Remember when Batman: The Animated Series was an anime abomination that is going to ruin Batman forever because it should look like a real cartoon for adults and not babies?
It’s gonna be a fun show, even if they’re not keeping the Timm styling. Besides, I’m gonna be watching it for Lauren Faust’s Super BFFs segment; her stylized Supergirl is awesome.
“They’re making some KID Batman? And it’s in the future, but it’s not the Legion or anything like that? Oh God, this will suck so bad, why would they do this???”
You forgot the part about, “I read about Batman’s future, he returns from retirement, gets a girls Robin, fights punks in a tank, fights Superman and ‘dies’!”
I didn’t care for the batman but it wasn’t because of the animation. on a related note I was just a kid when batman beyond came out what was the outrage because of that?
I don’t remember “outrage,” exactly, but I know a lot of Batman fans (most of whom loved the Animated Series) felt that it wasn’t really Batman. I was one of those people. Never really liked it, although I did like the Return of the Joker movie, except for the cop-out ending.
I never did really give “The Batman” a fair shake because one, I don’t like reboots when there doesn’t need to be, and two, because they made Bruce Wayne look too much like Jackie Chan in my opinion.
Well, it was made by the same studio that did Jackie Chan Adventures. I admit I was rather hung up on the art style myself at first, but I came to really love the show.
I hated Batman Beyond as a kid because it seemed like they took away everything that made Batman cool. The intelligence, the skill, the refinery, the utility belt, the batmobile, the intimidation factor and the fear he incites in the criminals. They got rid of all Batman’s cool villains. The ability to kick ass without having beyond human abilities. I insisted quite vehemently that this wasn’t Batman at all but just some kid in a supersuit.
I certainly loved the movie. That was some bitchin stuff, but ultimately I didn’t come to like Batman Beyond in general until I revisited it the better part of a decade later. It’s awesome, and I can see that now, but I was probably about twelve or so and I couldn’t get past the fact that none of the things I liked about Batman were present in this incarnation.
I loved BTAS, I had no idea people had problems with it, but then again I was 9 when it premiered. However, I think you’re omitting Batman Beyond from your chalkboard list there.
I remember some critic’s saying it was “too dark” for a kid’s show, but never anything about the quality.
I love Bruce Timm’s art, but after seeing the GL stuff and even the JL opening, it just doesn’t really translate well in CGI. I’m not sure if the studio is truly going for a “Timm” style here though, because Batman’s head shape is radically different.
I could never get into “The Batman” but I love “Brave in the Bold,” I assume that’s going to be cancelled for this new series?
Not cancelled, ended. It got 65 episodes, the standard for a successful American cartoon. Brave and the Bold would have been canceled even without an upcoming Batman cartoon.
I don’t like the squat head and the big lips on Batman, and I don’t like CGI cartoons as they are made at this era in time (I don’t think the technology has advanced enough to make it anywhere near as good the more drawn cartoons these days). I miss a Transformers that didn’t fight in an endless series of nearly identical looking canyons.
But I also remember how the still images from the Legion of Superheroes and Brave and the Bold shows looked pretty bad until I saw them in action.
The original Transformers fought in an endless series of nearly identical canyons! That was the entire first season!
Transformers: Prime has *way* more variety in their settings than most series previous. It’s crazy how beautiful and complex its backgrounds are. I don’t think the environment designers get time to eat or sleep.
Fair enough, I was just nostalgic for Animated. The only nostalgia I actually retain from the 80s is how I vaguely recall female characters actually getting action figures made of them.
I rather like Prime, by the way. I think they’ve done a great job with their characters and I even like Miko (though it took me 20 or so episodes to warm up to her). I just don’t ever really feel like the action ever takes place anywhere.
I actually generally like the humans – I haven’t seen RiD or the Unicron Saga, and didn’t really like Marvel G1 in general, but aside from AHM-era IDW-Spike, and RotF Mikaela, I’ve liked all the Human Friends in the series I’m familiar with. (…Now I’m imagining Fluffmodeus as an Autobot. ‘Hello, Human Friend!’ That’s…a worrying image.)
I like her fine, but it seems like in a lot of episodes, they don’t use her as a character and more as a formula to keep the humans involved. Miko runs off to join in a fight, Jack and Raph try to stop her, they get dragged along, wash-rinse-repeat.
If they would break this formula, I think Miko would get a lot more approval. And it would be ridiculously easy to do – just have the Autobots start acknowledging that the kids have helped plenty, and could easily be of more use than just “holding down the fort.”
To be fair, I seem to remember them fighting in the arctic with Skyfire, Cybertron, an Inca Temple or something in Peru and Sherman Dam. Then of course second season they were all over the place, football stadiums, alien planets, Arthurian Camelot, Discos, etc.
I’ve never liked a CG-animated TV series, either, but I can’t fault them for trying. You don’t improve the technology by not using it until it’s ready. You just have to suffer through the growing pains.
Similarly, someday, motion capture movies will all look as good as (or better than) Avatar, not that God-awful Polar Express crap.
I really like Transformers Prime, and Iron Man Armored Adventures, and, honestly, that’s why it kills me to think “this looks so dated now, how’s it going to look in 10-20 years?”
The more stylized a CGI show is, the better it ages, I find. Beast Machines’s art is often so abstract that it doesn’t really matter how complex its rendering was, for example, while Beast Wars’ attempt at pseudo-realism fares much worse. Beast Wars’ saving grace is that all of its cast are robots, who don’t have to look real to look “real.” Their environment, the animals, and their Neanderthal pals, not so much.
Transformers: Prime is purposefully cartoony and stylized, so I think it’ll still look okay years from now.
(This isn’t a phenomenon that’s limited to CGI, by the way. Batman: The Animated Series doesn’t look so hot, either, compared to the tightness of modern computer-colored cel animation. Technology advances on all fronts.)
I know animation styles age, and nothing is immortal, and one day I, too, will die. Batman the Animated Series probably should look dated-it is old, after all. I just feel that by choosing to use today’s television series level of CGI animation they are shrinking the life cycle of their shows significantly.
The main aim of a Transformers show is to sell the toys currently in the shops (or, er, in the shops later in the year). How good that cartoon will look in 10 years is fairly irrelevent for Hasbro.
And how many of the toys currently on the shelves are selling now simply because of the fanboys from the Transformers incarnations no longer on the air?
And the 80s cartoon looks terrible and dated, even though it was great animation for its time. I’m not sure what the difference is.
It’s more important that today’s kids *remember* the show being awesome if you want to factor in how they’ll feel about the show decades later. And by using cutting edge animation now, that seems to be accomplishing that. If it looks terrible by comparison later, who cares? G1 looks terrible, and that didn’t stop it from ballooning into the franchise it is today.
(Putting it on a network that not many people get, though, somewhat negates that.)
that’s pretty apt for batman, at least nowadays. anyone else remember batman w/a gun? http://sacomics.blogspot.com/2005/08/batman-and-guns.html also i was reading about the comicon panel where they said it was going to be a darker version of batman. the art doesn’t look like it’ll do it, but i’ll give it a go
I wish he had his shotgun and not pistols. I always love when Alfred busts out the shotgun. He kind of reminds me of Walter from Hellsing this way, though.
Shotgun would have more limited nonlethal applications than dual pistols though. I assume he’s gonna be doing that whole thing where you shoot all sorts of stuff that isn’t people. Shoot a pipe to scald the enemy with hot gasses. Shoot a loose piece of construction to have a ceiling girder fall down and pin the bad guy to the ground. Probably doing small amounts of “Non-kill shots” on people. A leg shot to stop someone moving, with even more liberal interpretations of nonlethal when going up against superhumans. Maybe if they’re feeling particularly clever they’ll have Alfred working cover fire in creative ways. If they’re really thinking they’ll give him an assortment of trick bullets with manifold applications.
All of this is just so much harder to do with a gun that only shoots five feet and has a shot wide enough to to cover an entire torso. For all that a shotgun is perfect for Alfred’s current role, I have trouble envisioning what he’d do with it tagging along with Batman on the nightly patrols.
Shotguns really aren’t *that* short ranged, and the spread depends on what kind of load they’ve got and barrel length. It’s sawed-off shotguns or blunderbusses that come closest to behaving like video game shotguns. Heck, shotguns already *have* more less-than-lethal options than pistols. Bean-bag rounds, taser rounds, etc., etc.
My big wonder here is why Alfred’s not got any sort of disguise in the promo image, if he’s going to be used as any sort of a sidekick or backup for Batman. When Bruce Wayne’s butler is going all vigilante, you’d think somebody’d notice.
I have very little actual knowledge of guns. On TV the shotgun’s usually used to obliterate something directly in front of you. In COD4 the shotgun has the same effective range as your knife.
Anyway that’s certainly cool. The existing nonlethal ammo for the gun actually really interests me. It would fit right in with some of the more militant renditions of Batman, which might be what they’re going for here. There are a lot of ways that could work really well. Obviously it would give him an entirely different dynamic in how the action scene choreography, but it sounds like it could be a really cool dynamic in the hands of someone who knew what they were doing. I’d love to see that.
I’ll give the show a chance because hey why not…but oof that art is looking a little rough.
But wow did people really rage on BTAS? ’92 makes me 2 so I definitely wasn’t on the forums or whatever y’all did back in 92…but I ended up loving that fiercely so maybe this’ll be like that.
