In the analog, pre-internet age of the 1980s, hardcore genre fans eager to learn the latest about films in development had to rely on snippets from magazines like Starlog, Fangoria, and Cinefantastique. It was in the pages of these publications that we tracked the progress (or lack thereof) of "Star Wars," "Star Trek," and myriad superhero movies. Aside from a couple of "Swamp Thing" flicks and the diminishing returns of the Christopher Reeve-led "Superman" movies , these years were a desert for comic book fans. Rumored big-screen adaptations of "Batman," "Spider-Man" and "Captain America" kept going nowhere. Then the dam broke. Tim Burton's "Batman" became the top grossing film of 1989, at which point studios began kicking the tires on everything comic book-related.

This was the moment

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