Superhero Media: Batman the Animated Series

Best Batman ever. Sorry Adam West, you shall be greatly missed, but you're a very close second to Kevin Conroy. Naturally I don't need to talk about how good this series is, it should speak for itself, but there are couple of things I wanted to discuss that won't quite fill up several "Thinking Out Loud" articles, so they may as well go here. Firstly, how can Warner Bros. not find a good outline for a Batman film when almost any of the Batman the Animated Series [BTAS] episodes would be a good starting point? Sure, there are a few duds like "Baby-Doll", though the pay-off for that one in a later season kind of makes it worth it. Most of the two-parters, like "Feat of Clay" and "Shadow of the Bat" would make a damn good 90 minute film with a little world-building added. Bruce Timm and Paul Dini are still around, why haven't they been approached to take a swing at the flailing Batman film franchise? 

Second, why are people so down of the 4th season of BTAS? Is it just because the animation style changes? Or even just because the design of the Joker takes a weird turn? Season 4 has some of the best episodes, hands down! Ok, the change in animation is jarring, but it was done to keep a unified style with Superman the Animated Series and Justice League, both of which are awesome in their own rights. Season 4 episodes like "Legends of the Dark Knight", "Mad Love" and "Judgment Day" are astonishingly good, stop shunting the later stuff off just because you don't like the Joker having black eyes. For me, a slightly odd-looking Joker is a decent trade-off for Nightwing, Batgirl and Robin. 

Finally, if we're to buy the idea, that in the DECU Films, Batman uses some kind of voice-modulator to disguise the fact he's Bruce Wayne (which is actually a pretty good idea), why not get Kevin Conroy to dub the dialogue? Fanboy moment? Sure. But you cannot deny that the Bale-grunting and Affleck-bot are tiresome, nor can you deny that Conroy has a hell of a voice for the character. It would differentiate Batman and Bruce Wayne, something the better Batman films do well, give a fun nod for the fans and keep the seed of the good idea that the modulation was to begin with. On a similar note, now that Mark Hamill is back to major film roles, if DC and WB insist on doing "Old Batman", why not get Hamill in as "Old Joker"? Just a thought. Haven't seen BTAS? It's as good as you've heard. The DVDs are finally available in Australia for a reasonable price, so I assume they're elsewhere too; check it out, a great addition to the collection.