planned for the animated Batman series and Egghead actually had a cameo in the first Shadow of The Bat storyline. I also recall a light hearted Riddler story from Secret Orgins special #1 where says " And there were all these guys you never see anymore ... Bookworm. King Tut. Marsha, Queen of Diamonds. Egghead. Where did they all go? Batman and Robin were part of the fun. They were straight men, but we were the stars. No one ever hurt anybody. Not Really. Nobody died. You look around these days -- it's all different. It's all changed. The Joker's killing people for God's sake! Did I miss something? Was I away when they changed the rules?"

[Drain]

Julie Newmar as Catwoman

[batmanmc]

to me its julie newmar as catwoman the riddler then joker and the penguin. i loved teh others but those were my favorites . alos loved tehe artha catwoman. mike

[mitchedwards]

1-The Joker
2-Penguin
3-Riddler

[kingdom warrior]

I can't just pick one. the series just has a classic line-up of Rogue Villans. All portrayed by fine actors from Hollywood's Golden-age. There are too many stand outs. That's why the series is such a classic.

Julie Newmars Catwoman is great but Eartha Kitt played her like a straight up Villian and had those fabulous rolling R's.