Tim Burton didn’t want to make a sequel, but he agreed to return in exchange for creative control, which meant he got to change up the script by Sam Hamm and Daniel Waters, with Wesley Strick rewriting things to establish what the Penguin’s plan was. While this was a big success, it wasn’t at the level of Batman and that may be because of how dark, sexual and violent is became, which is one of the reasons why I like it so much.

It’s also totally a Christmas movie.

Unlike Bruce Wayne (Michael Keaton), whose rich parents loved him, the Penguin is born to Tucker (Paul Reubens) and Esther Cobblepot (Diane Salinger), who despite giving him the name Oliver (Danny DeVito) treat him like more an animal than a child. They dump him into the sewer, where he is raised by penguins. Yes, this really happens.

His Red Triangle gang kidnap rich man Max Shreck (Christopher Walken) and force him to work alongside his plan to take over Gotham City. It starts by kidnapping the mayor’s son and rescuing him, making the Penguin a hero. As for Schreck, he’s been planning to steal all of Gotham’s electricity, a plan that his secretary Selena Kyle (Michelle Pfeiffer) learns about and is shoved out a window to her death. Well, it would have been her death, but she’s brought back from the dead by alley cats. Yes, again, really.

Bruce Wayne, being Batman, ends up fighting Penguin, Catwoman and Schreck, all while as Bruce he falls for Selena. This all sounds too ordinary for what the movie has happen, because this has so many wild ideas and actors in it, like the Red Triangle gang being made up of Organ Grinder (Vincent Schiavelli), the Poodle Lady (Anna Katarina), the Tattooed Strongman (Rick Zumwalt, Bull Hurley!), the Sword Swallower (John Strong), the Fat Clown (Travis Mckenna), the Thin Clown (Doug Jones), the Knifethrower Dame (Erika Andersch), the Acrobatic Thug (Gregory Scott Cummins) and the Terrifying Clown (Branscombe Richmond). There were even plans for a black Robin, to be played by Marlon Wayans, to the point that even toys were designed.

Everyone in this is a shadow of Bruce Wayne: Selena may be “the same, split right down the center” but she wants vengeance instead of justice; Penguin was born rich as a freak but Bruce became one; Schreck is the rich villain that Bruce could have been. Catwoman embraces her sexuality by covering herself in leather and embracing a BDSM-coded whip; even at the end, she chooses solitude instead of love with Bruce, as he’d be just another man dominating her. She’s content to see his Batsignal in the night and know that he’s close.

This is also a Christmas movie that hates the holiday; a cash-in sequel that hates that fact as well as merchandising, despite having a toyline out in stores in time for its release. It feels like a movie that took chances, back when superhero movies had no rules or template. Compared to the next few Batman movies after, it felt so right, so perfect and still feels that way today.