Then again why can’t we just have 90s Batman again? Please?
People hated BTAS because it looked different. Until BTAS, every non-talking-animal cartoon looked roughly the same. If you’d seen G.I. Joe, then you’d seen what every other “realistic” cartoon looked like.
BTAS dropped a lot of detail from its models so that they would animate better. It was done in a style. Fans raged. Until they saw the damn thing.
Kind of like The Dark Knight’s Joker. Man, the people foaming at their mouths when they saw that first promo image of Heath Ledger. And now all those same people are dressing as him for every Halloween.
I kind of miss that “realistic” style (as terrible as it made animation). I’d pay good money for another action cartoon in the style of, say, Gargoyles again.
I’ve had experience with judging shows based solely on the promo image. If you look at Transformers Animated and Teen Titans’ promo images, they look archaic to how the shows eventually came to look. So initial knee-jerk reactions to the image were accurate, but the image didn’t properly relate to the final product.
Honestly, I wish a few cartoon studios would return to the “realistic” style of the Joe toon. Seems like nowadays EVERY cartoon on CN drops the detail and stylizes the characters, and we end up with cartoon series that all basically look the same. (X-Men Evolutions, Megas XLR, Generator Rex, etc.) Then of course you have the shows aimed at smaller childeren that look like flat 2-d “flash” animation. It’d be nice to see something artistically different from the pack.
I dunno they all visually look pretty similar to me, and I’m not saying any of these shows are BAD, just that these cartoons all share the same aesthetics, imo. Nor did I say the 80′s “realistic” art of Jem, etc. is ALL I want on TV, just that a little variety would be nice.
Also, just because someone disagrees with you on something, doesn’t automatically make them a “troll.” I certainly wasn’t trying to push any of your buttons because honestly I don’t even know what the hell you’re opinions are on “Generator Rex” or “Megas.” (I think I remember that you liked X-Men Evo but so did I, so I’m not “bashing” that.)
But if not agreeing with you 100% on everything = troll then I’d MUCH rather be thought of as a troll then some pathetic sycophant, with no original thoughts of my own.
I have no opinion on the quality of those three shows. I am just boggling at the idea that the three are drawn in an identical style. I went back to look them up to make sure I wasn’t misremembering them, but no. If they’re all the same style, then so are Questionable Content, Bad Machinery, and Girls with Slingshots.
I think the word you’re looking for is “different.”
It’s a different take on many aspects of Batman, but if you can take it for what it is, it’s quite fun. There’s less focus on the psychological issues than B:TAS, but the action is quite well done. And the animation is waaaaaay smoother than B:TAS.
The first season honestly wasn’t very good (well, what I’ve watched of it. I kinda stopped at the Penguin episode) but from The Batman vs. Dracula on, it was fantastic.
Why is that a bad thing? Does The Penguin have some character trait that says he shouldn’t know how to hold his own in hand-to-hand combat? I mean, yes it’s weird but so is weaponry stored inside umbrellas.
The Batman’s The Penguin is by far my favorite Penguin. Penguin’s always such a waste of a character elsewhere, but in The Batman, he’s greatly entertaining.
Mr. Freeze isn’t a scientist, he’s a generic, two-bit diamond thief. Because diamonds are ICE, and everyone knows that his defining trait wasn’t being a tragic figure trying to save his sick wife, it’s ice puns.
Although, I’d like some examples of bad voice acting myself. Not everything can use Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill. Even though I’m pretty sure The Batman did use them at one point.
Considering that what you consider to be his “defining trait” was introduced in Batman the Animated Series only 12 years earlier, I don’t think the term means what you think it does.
IN this case, it does. It was adopted so readily it really became the characters defining trait, at least aside from using an ice gun. Much the same way batman used a gun early on, but his eschewing them is at this point a defining trait.
But the point of The Batman was that it was an alternate take on the mythos. Freeze wasn’t as compelling a character, no, but he got to just be an unabashed evil villain, which was more in keeping with the show’s mood.
I thought The Batman versions of Poison Ivy and Clay Face were rather good. Mr. Freeze was a bit too much of a generic thug with Ice Powers for my taste, and I didn’t like the Joker design.
All and all, I thought it was okay, but the weakest of the 4 Batman TV series to come out during my lifetime.
I know in my other post on this page I said I didn’t really give “The Batman” a fair shake, but that Joker redesign was one of the few things I liked about it. Maybe it was the combo of the fact that he now looked unpredictable, and the new voice had a darker tone than Mark Hamill’s Joker. Or it could be the fact that it was a departure from the Cesar Romero-type suited Joker. I may have to revisit it on DVD (or BluRay) some day, when my feelings on most of the artwork have subsided.
i agree, that joker was among my favorites to appear in a cartoon to date, and i always felt that his inhuman features were more than a little fitting for his psyche.
I didn’t give The Batman a fair shake. I kept wondering when The Joker had time to be a part of Korn…
I didn’t start watching it really until The Robin and The Batgirl came along. There were some good episodes though and I liked how The Oracle and The Nightwing were included in one episode.
Yeah, I hate to say it, but B:TAS looked great from moment 1, and turned out to be a great show, while The Batman … well. Lacked the mood, and the voice acting, and the art. But also? Too many “Look, if I can see this is a shit idea, Batman who supposedly is a genius really should know better!” moments. That he looked really fug as Bruce and unimposing as Batman didn’t exactly help, either. I have no idea what the point of that show was, anyway. They just should’ve added some episodes to the B:TAS canon instead. If it ain’t broke, don’t reboot it.
The art style? The art style was one of the better and more notable things about that show. I tuned in just to see the crazy character designs for the villians. Every single villian was completely recognizable just by their sillhouette. I’m also going to go ahead and say it: The Batman is the only thing that really got me to like Dick Grayson as Robin and Barbara Gordon as Batgirl.
I love what they did with Clayface in The Batman. And I really dug the Joker’s design as well. It was a damned good cartoon, from some damned good animators…
I also loved the Jackie Chan cartoon. It was nice to see a cartoon last so long and not have any kind of merchandising tie-in.
…Who are these people that claimed this about Batman: TAS, and where do I go to slap the living shit out of them?
The others…okay. I’ll admit. I didn’t think The Batman or B&B were going to do well AT FIRST, but I chalk it up to just being so different, and so immediately following the OTHER Batman cartoons. It’s just weird to drop one show and immediately create another one when that other show could just still be running.
Why not give some space between the Batman shows instead? Why does it need to be immediately following the end of the other show?
I don’t know why they didn’t, but I know they couldn’t use Scarecrow or Two-Face because they were gonna be in the Nolan movies. Dunno why they didn’t take out Joker too, I guess just cause he’s, you know, The Batman’s nemesis.
But it was kinda cool they changed it around some, making Clayface the friend-of-Bruce-who-was-horribly-disfigured and making Penguin surprisingly badass. Also, introducing Batgirl first because Robin was also in another show at the time. Again, I think that kind of works with their naming- always thought it a little strange that it would go Batman, Robin, Batgirl- why wouldn’t she pick a more unique name, since Robin already had?
I think you misread the person you’re responding to. I do believe that he or she wasn’t referring to the series “The Batman,” but was asking why they don’t take more time between series starring Batman.
Yeah, I like those, but funny enough, it was not my favorite- all the treamups kind of gave short shrift to Batgirl and Robin, their dynamic with Batman is one of my favorite parts of the show. But a great, different take on the JL.
It looks kind of like The Batman, which is awesome, so in in favor. Though I really don’t like Professor Pyg- he just doesn’t sit right with me. But maybe in the adaptation to a kid’s cartoon, they’ll take out all the icky stuff with the barbed wire and acid glue and make him into a more enjoyable character. You know, like they did with Starfire.
I love Professor Pyg. He feels genuinely mentally ill and not just comic book crazy, and I read him in the voice of Rex Harrison. I have a feeling I’m going to be let down by whoever does his voice because I have the bar set so high.
Yeah, maybe that’s why it made me so uncomfortable, that he seemed actually mentally ill and not comic book-crazy. The whole thing just was a little more unsettling than entertaining to me.
I think that Rob over at Topless Robot had some salient points about the promo image. Mainly, he was mad about Alfred shooting guns, which would not seem to fit at ALL well with Batman’s one rule: that he doesn’t kill people. It’s rather difficult to reliably shoot someone in a way that doesn’t kill or permanently cripple them.
That’s totally different though. Alfred would, promo and description implying it, be running around as Batman’s sidekick guns blazing to fight crime. Now Bats does allow Alfred a shotgun in the gave, even though he wishes he didn’t have it, but his rule for the longest time (like the 40s and up I think?) has always been no guns. I even vaguely remember a story where he asked Gordon not to draw in a situation where it would have helped.
My biggest issue with Beware the Batman though is that in an effort to do something different, they over thought things. We’ve yet to get a Batman cartoon featuring a ton of his supporting cast. Damien, Cass, Steph, Kate, Tim (Timm admitted the BTAS version was more of a toned down Jason Todd then Tim Drake), a non-flash forward Oracle, Azrael, A good chuck of the GCPD, Knight, Squire, and more have still not received proper other media appearances at all. Now they could of course appear, and hopefully they do, but the press release implies that Katana and Alfred are the shows main supporting cast, and that’s really my biggest issue with what we know about this show.
