Category: Comics & Comic Books

Some months back, I recall reading (but, evidently, not blogging about) a direct-to-video Batman Beyond movie, The Return of the Joker. The controversy at the time was that WB had announced it was making significant edits in the film to make it more children-friendly.

There were loud howls of censorship (which is nonsense, since that’s a governmental action, not an action by someone who owns an artisitic property) and aesthetic visigothism (which held more weight as an accusation). Of particular anger was that WB had passed on everything in the script, but was seemingly cowed at the last moment by various Washington rumblings about violence and kids (the video was released uncut in Europe and Asia). They forced the creators, after the fact, to go in and re-edit (some said gut) the film, and then pretended that was the plan all along. Only the availability of pre-release “screener” copies of the video allowed the public to know what had been excised. It was all a nasty enough tale to make me resolve to eschew the regular video release.

A special uncut version, though, has finally been released by WB, after a long letter-writing campaign. And I picked it up, and loved it.

First, I’ll say that WB had the right idea, but the wrong implementation. The Uncut version is too intense for little kids. It’s rated PG-13, and that may be too harsh, but I wouldn’t want to show it to kids in the single-digits of age. There are some extremely harsh psychological moments in this film, the stuff of nightmares, and it just would be wrong to run a kid through that (which, ironically, is one of the conflicts in the story).

Even the creative team behind the movie tacitly admits this in the audio track, made before the original release schedule was made, where they nervously chuckle, “I can’t believe we did that,” and “That’s just evil.” They also note some areas that WB asked them to tone done in storyboard, and admit the story came out better for it.

What WB should have done, though, is issued both versions at the same time, or at least announced that the uncut version would come out two months after the kid-friendlier one. Maybe they just didn’t realize there was enough demand. Silly boys — anime, super-heroes, and all that is hot-hot-hot.

I know of some folks who really despise Batman Beyond. Just to establish my quals here, I loved the original Batman: the Animated Series, and really liked The Adventures of Batman & Robin (better animation, not quite as good stories).

I was upset when that was all cancelled for Batman Beyond, a reconception of the character as a rebellious teen in a dystopian future.

For one thing, it seemed like a cop-out. Batman has been running in comics since the 1930s. You mean to say that they ran out of dynamically visual ideas for the cartoon already?

Part of it is annoyance at the economics of television. Most shows don’t actually make money during their first run. They don’t make it until they’re in syndication, which usually requires about three seasons worth of shows (since that’s enough for the syndicator to “strip” it, running an episode every day). That’s why low-margin, fair-rating shows have a hard time after three seasons, because there are automatically bean-counters who say, “Hey, let’s cancel it and sell it.” Even if there’s enough of an audience to justify it continuing were it one of the first three seasons, there’s an economic incentive to cut the cord after the third season’s over. I’ve always had the impression that it was this pressure that was behind WB cycling through different DC hero cartoons so quickly.

There was also a sense I had that the creators were just “tired” of the traditional Batman tales, and wanted to do something new. And that WB thought it could pump up the ratings by making it a show about a rebellious teen.

So, we toss out nearly all that we know, all the characterization and history and universe-building that’s been done, and head off to the future.

Feh. Been there, done that. And, frankly, even with the orignal Batman’s retro look, there isn’t much in the future that can’t be found in the “current day” setting.

The 40-years-ahead future Batman? Teen troublemaker Terry McGinnis. His dad getting bumped off sends him over the edge. When he stumbles on elderly Bruce Wayne’s former secret ID, Terry steals an experimental Bat-suit and goes out to avenge his Dad. Wayne likes the kid’s spunk, and a new partnership is born.

Frankly, teen drama doesn’t do anything for me. I was a teen once. I endured the drama. I don’t need to see more of it. Terry’s character gets to actually shine a bit in this DVD, as he tackles the Joker in a way the original Bats never did. But aside from those brief moments, toward the end of the flick, there’s not much to recommend Terry. He whines. He pouts. He worries about his girlfriend. He manages to bollix things up time and again despite having a (yawn) super-cool, strength-augmented, stealth bat-suit. Again, yawn. Spider-Man was doing that forty years ago.

No, what’s always held appeal for me in the BB universe comes to the fore here. Bruce Wayne. The original Batman. Still a strong, brooding figure, full of dark secrets, betrayed by a failing heart into giving up crime-fighting. Wayne, voiced by Kevin Conroy, is in many ways the heart of both the show and the movie. And for those missing the original Batman animated series, there’s an extended flashback in the middle of this DVD that returns us to those glory days — and reveals the secret around the disappearance of the Joker and what broke up the old Batman/Robin/Batgirl team.

The creators had one guiding principle in the new series, and that was not to simply resurrect all the old Bat-villains. Despite the presence of anarchistic “Joker gangs” in mid-21st Century Gotham, the real Mr. J. has been absent, with nobody talking about what happened to him, but hints of dialog between Terry, Bruce, and the current Police Commissioner, Barbara (Batgirl) Gordan. The “returned” Joker, voiced once more by Mark “Luke Skywalker” Hammill, is even crazier and darker than the original back in the old Bat-days. As he pursues his destructive vendetta against Gothan, Batman, and Bruce Wayne, secrets are revealed, stomachs are churned, and the ghosts of the past do all sorts of nasty things to all the remaining players in the present. Heck, we even learn why the elderly Bruce Wayne walks with a limp.

Despite frequent bouts of fisticuffs and some really nice blowing-up imagery (the animation here is a definite cut above the TV show), at the bottom of it this is a character piece. We learn why the Joker (and his sociopathic side-kick, Harley Quinn) were not to be laughed at. We learn more about the interactions between Robin, Batman (Wayne), and Batgirl, and what finally tore them apart. In Terry’s whining, we even learn more about his relationship with Wayne. Even Ace the Bat-dog gets some nice character scenes.

By turning an action/fantasy into a psycho-drama, the creators here (Paul Dini at the fore) have done something special. And while it’s not for little kids, older kids (as well as adults) have something to learn here, too, about dedication, danger, evil, and forgiveness. It strips the G-Rated veil away from what it would mean to have a psychopath like the Joker as your opponent, what you would be likely to suffer, and why you would have to ultimately prevail.

As much as BB has never fired my imagination, I wish the makers of live-action Batman flicks could come up with something half as good as this. And it just makes what WB did with the original version of this all the less forgiveable — not that they wanted something they could release to the little kids, but that they hid the more powerful version from the viewers who are older.