“I’ll Be a Mummy’s Uncle”
Written by Stanley Ralph Ross
Directed by Sam Strangis
Season 3, Episode 23
Production code 1725
Original air date: February 22, 1968
The Bat-signal: King Tut is being treated at the Mount Ararat Psychiartric Hospital. Tut has gone on and on and on and on about his problems for so long that his shrink falls asleep, giving Tut the opportunity to make his escape. He immediately hits the Rosetta Stone Company (according to their sign, they are manufacturers of cornerstones, curbstones, cobblestones, and milestones) and steals $47,000.
The sleepy shrink calls Gordon to inform him of his somnabulent screwup, and Gordon heads straight for the red phone. Batman and Robin hie themselves to GCPD HQ, where Barbara is visiting her Dad (does she ever actually work in the library anymore, or just loiter in her father’s office?).
Tut believes there is a vein of nilanium—the hardest metal in the world—under Wayne Manor. He intends to buy the land next to Bruce’s house (which Bruce has put on sale for $47,000 to aid in the property shortage) and then dig for the metal.
The Bat-computer provides the lot Bruce is selling, but Batman assumes that the computer’s off-kilter, as he’s selling that for $48,000. However, Tut is friends with Manny the Mesopotamian, an unscrupulous real-estate dealer who will sell it to Tut for $47K.
Tut arrives at Manny’s just as Barbara is about to leave—she’s there to look for a place in the suburbs for her father, who’s tired of city congestion—and she observes the transaction as Tut buys the property.
Barbara, as Batgirl, calls Bruce to warn him, and Bruce passes on a message to Batman for her (cough) to meet at Gordon’s office in half an hour. But then the Bat-computer reveals two things: that there is nilanium under Wayne Manor (why this fact was never revealed previously is left as an exercise for the viewer) and that Tut is digging for it—and his mining operation will lead him right to the Batcave!
After calling Batgirl in Gordon’s office to tell her to meet them on Tut’s new property, Batman and Robin hoof it to the mine. (The Batmobile might be seen with all the miners wandering about. Why Batman didn’t consider the possibility of people seeing the Batmobile when he put the property up for sale is also left as an exercise for the viewer.)
Tut’s miners hit the titanium shell around the Batcave, and they’re afraid to blast it due to the danger. Tut laughs in the face of danger, and he volunteers to do the blasting himself. That’s when Batman, Robin, and Batgirl all show up. Tut and his gang retreat down the shaft in a minecart, with the heroes following on foot. Batman asks Batgirl to stay behind and guard the entrance in order to protect the secret of the Batcave, and Batgirl inexplicably goes along with it even though Batman can’t provide a convincing reason.
Tut and his people burst into the Batcave, and Tut is overjoyed to realize that he has discovered Batman’s secret. Batman and Robin arrive and fisticuffs ensue, trashing the Batcave something fierce. Tut gets away, though, but before he can reveal his secret, a rock falls on his head, the cranial trauma reverting him to his other personality of a Yale professor of Egyptology.
Tut—or, rather, Professor McElroy—returns to work at Yale, but then a flying saucer containing the Joker is sighted over Gotham…
Fetch the Bat-shark-repellant! The Dynamic Duo use the Bat-directional finder to track Tut’s mining movements. Batman requires a bat-compass to inform him that north-northeast is in a north-northeasterly direction. Yeah. Batman has bat-nesia gas that erases short-term memory, thus keeping the henchmen and moll from remembering that they learned Batman’s secret. He runs out of it before getting to Tut, and so must rely on his being thunked on the head to save the secret of his real name.
Holy #@!%$, Batman! Upon learning that Wayne Manor is sitting on a vein of nilanium, the hardest metal in the world, Robin’s response is to cry out, “Holy hardest metal in the world!” Upon discovering that Tut and his gang are riding down the tracks to the bottom of the mine (and the Batcave), Robin’s response is, “Holy journey to the center of the Earth!” Upon arriving at the end of the mineshaft after running up it, Robin grumbles, “Holy waste of energy.” Upon discovering that Tut has reverted to his professorial persona, and won’t reveal their identities, Robin sighs, “Holy razor’s edge.”
Gotham City’s finest. Gordon is no longer satisfied with his brownstone in Gotham City and is looking for a place in the ‘burbs.
Special Guest Villain. Victor Buono makes his final appearance as King Tut. Of the villains created for the show, he was the first and the most successful, having appeared in eight episodes all together.