My biggest issue though, above all else, is that Katana, a character I really do like a lot, has no place to be in a Batman show’s main cast over Cass Cain, the series perfectly usable and fresh for other media Asian Batgirl.
But since it’s already been established in the comics that Alfred will wield a gun when necessary, it’s a patently illogical complaint (as is most of what’s posted on TR).
yes however Gordon uses guns as a part of his JOB Alfred is a BUTLER.
on top of that Alfred KNEW Bruce’s parents and raised Bruce himself, i think he’d shy away from guns just out of respect for Bruce.
Batman Beyond Batman had bladed explosive batarangs. The Batman’s Batman had a series of capsules that would perform a variety of purposes including freezing someone solid. Batman in Batman: Under The Red Hood had Ironman style repulsers that could launch someone halfway across the city, a rocket-launcher type device designed for taking down helicopters, large amounts of plastique, and was perfectly cool with Nightwing having those two knives he shoved in Amazo’s ears. Batman: The Brave and the Bold’s Batman has a lasersword in his utility belt, Bat-grenades, and regularly teams up with the Blue Beetle who’s basically a gun-based arsenal on crack and steroids.
All these items were entirely nonlethal in Batman’s hands. Same for his teammates. I think Alfred’s gonna manage to keep his little peashooters from killing anyone just fine.
I loved BTAS and the New Adventures from promotional to end. Although I did think Batman Beyond was going to be a pile of dumb bullshit based on the promotional footage and trailers (I loved it in the end, but yeah, that was definitely a divisive moment for Batman fans)
I never got into any of the other Batman cartoons, but what I did watch of “The Batman” was stupid. Penguin and Joker are both hyper-bad ass kung fu experts? WTF?
Joker was never really a badass kung fu expert, he just moved in a really unpredictable way and used his gimmicks to amplify that unpredictability. Pretty much the Joker’s defining trait, just in a series that focused more on action.
You really do need to go beyond the first season. What got me into it was The Batman vs Dracula. Before then, I was much like you.
My initial reaction to the style is “Aw hell no!” but I have to stop and remind myself that I thought Brave and the Bold’s promo image made the show look stupid as hell.
Never so glad to be proven wrong. (Still kinda wish the Batgirl show had been a real thing…)
Stupid as hell is kind of the Brave and the Bold’s thing, though. It’s got more in common with pre-Kirby Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olson with a dash of Superfriends than much else. It doesn’t stop being stupid. It just does stupid very well.
I’d just like to say that after all of this talk, I feel very old compared to the rest of you.
That said, I’ve watched all the shows named here except for Prime (no access to the HUB and haven’t taken the time to stream it yet), and loved all of them for different reasons.
I don’t dislike the new artstyle, but Alfred shooting dual pistols? Seriously? Reminds me of that All Star Batman crap with the super buff Alfred, who at first glance I thought was Bruce Wayne.
Anyway, gotta be better than The Batman, since that show’s villains ended up going back to the stupid camp stuff. I have to say, it’s ironic that people here want others to accept The Batman’s one-dimensional villains while lambasting still others for wanting one-dimensional badass transformers characters. As an example, having Mr. Freeze turn out to be a tragic, sympathetic character then returning him to be a borderline retarded villain is going to rub a lot of people the wrong way, like it or not. I have to wonder if people here would cry foul if Beast Wars was remade and Megatron was a bumbling, screaming oaf instead of the megalomaniacal genius he used to be.
Shotguns and dual pistols imply different things, though, and are handled vastly differently due to their difference in size, pull back, firing spread, etc.
Dual pistols are – in addition to being incredibly impractical – mainly used in gun fu style battles like The Matrix or any film that stars Chow Yun Fat. Alfred’s generally too old to do that kind of stuff (well, in my opinion; most of the time he looks too elderly to be jumping around doing kung fu stuff).
Shotguns, however, require strict foot placement, careful aiming, a good posture, etc; it’s more of a weapon that you use to stand your ground with, which fits Alfred – when he needs to fight it’s probably a “you shall not pass” moment – something that has defeated Batman or reached the Batcave will probably not be hurt by dual pistols.
Shotguns may fit today’s comic book Alfred better.
But handguns might fit a different version of Alfred better. And different versions aren’t always bad, or else BTAS Mr. Freeze was a wrongheaded idea for diverging from the source material. I’m perfectly happy to see the Batman mythos continue to be experimented with. BTAS changed the way we thought about a lot of Batman’s world. Other shows should be allowed to attempt the same thing.
I don’t disagree. I was going on one image because one image is all we have. If Alfred is this guy who’s in his mid-40s to 50s while Batman’s still in his 20s, I could see how it could maybe work out.
Still though, I always thought of Alfred as the ‘holding down the fort’ type (since he’s a butler and all). I do agree that it cou change how we think about the Batman mythos, however I really think that some things can’t be changed, otherwise you risk upsetting the innate themes of the characters (as an example, a Batman show where his parents are still alive? Everyone would go WTF).
Nevermind Mr Freeze. Just look at how BTAS completely changed Clock King! Without his time stop powers he’s just a schmuck whose most impressive ability is reading the train schedule.
As an aside, I find it really irritating that you decide to act like a snarky asshole whenever anyone DARES question something, or dislikes something you don’t, or vice versa. I can respect your opinions, but I can’t respect you when you act like a smarmy hypocrite.
Your first post in this thread included passive-aggressive snark. Are you the only one allowed to be smarmy? Is it unfair that other people can respond in kind?
There’s a difference between being smarmy towards a form of media and people. As an example, “this Batman show looks horrible” and “the people who made this Batman show are horrible people” imply different things. I made a halfway snarky statement about a TV show (not even your opinion about the show), you made a smarmy statement about ME and my opinions.
You were being smarmy towards people, is the thing. “I have to say, it’s ironic that people here want others to accept The Batman’s one-dimensional villains while lambasting still others for wanting one-dimensional badass transformers characters.” How is that about the show and not the people here? Your first comment was focused on the opinions of others.
I responded with three comic book scans. I am so sorry.
Maybe you just automatically talk in snark and don’t realize it. It happens to me, too. Opinions can definitely be wrong, but when you attack others’ opinions for allegedly being stupid and hypocritical, you should maybe allow for a little blowback, and not be so shocked when it happens.
(You’ll notice that I’ve matched the tone of your posts when I respond to them. The snarky ones I snark back. The less snarky ones I debate more evenly. If you don’t want snark, start with no snark.)
I don’t see how that’s snarky. There’s no passive-aggressive behavior, I just threw it out there. I wanted to highlight the incongruity and incompatibility of the two lines of thought, is all. I wasn’t judging or whining or anything, really. Just making an observation about some of the opinions held here. Note that I didn’t imply or say how that’s stupid or dumb or what-have-you; just that it’s ironic. Maybe I should have used a different word (I only used ‘ironic,’ as ‘hypocritical’ was insulting and I didn’t want to do that), since you still took it the wrong way.
Regardless, it wasn’t about the scans. More about your implication that my opinion was wrong/stupid. “Alfred has used guns on several occasions” would have worked just as well without implying anything insulting.
It was the great (and FAR more snarky than Willis) Harlan Ellison who said: “you are NOT entitled to an opinion. You are entitled to an INFORMED opinion.”
Posting pictures as a refutation is snarky somehow? That doesn’t make a lot of sense. If anything, a simple image refutation would be one way to completely remove all emotion out of the response and just present facts. If you’re reading snarkiness from that then you’re a bit oversensitive, hon.
I think what lets B:TAS age so well is it was designed to look old and classic from the get go, being inspired by the Fleischer Bros Superman cartoons. On another note, I just realized that next year will be the 20th anniversary of B:TAS, and I am old.
Batman the Animated Series has not aged well. The animation is still very archaic by today’s standards, and fluctuates even within the same episode.
It really didn’t get a solid animation down until The New Batman Adventures that eventually became the same style used in Superman The Animated Series and Justice League, etc.
I admit my initial reaction is skepticism, but that’s just because the promotional image looks like a generic action movie poster with the Batman logo slapped on it. Also, though I love Katana as a character, WTF is she doing as a major character in a Batman cartoon? WHY NOT CASSANDRA CAIN?!?!?! *capslock raeg*
(Oddly enough, Alfred as a gun-toting badass doesn’t bother me.)
I’ll give it a shot, though, despite my trepidation. Promotional images are never a good indicator for the quality of the final project.
Now see, I don’t think the chosen art style has any bearing on the ultimate quality of the show whatsoever. “Beware” could suck, could be awesome, we won’t know until we see it.
That being said, I think it looks hideous. Just don’t like the art style. Just like I didn’t like the later DCAU art style, circa “Batman” and JL/JLU. That big chest, tiny legs, extra-long ears stuff . . . ick.
After reading Willis’ comic I did a web search to find the offending image. And yeah, that is pretty darn ugly design. No comment on what the show will be like since I don’t have any information on that, but the character design is not appealing.
I don’t like the style. That being said, I didn’t initially like the style of Teen Titans.
Don’t have a problem with Alfred using guns. It’s not terrible. There’s a difference between protecting your home and gunning down someone in the streets. We don’t know where this is going to lead, so I’d sit on it.
