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REVIEW: Batman: Gotham Knight

I haven't seen it yet, but they're wrong about it being the first PG-13 animated movie in the series. That honor goes to Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker.

The didn't explain why Alfred's mustache disappeared in the last segment from when we see him at the end of the next-to-last one. Plus, Batman's outfits kept changing the whole time.

The next short, Crossfire, is easily the weakest on the disc...it's stilted, poorly written and cheaply animated. If there's a lone example in this film of how specifically not to use anime as a means to showcase creative and visual flair, this is it. The dialogue is uniformly terrible and the dub feels weak. The story is very simple; two detectives, one a big Batman fan and the other a skeptic who thinks he's a dangerous vigilante, deliver a criminal to Arkham Asylum, which is now an entire island. They find themselves in the middle of a mob war between the Russians and the Italians (a plot thread that weaves through most of the rest of the film), and Batman shows up to save them when they get caught in the – wait for it – crossfire! That's all there is to it.

it looks like high-end anime with very stereotypical character designs (ask yourself if you'd ever really want to see bishonen Bruce Wayne; if the answer is yes, this will be your personal favorite).

This leads into one of the stronger stories in the film, Field Test. ...It's nothing particularly special, but it's not bad.

It's entertaining enough but, like all the other shorts in this collection, it lacks any weight. Batman fights Killer Croc, thwarts the Scarecrow, the end.

Finally, there's Deadshot, a remarkably silly story about a tremendously skilled assassin who's taking down Gotham elites one by one....Problem is the story is really poorly-executed and way too short...It does attempt to tie up all the simplistic themes explored briefly in the other shorts, but it does so while simultaneously being clunky and lame.

Had they gone the route of The Animatrix – telling distinct, self-contained stories, perhaps with longer individual run times – or took cues from standard feature-length DC animated films and just told a normal narrative, Gotham Knight probably would've worked out. Unfortunately the creative decision to try and blend the two cripples the film.

It's important to note that Warner is really downplaying the anime angle; nowhere on the disc outside of the closing credits is there any mention of the Japanese directors who brought their unique styles to the shorts in this anthology.

Even they might find the writing to be extremely mediocre, especially when compared to previous animated efforts like the classic 1992 series Batman: The Animated Series, which was lauded again and again for its excellent writing. In fact, on the 2-disc DVD and Bluray special edition versions of this film, Warner saw fit to include 4 sterling episodes from that cartoon. They serve as a reminder of what Gotham Knight could've been, rather than the uneven, uninvolving and ultimately forgettable film it is.

In fact, on the 2-disc DVD and Bluray special edition versions of this film, Warner saw fit to include 4 sterling episodes from that cartoon. They serve as a reminder of what Gotham Knight could've been, rather than the uneven, uninvolving and ultimately forgettable film it is.

I remember liking "Heart of Ice", but it'd be considered sappy nowadays.

Quote:

I remember liking "Heart of Ice", but it'd be considered sappy nowadays.

I watched that for the first time in years the other day. It doesn't really do anything new for the Mr Freeze vengeful about wife story, but it's not bad.

166eric wrote:

Quote: I remember liking "Heart of Ice", but it'd be considered sappy nowadays. I watched that for the first time in years the other day. It doesn't really do anything new for the Mr Freeze vengeful about wife story, but it's not bad.

Uh, actually, "Heart of Ice" is where the "Mr. Freeze vengeful about wife story" comes from. Dini and Timm completely recreated the character, who was previously a gag villian at best. "Heart of Ice" is really the beginning of the modern Mr. Freeze, so yes, it certainly does something new, or it did, anyway.

You obviously haven't sat through that season which had crap character designs

166eric wrote:

Quote: I remember liking "Heart of Ice", but it'd be considered sappy nowadays. I watched that for the first time in years the other day. It doesn't really do anything new for the Mr Freeze vengeful about wife story, but it's not bad.

Uh, actually, "Heart of Ice" is where the "Mr. Freeze vengeful about wife story" comes from. Dini and Timm completely recreated the character, who was previously a gag villian at best. "Heart of Ice" is really the beginning of the modern Mr. Freeze, so yes, it certainly does something new, or it did, anyway.

The fact that it still holds up today is a testament to the creativity of Timm and Dini.