The current pop cultural "Cult of Batman"

[RobinFan4880]

It's been a long, long time since Batman wasn't hugely popular. It's not a 2010s thing, or a 1990s thing.

He's the most popular superhero for a reason.

[AlexanderLuthor]

Hmmmm...multi-billionaire ladies man, who is often depicted as the smartest man in the world, Sherlock Holmes and a ninja master, all while wearing arguably the best costume in superhero land with a ton of cool gadgets. No idea why he is popular. As a popular saying goes, "Men want to be him and women want to be with him"

[Mace Dolex]

Basically Batman is 'effin cool, he's a badass that can scare criminals just by giving a stare and I'm happy to have been a Batman since 1987, even before Tim Burton's movie I knew Batman was awesome, just check the myriad of comic book writers/artists who've all taken a crack at him proves how great of a characer he is.

[Powerboy]

What is it all about? People who would never touch a comic book or get into comics otherwise LOVE Batman and put him up as the epitome of cool. Among younger people Batman really seems to have a sort of "cult of [fictional] personality" going on nowadays. When did Batman become such a huge cultural thing and why? It seems he's especially popular among women, but a lot of guys think he's awesome too. Like I said, people who don't even care for comics otherwise.

This has happened before more than once.

The 1960's Batman was a phenomenon of "Bat-Mania."

In the late 1980's, people were going to the Batman movie dressed as the Joker and girls going dressed not as Harley Quinn but as a female Joker. I doubt most of them had ever read the comics but it was a cult sort of thing.

With the DK trilogy, for a lot of people, dark = cool and it's happening again.