Na-na na-na na-na na-na na.
“Very good, Robin, I didn’t know you were a student of the classics.”
“Batman teaches me a little poetry in between remanding criminals to jail.”
“Enough prose and cons, Robin.”
–Barbara complimenting Robin on a literary citation he made, Robin accepting the compliment, and Batman making an awful pun.
Trivial matters: This episode was discussed on The Batcave Podcast episode 65 by host John S. Drew with special guest chums, Robert Greenberger (author of The Essential Batman Encyclopedia) and Jim Beard (editor of Gotham City 14 Miles).
This episode was originally written to be part two of the story begun in “The Unkindest Tut of All,” but Stanley Ralph Ross rewrote it as two separate episodes, with the secondary roles rewritten and recast as different people. The one link between the two is the general theme of Tut learning Batman’s secret identity, and also Tut finding the life-sized dummies of Batman and Robin that were used to show Batman and Bruce in the same place at the same time in the other episode.
King Tut’s real name is revealed to be William Omaha McElroy, which is a tribute to executive producer William Dozier, who was born in Omaha and whose dog was named McElroy. In addition, H.L. Hunter is a play on oil tycoon H.L. Hunt.
Henny Youngman is the latest comedian to make an uncredited cameo, in this case as Manny. Playboy Playmate Victoria Vetri, credited as Angela Dorian, plays Florence, and unlike the last time I thought she was in something I was rewatching, this time it’s really her.
Pow! Biff! Zowie! “I prefer not to think about those things, Robin, they depress me.” A fitting finale for the fake pharaoh, as Victor Buono remains his usual spectacular self, the plot is pretty straightforward Bat-stuff, and a good time is had by all. Batgirl is sadly underused in this one, though this time it’s mostly due to her not being able to know what’s at the end of the mineshaft.
Amusingly, the script itself plays with the absurdity of the secret-identity thing, as Tut just assumes that Batgirl, Gordon, and O’Hara already know that Batman is Bruce Wayne—which is a reasonable assumption, since it makes no sense that there’d be so much trust there without that secret being known. But whatever.
What’s particularly hilarious about this one is that, aside from the fight at the very end, the Dynamic Duo don’t actually accomplish anything. (Well, okay, they break the world-record for running the mile three times over, but big whoop.) Batgirl does more actual useful superheroing as Barbara when she learns of Tut’s real-estate purchase, though the Bat-computer also informs Batman of it, so she isn’t all that useful either. Basically, Tut succeeds in everything he wants to accomplish, and only loses in the end because a rock falls on his head. (Batman claims that he deliberately taunted Tut so that he’d raise his voice loud enough to shake loose the rock.)
The wordplay is a delight in this one, from the prose and cons pun to Tut referring to Batgirl as the Dynamic duenna to all the nomenclature references (Manny the Mesopotamian, Mount Ararat Psychiatric Hospital, Rosetta Stone, etc.). Just tremendous fun.
Bat-rating: 8
Keith R.A. DeCandido will be a guest at (Re)Generation Who 3 this weekend in Baltimore, Maryland, alongside Doctor Who actors Sylvester McCoy, Ingrid Oliver, Katy Manning, Neve McIntosh, Catrin Stewart, Peter Purves, Terry Molloy, and Richard Franklin; fellow writers Andrew Cartmel, George Mann, John Peel, and Paul Magrs; and tons more cool folks. Keith will have a table, where he will be selling and signing books, and will also be doing a one-hour presentation Saturday at 4pm and a panel on writing science fiction with Peel and Mann Saturday at 7pm.
Another strong one from Stanley Ralph Ross. Lots of his usual clever turns of phrase. (Although “Dynamic Dueña” is not exactly an insult.) Plus we get the lovely Victoria Vetri as Florence of Arabia. (I always found it odd that someone with a real name as cool as “Victoria Vetri” would adopt the blander pseudonym “Angela Dorian” to do Playboy. Gee, too bad she never did Star Trek as an Andorian…)
Bit of a plot hole, though… Either Barbara waited a very long time to notify the Commissioner that she’d overheard King Tut’s land deal, or Tut was able to get his mining equipment, take it to the abandoned mine, and dig halfway down to his target in a matter of minutes. Also, how did the Batcomputer’s “seismic detector” gather such precise information, including what it was that Tut was mining for? Also, they kept using Islamic elements of modern Egyptian culture (salaam alaikum, the ban on pork) as if they were things that an Ancient-Egypt poseur like Tut would abide by. That’s some major cultural confusion.
