Who played the best Batman?

There are some very simple reasons why Christian Bale is clearly a better actor. For comparison's sake, I'll play devil's advocate against Michael Keaton, since he seems to be another favorite. I'll leave Kilmer and Rubber-Nipples out; they were not playing Batman.
1) The Looks: No, I'm not going to go on about how hot Christian Bale is. Bruce Wayne is supposed to be a handsome, tall, dark-haired, well-built, battle-worn man. Bale pulls this off beautifully with his fantastic physique. Keaton has curly hair, never depicted on Wayne, and he was much smaller. When I first watched "Batman" as a child, I didn't even know who Michael Keaton was. I couldn't tell who was Bruce Wayne at the beginning at the party scene at Wayne Manor. In "Batman Begins" and "The Dark Knight", you looked at Bale and instantly connect him to Wayne from the comics.

2) The Personality: You can also see the pain in him, especially in "Batman Begins", when he is about to shoot Joe Chill. You can feel the repressed anger in him, knowing that he wants to avenge his parents, but not knowing how to do that. Keaton never went deep into the character; all he did was try to explain to Vale about his dual life. In the 1989 film, you could see that Keaton pulled off a very strange Wayne in public. At the party scene, he is somewhat shy and has an almost confused look on his face. Bale nailed the "troubled-in-private, playboy-in-public" persona. In "BB", Wayne goes into a "drunken stupor" and makes the guests leave his home. Bale's Wayne routinely walks into restaurants with models and asks to buy the establishment.

3) The Voice: People keep whining about Bale's gruff Batman voice. Keaton's Batman/Wayne voice is identical. Batman's voice is supposed to: a. mask his identity b. frighten his foes. Bale's voice does exactly this. Batman is not supposed to sound pretty, he is supposed to be a monster of the night.

In conclusion, Bale is a better Batman. AND, by the way, Heath Ledger owns Jack Nicholson any day.

for me, it's bale vs keaton! michael keaton and tim burton were all right at first when jack nicholson blew us all away as the joker in the first film and then when both keaton and burton made batman returns, they both it more gothic than the first one. but i think in first place should be christian bale and christopher nolan, because they did a much better job of doing batman begins and dark knight than burton and keaton ever did. the thing with bale and nolan is 1st in batman begins cause, it's where bruce wayne goes under the guidance with liam neeson also known as ducard/ra's al ghul who teaches him to become batman, plus, bruce wayne would have to get a suit, equipment and the batcave to start the journey including the tumbler a.k.a the batmobile. in the dark knight, we meet the updated, new joker a.k.a heath ledger-i like him now, more compared to jack nicholson, cause, what he did as the joker was so clownish, especially with very old elongated revolvers that managed to blew up the batwing and has flags that said bang! on them. plus, he didn't kick much butt, did he? but, he was funny though including trashing up the art gallery and poisoning people with smylex gas.-the thing i like about heath ledger is that he's more psychotic, he kicks more butt, he's a man of his word, he doesn't use what nicholson used, he feels less pain, and he can do any killing job affectly and properly. that's why i like bale, ledger and nolan more better! can't wait for the dark knight rises. it's a sham that heath ledger is not alive to do it, i would love to see him again.

The only two people to even compare are Keaton and Conroy. Conroy is the voice of batman! If you even try to deny that you don't belong here. However Keaton is the only one, on camera, to portray the darkness of batman.
Bale is a HORRIBLE batman! I can't stand everyone giving him so much credit for nothing! People only say he's "the best" because the movie was GREAT! (I say movie because Begins was ok, TDK was amaizing) Bale's portrayal of batman/bruce wane is pathetic! He by far has the WORST Batman voice!
If they could have keaton on screen with conroy's voice as batman it would be the best of both worlds. However on screen (since I've never actually seen conroy in person) as an overall performance Keaton is the only one to capture both bruce and batman.
Bale plays it as an angry kid who's just trying to impress his girl; while Keaton really understood the darkness of batman, and lost person that is bruce wayne. Who is doing it by himself, beacuse he doesn't trust anyone else; nor needs anyone else. As much as I enjoy the character of Fox, I don't think so! The only one that Bruce can trust is Alfred! Eventually his sidekicks, but even then, not as much as bale depends on Fox.
Now to be far, to truly compare, you would have to put each actor in the other persons time. By doing that, you'll understand that Bale could never have been Batman in the late 80's early 90's; while Keaton would still be a great fit in the present day! You put Keaton as batman in the next movie, put this poll up again and most of the people that picked Bale would then say that Keaton was the best ever!

I'll leave you with this, try to take out the special affects, storyline, directors, and supporting actors/actress', etc. If you get down to what you think of when you think of Batman, you'll agree that Conroy is the voice you think of, and Keaton best fits an on screen portrayal.