If Batman starts using a gun, I’ll be a little mad. Yeah, he’s used a gun before, and in most of the instances that come to mind, that was a last ditch effort that still had him questioning what he had done.
While I respect Carrie’s status as first girl Robin, that’s pretty much all she is to me: a name, an image, and the title “first girl Robin”. I know nothing of her as a character, as I haven’t read DKR.
On the other hand, I know Steph, and I love her. Especially when she and Cass are working together, they’re such perfect BFF in both harmony and contrast. That same contrast she has with Bruce is what makes her a good Robin. Like Dick, she’s light and upbeat to Bruce’s dark. She’s the type of Robin Bruce should have.
(Tangentally: Damian worked as Dick’s Robin, not a fan of him as Bruce’s)
So not that I’d be against Carrie, but if I’m living in a fantasy world, mine’s Steph-Robin.
I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that it’s the same reason Robin was initially absent from The Batman – with Young Justice currently airing with Robin as a main character, it’s possibly a similar restriction to The Batman and Teen Titans being on at the same time. As for Batgirl, no idea. Maybe she’s planned to show up in some later YJ episodes (Barbara has already made a brief appearance).
No, I don’t at all remember people disliking Batman the Animated Series before it came on. Because I didn’t have a computer or internet access back then.
So not only am I old, but I grew up poor. Thanks for the reminder, jerk!
“Remember when Batman: The Animated Series was an anime abomination that is going to ruin Batman forever because it should look like a real cartoon for adults and not babies?
“I do.
“Because I’m old.”
I’m older than you, and I don’t remember anything of the sort. Of course, I wasn’t online as long as you . . .
I don’t recall any hate for the original BTAS, but there was plenty when Timm gave all the characters bigfoot designs to keep the animators from bankrupting themselves putting all their manpower on one project.
I don’t like the way Batman looks in the picture but I am going to try to be fair to the cartoon when it comes out, after all I didn’t think I’d like Brave and the bold due to its light hearted style but after watching it I love it.
If Disgruntled Guy had been talking about the upcoming CREEN LANTERN cartoon, he’d have been right on the money. Ugh. I’ve seen first generation Playstation ONE videogames with better graphics than that show. Hell, I’ve seen Super Nintendo games with better graphics than that show!
But then again, it’s Hal Jordan…and no one outside of Geoff “Captian Yesterday” Johns gives a flying fuck about him, as the movie’s box office numbers shows (#11 in the worst box office BOMBS of all time, BTW).
I think the GL movie was less a bomb because it was a Hall Jordan movie and more a bomb because it sucked Donkey Balls. Terrible writing and direction is universal, regardless of the character.
In all fairness, Hal Jordan is still the more recongised Green Lantern character of the two (Though I’d wager that John Stewart may be more so). More then likely reactions to a Kyle Rayner GL movie would have been along the lines of “Who’s this guy? I thought he was a pilot!”
I thought the same from the first creapy images of Spectacular Spiderman.
I still find their eyes creapy as hell….but holy fuck that cartoon was awesome.
the only thing that bothers me about “beware the batman” alfred is that he appears to be helping batman in his normal clothes. wouldn’t gothamites start wondering why bruce wayne’s butler is prowling the streets with batman?
the press release for this show says that it will be part of an hour long block called DC nation. that means there’s only room for two DC cartoons, which makes me a little worried about young justice. have they already decided it’s going away when BTB starts up?
Flip the chalk board over Robin, your handy work is still there. I’m telling you this angry guy who comes in every so often is TOTALLY Ethans wet dream. (LOL) Just kidding.
I’m sad to say, it took me a second to figure out it was the SP-version of Rob– at first, I was like, ‘Charlie Brown sure likes Ethan!’
As far as the new show, I will reserve judgement until I see it. I recall a bunch of Wonder Woman fans (often a contentious bunch, even by geek standards) complaining about the promo illustration of the direct to DVD Wondie and her ‘butterface.’ Just because she had a nose that wasn’t a perfect aqualine form, they were ready to tear apart everything about it. Ah well.
Oh, also, in regards to ‘The Batman’ I agree that the later seasons were better. I hated the character designs (mostly), but loved some of their more clever plots/ideas. Joker pretends to be Batman? Awesome!
The original pitch for the next show had Cass in it and was gonna be 90s~early 00 Comics based. I imagine Katana is what was left over from Cass. I’m guessing they didn’t wanna use Cass because either Barbara was more recognizable (which is because she’s the ONLY ONE WHO’S BEEN SHOWN OUTSIDE THE COMICS) or she was gonna be in another cartoon and they wanted to have the same type of thing and settled on Katana. Or possibly Katana got popular amongst the staff or fans from B&TB and they wanted to use her? I’m not quite sure but that’s what I remember.
That was a different show. The first rejected pitch revealed to the fans was a Batfamily show with Cass, Damien, Dick, Selina, and Bruce dealing with a No Man’s Land like crisis. It was deemed to dark and was rejected.
Another I’ve read about was a Quantum Leap-like show about Batman being guided back to his own time by The Phantom Stranger after getting hit with Darkseid’s omega beams.
Both sound pretty awesome if you ask me, and it’s a real shame they were passed over. Especially the first one since it was exactly what I wanted in a new Batman cartoon.
On a sidenote, much like Ethan I get irritated when people say the animation is bad when they mean the art style is bad. It’s a huge pet peeve of mine.
Ah, well I do agree. I really wanted the batfamily one because that’s exactly what I was hoping for. :C
And on the art style thing…yeah that’s a major pet peeve of mine too. Animation = / Art Style and Artstyle = / = Quality of a show
You’d think people who’re familiar with video games would know that the look of something doesn’t mean it’ll be good or bad (two different mediums, but really, whether you like the aesthetics or not, that doesn’t make the show wholly bad or good on it’s own)
You’d think people who’re familiar with video games would know the look of something doesn’t mean it’ll be good or bad, and yet everyone threw huge fits over that celshaded cartoony Link video game. D’oh well.
I don’t remember anyone saying Batman:TAS was going to be shit because I was four. I only remember watching it with my dad on Saturday mornings and having him tell me a whole bunch of other Batman stories during the commercials.
I’m surprised to hear (almost 20 years later) that there were haters for B:TAS when it was announced. I remember seeing a trailer for it at a con (the aerial battle with Man-Bat, as a matter of fact) and the audience loved it.
Just the notion of an animated adventure show where there was, y’know, action, seemed positively revolutionary in 1992. And, hey, the cops and the villains used real guns that shot bullets and everything!
Now, granted, I was 28 when I saw that trailer and basically hadn’t watched any made-for-TV cartoons in almost 15 years (my first job was working on Saturday mornings, so that broke my habit pretty fast). And I remembered the last animated Batman: The one from 1977, that had Bat-Mite and used the 1966 Filmation model sheets.
I did think the retro design with modern tech was a little weird at first, but the rest was just so damn good I accepted the 1940s-looking police cars and modern computers side-by-side. And the show just got better and better-looking over its run, too. Batman Beyond, I kinda liked too. Still looked good, Terry wasn’t irritating. The Batman, now, I never got into. Didn’t care much for the design (mainly on the villains. THE JOKER DOES NOT REQUIRE A RESDESIGN) of the series, and I thought the non-ballistic guns the cops used were just plain stupid. I’m sure that was a standards-and-practices thing, but it still bugged me. “Hey, there’s the bad guy! I’ll just step out of my Chevy Corvair and blast him with my ray gun!” Bah.
Haven’t seen much of The Brave and the Bold, either, but I caught the “Elseworlds” one and it was a blast to see the Wally Wood MAD parody animated.
So I’ll go watch the promo for the new one and see how it looks, and when it airs I’ll watch it and assess the actual finished product (novel approach, I know, but I’ll stick with it).
I realize that there were shows during my vacation from Saturday morning (and weekday afternoon) cartoons that had action, despite what I wrote above, but I don’t really look at robots fighting the same way as I do humans fighting. Remember, I had last watched during the period where Popeye wasn’t allowed to hit anyone (seriously!) and the Justice League of America (aka “the Super Friends”) sat around the Hall of Justice discussing–at great length–the best way to talk the villain of the week –who was rarely if ever actually evil, just misunderstood– into seeing the error of his ways. So, yeah, an animated Batman actually trading punches with a flesh-and-blood villain and getting shot at with real bullets was a big deal in 1992.
Same here. Where there fanboys writing strongly worded letters to the new Wizard Magazine back then?
I was 11 or 12 when Batman: TAS debuted and I thought it was great right from the start. I was already used to the visual style from the Max Fleischer Superman cartoons. As someone who grew up with the cartoons in the 1980s, Batman: TAS was like a natural progression for me to appreciate more serious forms of animation. The series even gave me my ideal version of Batman and his universe which still holds today. Nothing the movies do, not even those by the revered Christopher Nolan, can ever match the ideal I have based on Batman: TAS.
It’s kind of funny to think that at some point in order to vocalize your dissenting to the masses you had to actually take pen to paper, send it through the postal system, and wait for an arbiter to decide if your opinions were worth reading. Worth charging for no less.
I’d be all critical of Duncan, but to this day I have avoided The Batman because I didn’t like the art style I’ve seen in its still images and DVD covers.