I love the “prose and cons” pun… except poetry and prose are opposites.
I love the visual of Barbara speaking as Batgirl while on the phone to Batman speaking as Bruce Wayne. It’s a shame Batgirl had so little to do in this one.
Thanks for explaining “H. L. Hunter.” I wonder if it was also a play on The Heart is a Lonely Hunter.
“Barbara is visiting her Dad (does she ever actually work in the library anymore, or just loiter in her father’s office?)” — In the ’77 Filmation New Adventures of Batman, Barbara was the district attorney — a job they never did anything with except as an excuse to have her hanging around in her father’s office.
Not much to say about this one – except I think it would’ve made a grand series finale. There’s something vaguely poetic about this show’s first (and most successful) OC villain getting to end the Dynamic Duo once and for all…
But was the implication supposed to be that this particular head trauma permanently cured the good Professor McElroy for some reason? Or that it just gave Batman some time to whip up more Bat-nesia gas?
I loved the part where Florence spatters grape juice on Tut and he says in a WC Fields voice “That’s OK Flo, your assets far outnumber your liabilities!” Also like when he tells his Tutling to mind his own skinny business after the Tut laments about his weight and the Tutling suggest he go on a diet.
BTW Penguin’s Clean Sweep is not on the contents page.
@2/rubberlotus: Given how bad the remaining three episodes are, I wish this had been the series finale…
@3 – Penguin’s Clean Sweep should be on the index page now. Thanks!
Another all-time favorite. The story developments are as rushed as in many of the third season episodes, but otherwise, what a hoot. The script is hilarious and Buono is on fire. Watching him go crazy buckwild ill on the bat dummy is fun even if you don’t remember why he has a grudge against the thing.
I, too, have long wished this had been the final episode. And not just because it’s the last wholly decent one overall. I would just like that final line of Batman’s to be the end of the series, because it explains his character so nicely. Note the wording: He prefers not to think about those things, because they depress him. Which means that he has on occasion thought about those things, or has entertained the possibility of thinking about those things, and has consciously rejected it. That’s an important distinction. It means he’s not naive – – just an idealist. He isn’t the Tick. He isn’t the Cartoon Planet version of Space Coast. He’s a smart guy who understands the depths to which the world can sink and has chosen to focus instead on the heights to which it can be raised, because he understands that doing so in the best interests of everybody. That’s what has made this interpretation of the character so beloved for half a century. (The line also acts as a nice bookend to West’s very first scene of the series, in which the first thing we learn about him is that he has channeled personal tragedy into something constructive. He doesn’t wallow; he trudges ever forward.)
I just looked up Angela Dorian, and learned that, a few years ago, she was sentenced to nine years imprisonment for shooting her husband. Anybody know if she’s still incarcerated, or if she was released early?
Interesting, I never even thought of how fitting this would be as a series finale. Ah, what might have been…………..
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
I know you probably meant for this to be included in your “etc.” but one of my favorite subtle word plays of the episode was Tut’s psychiatrist being named Dr. Denton, after the well-known pajama brand. No wonder he fell asleep on Tut.
David: Actually, I totally missed that reference. *laughs* Nice catch….
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
King Tut is my favorite Batman villain, it’s nice to know that there wasn’t a ‘grimdark reimagining’ of this character.
@10/Kirth: Actually there was a darker version of King Tut who appeared in a 3-part Batman Confidential arc in 2009:
http://dc.wikia.com/wiki/Victor_Goodman_(New_Earth)
He was “a criminal Egyptologist who targets and murders wealthy citizens, and leaves Egyptian-themed riddles, similar to the Riddle of the Sphinx.” A jealous Riddler helped Batman stop him. This was before DC cleared up the rights and permissions to use the ’66 show’s original characters, I think, but since King Tut was named for a real historical figure, they were able to use the name for a distinct character.
Very late to the party on this one. This definitely was one of my favorite third-season episodes. I always was amazed at how quickly Victor Buono could go from comedic to legitimately menacing. That was one of his great skills, among many.
Did anyone else notice, Tut noting something to the effect of only being able to have so many Tutlings, perhaps a comment on Season Three’s infamous budget/casting limitations…