As much as I think that this grittiness thing has been slightly overdone on the Batman, I don't feel that trying to make Superheroes a little darker or trying to interpret their character in new directions and discussing new themes through the lense of an old comic book character such as the Batman is really such a bad thing. It's actually not that badly done in most recent superhero movies and I don't think that this new, darker style has taken the characters into a direction which makes them less enjoyable for a younger audience!
If you think about it, a lot of the recent movies about superheroes weren't actually THAT gritty or dark at all! Especially the Hulk, Spiderman or Iron Man movies, which were really fun to watch for both adults and youngsters, who don't (and don't have to) care about or understand the "deeper, (sometimes) ironic, intellectual points about it" to enjoy these movies. If they DO understand or care about these undertones that just enhances the experience for them.
I would have thought that you would be quite fond of this new direction superheroes have taken in the movies! After all, as you said, they make people who were probably pretty biased against the subject realize that "comics aren't just for kids anymore," thus gaining a larger audience for them and increasing their fan-base.
But maybe you are just bothered by your fascination with comics, which has apparently (and sadly enough) earned you a lot of bullying and alienation in your youth, suddenly moving into the focus of a main-stream audience, leaving you as just another fan, instead of a rather unique, but alienated expert on the subject (as was "indicated," happened to your knowledge of horror movies after the first Scream movie in your Scre4m review...)
Just some thoughts from my point of view.
EDIT: I just want to add that I don't think superheroes are supposed to be part of any intellectual discourse or anything. They are fantasies to escape to from time to time and don't have to be extraordinarily intelligent or "mature!"