“The Batman” had its moments. It certainly wasn’t anything groundbreaking, but it was enjoyable.
The Batman Vs Dracula rocked, much better than the comic book encounters with Dracula!
Thanks for this strip, Willis (THANK YOU, WILLIS!!!!(?))
I’m not entirely sold on Beware of the Batman, but I’ll certainly give it a chance, and I like them using newer characters like Professor Pyg, though they’ll obviously have to tone him down a lot.
Now please do one with Ethan telling the same guy that not all Batman and Joker voice actors are automatically inferior to Conroy/Hamill, and that Conroy/Hamill are not automatically always the best choice to voice Batman and Joker. A lot of the time they are, and I’m really looking forward to Arkham City, but I also really like the other people to voice Batman in recent animated efforts, John Dimaggio/Jeff Bennett’s Jokers, and really hope to God we get Michael Ironside and someone other than Hamill for the DKR movie.
I’m less worried about the “animation” and more about the tone, a gun-toting Alfred just makes this sound Frank Miller-y, and in an All-Star Batman & Robin way, not in a Batman Year One way.
BUT, I’ll give it a chance. After all, we’ve still only gotten a very small description and a solitary promotional image.
The only Batman cartoon I never cared for was The Batman.
I don’t watch The Brave and the Bold, but I am glad that it exists. I think little kids should have a fun version of Batman as their introduction to the character, as I did. Heck, prior to Batman: TAS, that’s pretty much all there was.
The only Batman I haven’t liked is Brave and the Bold, but I can see it being great for youngins. It was just too…I dunno, maybe I watched the wrong group of episodes, but something was off for me.
when it comes to “The Brave and Bold” I don’t watch it because of how little it takes itself seriously, and I guess it could be called a more morden version of the real old cartoons.(?)
and these are all good things for ppl who like this kind of stuff.
I don’t, at least not in Batman. I prefer the darker “Batman: The Animated Series” that still has it’s moments of humorus stupidity.
Since I’m young, I also am not that well learned about what by majority is called good or bad in Batman history, I’m just sayin’ what I think.
plz don’t juge me^^
That’s entirely legitimate. Personally I like both darker batman and campy fun batman, but it bugs me how hard it is to find a balance.
That was one of my favorite things about The Batman though. It had a few places where it managed to bring in the best of both worlds with shocking effectiveness. Like its’ rendition of The Joker. He had all the silliness of Prankster Joker, but still managed to come across as a crazy sociopath and did some legitimately fucked up stuff. He didn’t just kill. He destroyed lives. He’d be doing the humor thing being the life of the party and quite legitimately hilarious when you’d suddenly see a bit of the anger when something displeased him and remember why this fun loving individual was someone you wanted to keep a distance from. He’s the kind of guy that makes you cut off your laughter with a gasp.
I personally view The Batman’s Joker as the greatest Joker. It struck a balance that I haven’t been able to see elsewhere and did so deliciously. There are a few points in that series I view that way.
I liked Batman TAS from the get-go, but I also watched the Fleischer cartoons when I was younger and I had read that it was going to be a serious Batman “like the movie” (because it took longer to get animated shows on the air then, production started before the second Burton film). I can’t imagine any fool thinking it would be bad. And it led to a good Superman cartoon and several other shows and movies and is the whole reason we have Young Justice and Teen Titans and Justice League and Brave and the Bold.
“The Batman”, on the other hand, I started watching … and immediately quit when Mr. Freeze turned out to be a cheap hood in a getup.
Thank god it wasn’t serious “like the movie”, or we’d have had endless episodes with nonsensical plots and a Batman who murders an awful lot of people.
Presumably meaning not campy like the previous TV show or juvenile like most of the 70′s & 80′s animated Batman. I don’t think I’ve seen the first Burton movie since 1992.
I remember the promotional images for TF Animated were ridiculously exaggerated, with this over the top foreshortening.. made it look friggin terrible.
In the end the art was the worst TF art ever, but that’s still pretty good.. and more importantly it was funny and interesting.
I was unable to give the Batman more chance than the first season to be honest… And still don’t like the designs…
Brave and the bold grew on my, the designs are my less favorita part of the show but it makes laugh so that is a thubsup for me. Pity the cancellation.
And I have to admit Bruce Timm style kinda grew on me as I grew older.. I used to see batman in spite of the designs not because of them…
Of the new series I still don’t know what to think, I don’t mind if they do adaptation over adaptation until we get another one that is great.
Hold up a sec. What exactly about that promo image gives the impression that it will be good?
Batman looks like he was drawn by Piccaso, the new teen sidekick means a wasted opportunity for an animated version of an existing character, and Alfred is going John Woo on people (and is drawn like he belongs in a completely different toon all together).
I’m not interested in any of these things.
It might be a completely awesome show, or, more likely, it’ll probably suck for its first season or two and gradually pick up when they pick up enough of a fanbase to risk trading the stand-alone vanilla stories we’ve seen a thousand variations of for something more interesting and complex.
Like what happened with Justice League, Teen Titans, and The Batman.
Either way, nothing about that promo image has me interested in watching it outside of morbid curiosity. Considering I, like I’m guessing everybody else that reads your strip, come pre-programmed to be interested in Batman by default, that in itself is a pretty big fail.
Nobody said it will be good based on the promotional image, it’s just that it’s premature to make judgements (especially about the animation) based on it.
She was in the Outsiders episodes of Batman: The Brave and the Bold.
Personally, I’m not a fan of CG animation, but I’m willing to wait until I actually see an episode to judge it. I don’t really care about what I’ve heard regarding the characters, especially since they’re going out of their way to not feature villains or sidekicks that have featured prominently before (in which case, I have to wonder, why make a Batman cartoon in the first place?) but that doesn’t have anything to do with budget or animation quality.
So are there actually people that are saying the animation is going to suck, or is this like the link Willis posted that was actually just full of people making mostly accurate assessments of TAS Season 4 artstyle?
I don’t have a problem with anybody making the assumption that this is going to suck. Anybody that’s paid attention to cartoons for any stretch of time can see the red flags and anybody familiar with DC adaptations similar to this can probably recognize the pattern.
We’ve already done this with The Batman. From the very first promo it looked heavy on style and light on substance and, as far as I can tell, that’s exactly how it turned out at the start.
Nine times out of ten, your first impression is the right one.
It’s….um….I hate it. Why is everyone’s head so flat? Why are the Bloaty’s Pizza Hog mascots hovering ominously in the background?
Granted, that says nothing about the animation or the writing or the voice acting, but I have to say right now this is the first Batman series I’ve seen that literally looks horrible.
I just see each Batman series like a different run on the comic. Each is a unique interpretation of the character.
Dini Timm felt like Classic Finger/Kane Batman with a little burton thrown in.
TNBA felt a bit more contemporary, like Neal Adams.
The Batman felt a bit like again Neal Adams/70′s in tone and mood
Batman: Brave and the Bold was a Homage to Sprang and the Silver age
Beware feels kind of like Dick Grayson Batman in tone and style.
But I don’t know if I can go for this on though. Too many compromises. Like replacing Damien with Katana and Alfred being another sidekick. The whole idea of Professor Pyg just seems inappropriate for animated series. That character is SICK. Unlike previous bat-rogues who’s psychosis had a charm to it, pyg is just so twisted he could turn off many viewers.
1. Does anyone watch the various animated Bat shows for the story lines, plots, and themes? Or is it all about the art work and animation skills?
2. One big advantage of the Shortpacked bike aisle is all that room to run away from random jerks (or Mike). Come to think of it, the place has the widest aisles in retail. That’s refreshing, after seeing all the freaking CONVENTION CENTER construction that uses Americans with Disabilities Act related minimum sidewalk widths as the mandated size.
2.1. Yeah, I’m sick and tired of lousy 42 inch wide sidewalks and walkways around the San Diego Convention Center grounds during ComicCon.
“1. Does anyone watch the various animated Bat shows for the story lines, plots, and themes? Or is it all about the art work and animation skills?”
Depends on the show.
Brave and the Bold is, frankly, hillerious at times. Very much watch for the comady factor – specificly normaly what Batman is saying in a deadly serious tone. Sometimes its storys are ok, but normaly they arnt supposed to be taken seriously at all.
TAS, on the other hand, frequently had very worthy plots, quite adult themes too. Other times it didnt, like with anything quality varied.
But certainly it isnt just a case of groundbreaking animation/style.
I am not a fan of these Batman cartoons, other than Batman beyond. The animation is being dumbed down each show, like most animated shows. I liked JLU animation, and YJ, but B&B was horrible.
It sure does make me angry when people judge things based on materials released by the producers of those things for the explicit purpose of allowing people to judge their things.
Not a fan, but I’m surprised there would be much negative reaction to those images. They look very promising. Salem looks a bit chibi, but if he is suposed to be naughtier than in previous incarnations that sounds good to me. And if it were more action oriented and less “The More You Know!—-*” that sounds like a show worth checking out.
I fukkin love it. Looks great. Should be fun. Not a huge fan of Salem’s new look but that’s hardly gonna make or break anything and I’m sure it’ll seem cool once I see it in action.
The article itself makes the show sound like shit, but it’s Sabrina. You can’t exactly fuck that up.
It doesnt matter if they reboot the design and direction of the TV series but when DC anounced reboot everyone was OK to hate it before hand?
