Batman? Batman, you say??

I have to revisit the subject of Batman since I saw The Dark Knight recently. I was just going to leave it at "I really enjoyed it, Heath Ledger did a great job, etc. etc." But I've decided I'd like to expand that and go into the subject that everyone is hacking to pieces:

The Older Batman Movies vs. The Newer Batman Movies

So to start...what are we dealing with? The older Batman movies consist of:
-Batman -Batman Returns -Batman Forever -Batman and Robin
But for the sake of sanity, I'm going to consider Batman and Robin as not a part of this group at all because it was the GAYEST movie ever...aside from Next Stop Wonderland. If you haven't seen this, don't. You need those extra few brain cells. Believe me.
The new Batman movies of course consist only of:
-Batman Begins - and -The Dark Knight
So what's all the fuss? The fuss is people are comparing the older with the newer as is to be expected. But frankly...let's look at the facts.
The Facts: The older batmans...yeah they weren't all great (but some of them were). But take a good look at them. The lead actor as batman changes 3 times (if you count Batman and Robin in the mix). The director changes twice. And really...they're all going for more of a comic book feel. From my understanding, the whole idea behind the creation of the newer batman series was to get some consistency in actors, storyline, etc. etc. Of course Katie Holmes had to go and be the GAYEST THING EVER and SCREW it all up...but then again she already was THE GAYEST THING EVER...so...Maggie Gyllenhaal taking over for her was pretty much the best thing anyone could have ever done. Kudos Maggie. I sincerely hope they can keep some consistency and so far they're doing really well. I like their perspective on the whole thing as well...seeing it all from a more realistic approach than the comic book approach. Granted, I loved the comic book approach but variety is very, very nice.
So...the moral of the story? Don't diss the oldies. They're just different. Oh and psst...I heard a rumor that Johnny Depp might be the Riddler. OMG!!!! What CAN'T Johnny Depp do??