If Batman Returns came out today...

Hard to say. Audiences have come to think of superhero movies a particular way. They love the 40% jokes 60% action set pieces formula that the Marvel brand has perfected. Guardians of the Galaxy, Deadpool, and other self-aware, irony-heavy, yet still strangely earnest films. Batman Returns takes itself seriously, has a unique Goth aesthetic, doesn't emphasize irony, and departs radically from the source material (somewhere along the line "We're going back to the first stories" became a bit of a fetish, too).

In short, audiences today are conditioned for a certain kind of comic book superhero experience and Burton's heightened reality ain't it. That could be really good or really bad. It might be a breath of fresh air amidst a dull cavalcade of clones and doppelgangers. On the other hand, it could wind up being weird and inaccessible, defying expectations to the point of self-destruction.

It's speculation (of course), but I'd guess that critics would be really interested in it. It would get mixed-to-positive reviews, with every critic highlighting its daring to be different. The phrase, "Even when it doesn't always work," would come up a lot. Audiences wouldn't like it. It would be too off-kilter, so they'd basically go, "It's not Nolan and it's not Avengers, so we hate it." DC fans would love it by default, but that's it. It'd make some money, but not a tonne.

In ten years' time, it'd be a cult classic. Everybody would look back on the era at all the xeroxed copies trying to out-ape one another and Batman Returns would stick out as something special - something nobody gave enough of a chance to see the madcap genius behind it. It would get its due, but it would take a very, very circuitous route to get there.