How do you get from the cheerful Batman of the 1960s to Christopher Nolan's brooding Dark Knight? Based on new fan film Batman Evolution, it involves Black Mask, some gunky chemicals and dubstep.

Directed by Peter Cornwell, the freshly released Batman Evolution takes a lighthearted stab at connecting Adam West's campy Batman '66 to the considerably more intense Caped Crusader depicted in Christopher Nolan's "Dark Knight" trilogy. Eric Gable wrote and starred in the title role of the film, which debuted on Comic Book Movie. Gable told the site he was looking to bring some verisimilitude to Batman's martial arts: "I traveled to Japan to study ninjutsu years ago, and I'm really surprised no one has brought it to film yet. Literally, all the 'ninja' movies to date are actually using karate."