God, I hate you all.
PD: Alfred need a shotgun, he is a kickass butler not some kickass hitman. And The new adventures of Batman had horrible character design, but It worked because It had good storytelling. And The best thing about The Batman was Cameos, thats why the next series was The Brave and the Bold. The Batman “sucked” to gain succes as the other series, Brave and the Bold was a huge hit.
Willis and Ethan´s problems are that they would hold an opinion just to disagree with the comon fanboy or troll, Ethan is more naive than his creator. My own advice to myself is to lisent and care about the criticism but not get in an argument, trolls are full of half truths thats why they are dangerous.
And talking about DC, The New 52 Aquaman and Green Lantern are really cool. My ffavourite adventure of Aquaman still is When he lose his hand (the cover of aquaman going out of the water in a beach is awsome!) and I love Geoff Jhones green lantern, but the new 52 reintroduced Kyle Rayner, who (under Jhones) was too much in the shadow of Hal Jordan.
So for me Didio has 2 in favor and 2 against (teen titans was lame after all, and Catwoman was so so hollywood style of crap), on to superman to break the tie.
Robin doesn’t own the chalkboard? That particular one, or ALL of them?
I’m guessing both.
Robin owns the concept of a chalkboard.
She patented it.
She likes to take that concept and reduce it to an object.
She likes to take those objects and put ‘em in her videos.
I like chalkboards
I like chalkboards
I like the concept of a chalkboard
It’s what you get when you save the world and bring about world peace on separate occasions.
Don’t infringe on Robin’s copyright.
I was too young to hear about how much Batman Animated was going to suck, but old enough to realise it was the best Batman show ever.
I remember hearing about how Batman: TAS was a bad cartoon because “Look at how it’s drawn. They’re going to teach children about sex!”
To be fair, it did have Harley and Ivy, sooo…
Harley and Ivy taught me about “Slash Fiction”
It’s gonna be a fun show, even if they’re not keeping the Timm styling. Besides, I’m gonna be watching it for Lauren Faust’s Super BFFs segment; her stylized Supergirl is awesome.
No one hated on Batman Beyond? I’m surprised (not because it’s bad but because this list proves people hate on what turns out to be awesome).
I accidentally left it out. Because I’m a dope.
*clings to her Batman Beyond DVD box set*
There was a lot of dislike for the seemingly “anorexic” Batman but it wound up with a good deal of acceptance.
“They’re making some KID Batman? And it’s in the future, but it’s not the Legion or anything like that? Oh God, this will suck so bad, why would they do this???”
Something like that I imagine.
You forgot the part about, “I read about Batman’s future, he returns from retirement, gets a girls Robin, fights punks in a tank, fights Superman and ‘dies’!”
And, yes, the grammatical errors were on purpose in the quoted section. This would include the use of the ever popular dangling participle.
I don’t mind seeing a participle dangling every once in a while =P YaY Kilts
People hated on it tons. I admit it took me a long time to warm up to the concept.
Speaking of old, is Ethan going gray or is this just a new coloring scheme?
Glad to see I wasn’t the only one who thought this…
Hey, if YOU had to deal with Duncan on a regular basis, you’d probably have a few gray hairs yourself.
That was the first thing I noticed. I thought I was going nuts. At least I know it’s not my screen playing Tricks with me now, just Willis.
I noticed too. He must be taking the break-up real hard.
Maybe he stopped dyeing his hair after Drew?
Goin’ a little reed richards on us.
He’s going a little Ra’s on us.
Deeeee-tek-tive.
Or Parallax :O
I was thinking Dr. Strange
Speaking of old, is Ethan going gray
For the last time YES, Ethan is gay!
I am man enough to admit that in 1992, I was very, very wrong.
Same here, but more because of all those Valiant titles I started buying. Still have most of them for some reason.
I didn’t care for the batman but it wasn’t because of the animation. on a related note I was just a kid when batman beyond came out what was the outrage because of that?
I don’t remember “outrage,” exactly, but I know a lot of Batman fans (most of whom loved the Animated Series) felt that it wasn’t really Batman. I was one of those people. Never really liked it, although I did like the Return of the Joker movie, except for the cop-out ending.
I never did really give “The Batman” a fair shake because one, I don’t like reboots when there doesn’t need to be, and two, because they made Bruce Wayne look too much like Jackie Chan in my opinion.
Well, it was made by the same studio that did Jackie Chan Adventures. I admit I was rather hung up on the art style myself at first, but I came to really love the show.
New Batman was too skinny, Batman should only be Bruce Wayne, future setting is dumb, stuff like that.
I hated Batman Beyond as a kid because it seemed like they took away everything that made Batman cool. The intelligence, the skill, the refinery, the utility belt, the batmobile, the intimidation factor and the fear he incites in the criminals. They got rid of all Batman’s cool villains. The ability to kick ass without having beyond human abilities. I insisted quite vehemently that this wasn’t Batman at all but just some kid in a supersuit.
I certainly loved the movie. That was some bitchin stuff, but ultimately I didn’t come to like Batman Beyond in general until I revisited it the better part of a decade later. It’s awesome, and I can see that now, but I was probably about twelve or so and I couldn’t get past the fact that none of the things I liked about Batman were present in this incarnation.
Huh. Well then. Can’t wait to see what sucks next.
I loved BTAS, I had no idea people had problems with it, but then again I was 9 when it premiered. However, I think you’re omitting Batman Beyond from your chalkboard list there.
I remember some critic’s saying it was “too dark” for a kid’s show, but never anything about the quality.
I love Bruce Timm’s art, but after seeing the GL stuff and even the JL opening, it just doesn’t really translate well in CGI. I’m not sure if the studio is truly going for a “Timm” style here though, because Batman’s head shape is radically different.
I could never get into “The Batman” but I love “Brave in the Bold,” I assume that’s going to be cancelled for this new series?
“Brave & The Bold” is already cancelled, they’re just burning off the rest of the episodes (that Europe has already seen, months ago).
Not cancelled, ended. It got 65 episodes, the standard for a successful American cartoon. Brave and the Bold would have been canceled even without an upcoming Batman cartoon.
I don’t like the squat head and the big lips on Batman, and I don’t like CGI cartoons as they are made at this era in time (I don’t think the technology has advanced enough to make it anywhere near as good the more drawn cartoons these days). I miss a Transformers that didn’t fight in an endless series of nearly identical looking canyons.
But I also remember how the still images from the Legion of Superheroes and Brave and the Bold shows looked pretty bad until I saw them in action.
The original Transformers fought in an endless series of nearly identical canyons! That was the entire first season!
Transformers: Prime has *way* more variety in their settings than most series previous. It’s crazy how beautiful and complex its backgrounds are. I don’t think the environment designers get time to eat or sleep.
Fair enough, I was just nostalgic for Animated. The only nostalgia I actually retain from the 80s is how I vaguely recall female characters actually getting action figures made of them.
I rather like Prime, by the way. I think they’ve done a great job with their characters and I even like Miko (though it took me 20 or so episodes to warm up to her). I just don’t ever really feel like the action ever takes place anywhere.
Miko is my favorite. People who enjoy her seem to be rare, though.
We’re not that rare. Just the other side is more vocal and vehement. Makes me rarely want to set foot into the Prime boards on TFW…
I like her, but she’s clearly the most suicidal human buddy they’ve ever had. Her lack of death spits in Darwin’s face.
I like her, personally.
I actually generally like the humans – I haven’t seen RiD or the Unicron Saga, and didn’t really like Marvel G1 in general, but aside from AHM-era IDW-Spike, and RotF Mikaela, I’ve liked all the Human Friends in the series I’m familiar with. (…Now I’m imagining Fluffmodeus as an Autobot. ‘Hello, Human Friend!’ That’s…a worrying image.)
I like her fine, but it seems like in a lot of episodes, they don’t use her as a character and more as a formula to keep the humans involved. Miko runs off to join in a fight, Jack and Raph try to stop her, they get dragged along, wash-rinse-repeat.
If they would break this formula, I think Miko would get a lot more approval. And it would be ridiculously easy to do – just have the Autobots start acknowledging that the kids have helped plenty, and could easily be of more use than just “holding down the fort.”
To be fair, I seem to remember them fighting in the arctic with Skyfire, Cybertron, an Inca Temple or something in Peru and Sherman Dam. Then of course second season they were all over the place, football stadiums, alien planets, Arthurian Camelot, Discos, etc.
Who says it was G1? Beast Wars managed almost every biome conceivable, and it’s fifteen.
I’ve never liked a CG-animated TV series, either, but I can’t fault them for trying. You don’t improve the technology by not using it until it’s ready. You just have to suffer through the growing pains.
Similarly, someday, motion capture movies will all look as good as (or better than) Avatar, not that God-awful Polar Express crap.
I really like Transformers Prime, and Iron Man Armored Adventures, and, honestly, that’s why it kills me to think “this looks so dated now, how’s it going to look in 10-20 years?”
The more stylized a CGI show is, the better it ages, I find. Beast Machines’s art is often so abstract that it doesn’t really matter how complex its rendering was, for example, while Beast Wars’ attempt at pseudo-realism fares much worse. Beast Wars’ saving grace is that all of its cast are robots, who don’t have to look real to look “real.” Their environment, the animals, and their Neanderthal pals, not so much.
