Clint Eastwood Could Have Played A Huge Batman Villain In A Canceled Episode

Batman has one of the most enviable ensembles of recurring villains in superhero comics. Look back at the 1960s “Batman” TV series starring Adam West, though, and not a lot of those now familiar evildoers are there.

Oh, for sure, the Joker (Cesar Romero), the Riddler (Frank Gorshin, with one exception), Catwoman (Julie Newmar, Lee Meriwether, and Eartha Kitt), and the Penguin (Burgess Meredith) all frequently guest star. It’s because of the West series that this crew was long considered the Big Four of Batman villains; it’s no coincidence that they were also the first four villains to star in the Tim Burton/Joel Schumacher-directed “Batman” films.

Then you had some other comic villains, like Mr. Freeze and the Mad Hatter, put in a few appearances too. But many episodes of “Batman” instead had West’s Caped Crusader and Robin (Burt Ward) face villains created specifically for the show, including wannabe pharoah King Tut (William Omaha McElroy), Egghead (played Vincent Price himself), the cowboy-themed Shame (Cliff Robertson), and so on.

Admittedly, some of the most famous Batman villains hadn’t been created yet, like Ra’s al Ghul, Killer Croc, Bane, and Harley Quinn (who would debut decades later on “Batman: The Animated Series”). But the show left out some existing adversaries too, like Scarecrow, Clayface, Killer Moth, and Two-Face.

Harvey Dent aka Two-Face, as it were, debuted in 1942’s “Detective Comics” #66, so he was plenty well-established by the time “Batman” hit television screens across America. At least the show considered using Two-Face, though. But who would’ve played Harvey Dent opposite West and Ward’s Dynamic Duo? The long-standing rumor is a young Clint Eastwood, who’d recently wrapped up a series-long tenure on the Western program “Rawhide” and made the jump to movie star by appearing in Sergio Leone’s “Dollars” trilogy.