I hear what you're saying.
My main problem with
Returns is that DeVito's Penguin is so twisted as to be completely off-putting to watch. Almost all of the scenes with Michelle Pfieffer as Catwoman are great. If I did a fan edit of Returns, I would mainly just cut out all of the Penguin's scenes.
Also, the storyline is occasionally incomprehensible. For instance: The Penguin brings Max Shreck down into his lair to tell Shreck that he (Penguin) exists, and then . . . what, exactly? What was his purpose? Later on, Shreck throws a big party for Penguin to get him to run for Mayor. But Penguin is completely taken off guard by Shreck's actions. He's standing there with the raw fish in his mouth, totally stunned. Then Penguin's ascenscion to power becomes the whole focus of the story. So what was Penguin's original plan? Did he expect that Shreck would eventually throw a surprise party for him??
After the grimness of
Returns, Forever seemed (at first) like a breath of fresh air. There were some silly parts, but it looked like the filmmakers might be getting back on the right track. I actually remember thinking, "If the filmmakers can focus on what worked in
Forever and get rid of the silliness, then the next film might be even better!"
From the previews to Batman and Robin, though, I could tell that the filmmakers had totally missed the point and had made the new movie even sillier. I didn't even want to see it. I was dragged to it by a friend, who insisted, "It's Batman. How bad could it be?"
Even at that, I don't (now) regret having seen it (once). It's become the default thing to go to in any discussion where you want to make a point about how much a franchise can go off the rails. If I hadn't seen the movie, I couldn't make those comparisons and analogies!