Transformers: Prime is purposefully cartoony and stylized, so I think it’ll still look okay years from now.
(This isn’t a phenomenon that’s limited to CGI, by the way. Batman: The Animated Series doesn’t look so hot, either, compared to the tightness of modern computer-colored cel animation. Technology advances on all fronts.)
Eh, Batman TAS animation varies alot from episode to episode. Some holds up quite well, some doesn’t.
I know animation styles age, and nothing is immortal, and one day I, too, will die. Batman the Animated Series probably should look dated-it is old, after all. I just feel that by choosing to use today’s television series level of CGI animation they are shrinking the life cycle of their shows significantly.
The main aim of a Transformers show is to sell the toys currently in the shops (or, er, in the shops later in the year). How good that cartoon will look in 10 years is fairly irrelevent for Hasbro.
And how many of the toys currently on the shelves are selling now simply because of the fanboys from the Transformers incarnations no longer on the air?
And the 80s cartoon looks terrible and dated, even though it was great animation for its time. I’m not sure what the difference is.
It’s more important that today’s kids *remember* the show being awesome if you want to factor in how they’ll feel about the show decades later. And by using cutting edge animation now, that seems to be accomplishing that. If it looks terrible by comparison later, who cares? G1 looks terrible, and that didn’t stop it from ballooning into the franchise it is today.
(Putting it on a network that not many people get, though, somewhat negates that.)
Watch the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles show. It’s CG, and it looks great.
I don’t like the art style, and I don’t like the fact that Alfred is a gun-toting sidekick. It could be good, maybe, but I have some doubts.
I don’t like the art style much (Batman looks fine; the rest, not so much)… but I *love* Alfred as a gun-toting sidekick.
Yeah, he’s Norman from “Big O”! And that’s awesome.
Pretty much the first thing I thought of when I saw that initial promo image was http://www.shortpacked.com/2007/comic/book-4/07-the-tome-of-the-ages/vigilante/
One of my favorite Alfred moments is in the comic arc “Knightfall” where Bane busts into the batcave and Alfred tries to hold him off with a shotgun.
That said, it is a little weird to think Batman’s totally cool with Alfred running around shooting criminals.
What about Superman commenting that he could at least give him a spare Mister Freeze gun in Public Enemies?
that’s pretty apt for batman, at least nowadays. anyone else remember batman w/a gun? http://sacomics.blogspot.com/2005/08/batman-and-guns.html also i was reading about the comicon panel where they said it was going to be a darker version of batman. the art doesn’t look like it’ll do it, but i’ll give it a go
I wish he had his shotgun and not pistols. I always love when Alfred busts out the shotgun. He kind of reminds me of Walter from Hellsing this way, though.
Shotgun would have more limited nonlethal applications than dual pistols though. I assume he’s gonna be doing that whole thing where you shoot all sorts of stuff that isn’t people. Shoot a pipe to scald the enemy with hot gasses. Shoot a loose piece of construction to have a ceiling girder fall down and pin the bad guy to the ground. Probably doing small amounts of “Non-kill shots” on people. A leg shot to stop someone moving, with even more liberal interpretations of nonlethal when going up against superhumans. Maybe if they’re feeling particularly clever they’ll have Alfred working cover fire in creative ways. If they’re really thinking they’ll give him an assortment of trick bullets with manifold applications.
All of this is just so much harder to do with a gun that only shoots five feet and has a shot wide enough to to cover an entire torso. For all that a shotgun is perfect for Alfred’s current role, I have trouble envisioning what he’d do with it tagging along with Batman on the nightly patrols.
Shotguns really aren’t *that* short ranged, and the spread depends on what kind of load they’ve got and barrel length. It’s sawed-off shotguns or blunderbusses that come closest to behaving like video game shotguns. Heck, shotguns already *have* more less-than-lethal options than pistols. Bean-bag rounds, taser rounds, etc., etc.
My big wonder here is why Alfred’s not got any sort of disguise in the promo image, if he’s going to be used as any sort of a sidekick or backup for Batman. When Bruce Wayne’s butler is going all vigilante, you’d think somebody’d notice.
I have very little actual knowledge of guns. On TV the shotgun’s usually used to obliterate something directly in front of you. In COD4 the shotgun has the same effective range as your knife.
Anyway that’s certainly cool. The existing nonlethal ammo for the gun actually really interests me. It would fit right in with some of the more militant renditions of Batman, which might be what they’re going for here. There are a lot of ways that could work really well. Obviously it would give him an entirely different dynamic in how the action scene choreography, but it sounds like it could be a really cool dynamic in the hands of someone who knew what they were doing. I’d love to see that.
XD Willis is either going to have to edit BB into the comic or be suffered 8 billion comments about why it’s not on the list.
I think the issues mostly stem from the promo image appearing to show Alfred running down the street with shotgun blazing.
Promo images are designed to get people interested in a show. The reaction “What the hell?” is probably not what they were intending.
I’ll give the show a chance because hey why not…but oof that art is looking a little rough.
But wow did people really rage on BTAS? ’92 makes me 2 so I definitely wasn’t on the forums or whatever y’all did back in 92…but I ended up loving that fiercely so maybe this’ll be like that.
Then again why can’t we just have 90s Batman again? Please?
People hated BTAS because it looked different. Until BTAS, every non-talking-animal cartoon looked roughly the same. If you’d seen G.I. Joe, then you’d seen what every other “realistic” cartoon looked like.
BTAS dropped a lot of detail from its models so that they would animate better. It was done in a style. Fans raged. Until they saw the damn thing.
Kind of like The Dark Knight’s Joker. Man, the people foaming at their mouths when they saw that first promo image of Heath Ledger. And now all those same people are dressing as him for every Halloween.
Oh so it’s just standard “It’s not what we’re used to so it automatically sucks” fan dumb.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TheyChangedItNowItSucks
I kind of miss that “realistic” style (as terrible as it made animation). I’d pay good money for another action cartoon in the style of, say, Gargoyles again.
Gargoyles style was less than a full step away from BTAS’s style. Not particularly more detailed.
Yeah, Gargoyles was more BTAS than G.I. Joe. It, too, was stylized. Not as strongly as Batman, but BTAS’s influence is obvious.
In fairness, the promo image of ledger looked awful. They could’ve chosen better.
By which I mean a better promo image.
I’ve had experience with judging shows based solely on the promo image. If you look at Transformers Animated and Teen Titans’ promo images, they look archaic to how the shows eventually came to look. So initial knee-jerk reactions to the image were accurate, but the image didn’t properly relate to the final product.
I had a similar experience with the movie Tangled.
In that case, the intentionally tried to make the initial promo look like a DreamWorks-y fairytale parody.
Honestly, I wish a few cartoon studios would return to the “realistic” style of the Joe toon. Seems like nowadays EVERY cartoon on CN drops the detail and stylizes the characters, and we end up with cartoon series that all basically look the same. (X-Men Evolutions, Megas XLR, Generator Rex, etc.) Then of course you have the shows aimed at smaller childeren that look like flat 2-d “flash” animation. It’d be nice to see something artistically different from the pack.
X-Men Evolution, Megas XLR, and Generator Rex do not look the same. It’s like you picked three different-looking shows just to troll me.
I dunno they all visually look pretty similar to me, and I’m not saying any of these shows are BAD, just that these cartoons all share the same aesthetics, imo. Nor did I say the 80′s “realistic” art of Jem, etc. is ALL I want on TV, just that a little variety would be nice.
Also, just because someone disagrees with you on something, doesn’t automatically make them a “troll.” I certainly wasn’t trying to push any of your buttons because honestly I don’t even know what the hell you’re opinions are on “Generator Rex” or “Megas.” (I think I remember that you liked X-Men Evo but so did I, so I’m not “bashing” that.)
But if not agreeing with you 100% on everything = troll then I’d MUCH rather be thought of as a troll then some pathetic sycophant, with no original thoughts of my own.
Can’t tell if ignorant or trolling, assume trolling if reading good webcomic.
I have no opinion on the quality of those three shows. I am just boggling at the idea that the three are drawn in an identical style. I went back to look them up to make sure I wasn’t misremembering them, but no. If they’re all the same style, then so are Questionable Content, Bad Machinery, and Girls with Slingshots.
The art style is crap, but who knows if the cartoon itself will be.
Also, The Batman is a terrible, horrible cartoon.
Why? I remember enjoying “The Batman” immensely.
Bad voice acting, bad art style, bad writing. I don’t recall the animation quality, so I’m not gonna try to judge it on that subject.
Essentially, nearly the entire thing was just… ugh.
I think the word you’re looking for is “different.”
It’s a different take on many aspects of Batman, but if you can take it for what it is, it’s quite fun. There’s less focus on the psychological issues than B:TAS, but the action is quite well done. And the animation is waaaaaay smoother than B:TAS.
Can you give me an example of the “bad” writing?
The first season honestly wasn’t very good (well, what I’ve watched of it. I kinda stopped at the Penguin episode) but from The Batman vs. Dracula on, it was fantastic.
Yeah, Penguin being a kung-fu expert who “studied in the Orient” didn’t exactly sell me on the show.
