There are plenty of strange Batman episodes from the 1960s. As a matter of fact, the entire series is strange, but in a fun, comical way. But there was one episode that took things right up to the edge. In season 3, “Surf’s Up, Joker’s Under” is in a league of its own. The episode takes the show into some totally gnarly territory. The Joker goes surfing. Batman goes surfing. And somewhere along the way, the Caped Crusader pulls out one of those ridiculous gadgets that could only have come from this particular version of Gotham City. It sounds like something a fan made up as a joke.
The episode is a perfect snapshot of just how far Batman could stretch before even Batman himself started looking a little uncomfortable. The series had already turned comic-book crime fighting into brightly colored pop art. Now, it was sending the Dynamic Duo to the beach in a radical way. Talk about cowabunga. There’s also the long-running story that Adam West hated the episode, which makes the whole thing even more outrageous. Because if you know anything about West’s approach to Batman, you know he wasn’t afraid of camp. He just wanted the joke played a certain way.
The “Surf’s Up, Joker’s Under” Episode
By this point, Batman had pretty much established that Gotham City could contain anything. Crooks had elaborate costumes, villains announced their plans out loud, and Batman’s utility belt seemed to contain whatever object the writers happened to need that episode. It didn’t seem possible to make things any wackier for the Caped Crusader. That’s exactly where “Surf’s Up, Joker’s Under” takes things. The Joker gets mixed up with the surfing world, sending Batman and Robin into a beachside adventure. It looks less like a typical Gotham crime story and more like somebody accidentally changed the channel to a ’60s surf movie. There are bodacious surfers, colorful clothes, and enough California flavor to make you wonder whether the Batcave was decorated like a Hawaiian getaway.
And then there’s the experimental heel-and-toe bat-rockets. The gadget is exactly the kind of thing that makes the 1960s series so much fun to revisit. Modern Batman has increasingly sophisticated technology. This Batman had gadgets with names that sounded like somebody had labeled them with a kid’s sticker. The experimental heel-and-toe bat-rockets are gloriously specific, completely unnecessary, and therefore exactly what the show needed. That’s also what makes the episode so memorable. In order to escape the Joker’s deadly trap, Batman uses his experimental heel-and-toe bat-rockets to get himself and Robin out of danger. The whole thing is ridiculous, but Adam West doesn’t suddenly start playing Batman like a guy who knows he’s in on the joke. He stays Batman. Completely serious Batman. The world can go completely sideways around him, but Bruce Wayne remains determined to treat every ridiculous situation like a matter of national security.
Why Adam West Hated the Episode
The story that Adam West hated “Surf’s Up, Joker’s Under” has followed the episode for years, although it’s worth being careful with the wording. West was certainly vocal about his frustrations with the increasingly campy direction of Batman, and he had a particular idea of how the character should be played. That didn’t mean he disliked comedy. Quite the opposite. West’s Batman worked because he played the character straight.
That’s an important distinction. Batman wasn’t supposed to wink at the audience every time something absurd happened. If Robin said something ridiculous, Batman responded as though it were perfectly normal. If a villain came up with an elaborate scheme involving a giant prop, Batman investigated it with the seriousness of a federal agent. The joke was that everyone else seemed to know they were in a crazy television show. Batman did not.
The only problem with the episode was Batman’s yellow swim shorts. They should have had a Bat Signal pattern!
An episode built around surfing pushed that balance pretty far. It’s easy to understand why West might have been frustrated by it, particularly as the series continued moving away from the darker comic-book tone that had helped make its first season such a phenomenon. But there’s an amusing irony to the whole thing now. The episodes that once seemed like they had gone too far are often the ones fans remember.
And that’s probably the fate of “Surf’s Up, Joker’s Under.” It has the Joker, surfing, Batman, an absurd gadget, and Adam West looking as serious as ever while the entire world around him gets increasingly ridiculous. For a show about a billionaire crime fighter dressed like a flying mammal, somehow the beach was where things got really weird. Well, at least Batman survived the Joker, the surf, and certain death. At least he finally knew his once-experimental heel-and-toe bat-rockets worked. We’ve yet to see them return, though. Perhaps The Batman: Part II is finally their moment.
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