Why is that a bad thing? Does The Penguin have some character trait that says he shouldn’t know how to hold his own in hand-to-hand combat? I mean, yes it’s weird but so is weaponry stored inside umbrellas.
The Batman’s The Penguin is by far my favorite Penguin. Penguin’s always such a waste of a character elsewhere, but in The Batman, he’s greatly entertaining.
Mr. Freeze isn’t a scientist, he’s a generic, two-bit diamond thief. Because diamonds are ICE, and everyone knows that his defining trait wasn’t being a tragic figure trying to save his sick wife, it’s ice puns.
Although, I’d like some examples of bad voice acting myself. Not everything can use Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill. Even though I’m pretty sure The Batman did use them at one point.
Considering that what you consider to be his “defining trait” was introduced in Batman the Animated Series only 12 years earlier, I don’t think the term means what you think it does.
Yeah, if you want to see “Heart of Ice” again, just friggin’ watch “Heart of Ice.”
IN this case, it does. It was adopted so readily it really became the characters defining trait, at least aside from using an ice gun. Much the same way batman used a gun early on, but his eschewing them is at this point a defining trait.
But the point of The Batman was that it was an alternate take on the mythos. Freeze wasn’t as compelling a character, no, but he got to just be an unabashed evil villain, which was more in keeping with the show’s mood.
I thought The Batman versions of Poison Ivy and Clay Face were rather good. Mr. Freeze was a bit too much of a generic thug with Ice Powers for my taste, and I didn’t like the Joker design.
All and all, I thought it was okay, but the weakest of the 4 Batman TV series to come out during my lifetime.
I know in my other post on this page I said I didn’t really give “The Batman” a fair shake, but that Joker redesign was one of the few things I liked about it. Maybe it was the combo of the fact that he now looked unpredictable, and the new voice had a darker tone than Mark Hamill’s Joker. Or it could be the fact that it was a departure from the Cesar Romero-type suited Joker. I may have to revisit it on DVD (or BluRay) some day, when my feelings on most of the artwork have subsided.
i agree, that joker was among my favorites to appear in a cartoon to date, and i always felt that his inhuman features were more than a little fitting for his psyche.
I didn’t give The Batman a fair shake. I kept wondering when The Joker had time to be a part of Korn…
I didn’t start watching it really until The Robin and The Batgirl came along. There were some good episodes though and I liked how The Oracle and The Nightwing were included in one episode.
Yeah, I hate to say it, but B:TAS looked great from moment 1, and turned out to be a great show, while The Batman … well. Lacked the mood, and the voice acting, and the art. But also? Too many “Look, if I can see this is a shit idea, Batman who supposedly is a genius really should know better!” moments. That he looked really fug as Bruce and unimposing as Batman didn’t exactly help, either. I have no idea what the point of that show was, anyway. They just should’ve added some episodes to the B:TAS canon instead. If it ain’t broke, don’t reboot it.
Proving you really don’t know how things work.
GUY 1: “We want to create a new Batman cartoon, something that will appeal to a new generation of Batman fans.”
GUY 2: “I know! Let’s just make new episodes of Batman the Animated Series!”
GUY 1: “The one that these kids wouldn’t have even been alive to see?”
GUY 2: “Yeah, that one!”
GUY 2: “You’re fired.”
In case you couldn’t tell, you’re “guy 2″.
The art style? The art style was one of the better and more notable things about that show. I tuned in just to see the crazy character designs for the villians. Every single villian was completely recognizable just by their sillhouette. I’m also going to go ahead and say it: The Batman is the only thing that really got me to like Dick Grayson as Robin and Barbara Gordon as Batgirl.
Batgirl was kind of good in it.
Aside from that yeah, awful.
I love what they did with Clayface in The Batman. And I really dug the Joker’s design as well. It was a damned good cartoon, from some damned good animators…
I also loved the Jackie Chan cartoon. It was nice to see a cartoon last so long and not have any kind of merchandising tie-in.
It had amazing numbers so it stays on the air, but it had a minority cast so it doesn’t get merch. See also: Static Shock
…Who are these people that claimed this about Batman: TAS, and where do I go to slap the living shit out of them?
The others…okay. I’ll admit. I didn’t think The Batman or B&B were going to do well AT FIRST, but I chalk it up to just being so different, and so immediately following the OTHER Batman cartoons. It’s just weird to drop one show and immediately create another one when that other show could just still be running.
Why not give some space between the Batman shows instead? Why does it need to be immediately following the end of the other show?
I don’t know why they didn’t, but I know they couldn’t use Scarecrow or Two-Face because they were gonna be in the Nolan movies. Dunno why they didn’t take out Joker too, I guess just cause he’s, you know, The Batman’s nemesis.
But it was kinda cool they changed it around some, making Clayface the friend-of-Bruce-who-was-horribly-disfigured and making Penguin surprisingly badass. Also, introducing Batgirl first because Robin was also in another show at the time. Again, I think that kind of works with their naming- always thought it a little strange that it would go Batman, Robin, Batgirl- why wouldn’t she pick a more unique name, since Robin already had?
I think you misread the person you’re responding to. I do believe that he or she wasn’t referring to the series “The Batman,” but was asking why they don’t take more time between series starring Batman.
Yeah, you’re right, but I mostly just took it as an opportunity to talk about how much I love The Batman.
I love The Batman.
Season five is probably one of my favorite animated Justice League stories.
Yeah, I said it.
Yeah, I like those, but funny enough, it was not my favorite- all the treamups kind of gave short shrift to Batgirl and Robin, their dynamic with Batman is one of my favorite parts of the show. But a great, different take on the JL.
I had to watch that season a second time to remember that Babs actually did get a significant amount of screen time.
Toys. It’s also why BATB is ending.
It looks kind of like The Batman, which is awesome, so in in favor. Though I really don’t like Professor Pyg- he just doesn’t sit right with me. But maybe in the adaptation to a kid’s cartoon, they’ll take out all the icky stuff with the barbed wire and acid glue and make him into a more enjoyable character. You know, like they did with Starfire.
I love Professor Pyg. He feels genuinely mentally ill and not just comic book crazy, and I read him in the voice of Rex Harrison. I have a feeling I’m going to be let down by whoever does his voice because I have the bar set so high.
Yeah, maybe that’s why it made me so uncomfortable, that he seemed actually mentally ill and not comic book-crazy. The whole thing just was a little more unsettling than entertaining to me.
Starfire just wasn’t the same without the barbed wire and acid glue…
Ha, I guess I did phrase that rather awkwardly.
I think that Rob over at Topless Robot had some salient points about the promo image. Mainly, he was mad about Alfred shooting guns, which would not seem to fit at ALL well with Batman’s one rule: that he doesn’t kill people. It’s rather difficult to reliably shoot someone in a way that doesn’t kill or permanently cripple them.
Batman’s best friend is Commissioner Gordon, who is not shy with guns.
But at the same time he frowns on other vigilantes running around and shooting dudes.
Batman needs to make up his mind.
That’s totally different though. Alfred would, promo and description implying it, be running around as Batman’s sidekick guns blazing to fight crime. Now Bats does allow Alfred a shotgun in the gave, even though he wishes he didn’t have it, but his rule for the longest time (like the 40s and up I think?) has always been no guns. I even vaguely remember a story where he asked Gordon not to draw in a situation where it would have helped.
My biggest issue with Beware the Batman though is that in an effort to do something different, they over thought things. We’ve yet to get a Batman cartoon featuring a ton of his supporting cast. Damien, Cass, Steph, Kate, Tim (Timm admitted the BTAS version was more of a toned down Jason Todd then Tim Drake), a non-flash forward Oracle, Azrael, A good chuck of the GCPD, Knight, Squire, and more have still not received proper other media appearances at all. Now they could of course appear, and hopefully they do, but the press release implies that Katana and Alfred are the shows main supporting cast, and that’s really my biggest issue with what we know about this show.
My biggest issue though, above all else, is that Katana, a character I really do like a lot, has no place to be in a Batman show’s main cast over Cass Cain, the series perfectly usable and fresh for other media Asian Batgirl.
But since it’s already been established in the comics that Alfred will wield a gun when necessary, it’s a patently illogical complaint (as is most of what’s posted on TR).
yes however Gordon uses guns as a part of his JOB Alfred is a BUTLER.
on top of that Alfred KNEW Bruce’s parents and raised Bruce himself, i think he’d shy away from guns just out of respect for Bruce.
Rubber Bullets. Honest.
Alfred uses a shotgun already.
Batman Beyond Batman had bladed explosive batarangs. The Batman’s Batman had a series of capsules that would perform a variety of purposes including freezing someone solid. Batman in Batman: Under The Red Hood had Ironman style repulsers that could launch someone halfway across the city, a rocket-launcher type device designed for taking down helicopters, large amounts of plastique, and was perfectly cool with Nightwing having those two knives he shoved in Amazo’s ears. Batman: The Brave and the Bold’s Batman has a lasersword in his utility belt, Bat-grenades, and regularly teams up with the Blue Beetle who’s basically a gun-based arsenal on crack and steroids.
All these items were entirely nonlethal in Batman’s hands. Same for his teammates. I think Alfred’s gonna manage to keep his little peashooters from killing anyone just fine.
I loved BTAS and the New Adventures from promotional to end. Although I did think Batman Beyond was going to be a pile of dumb bullshit based on the promotional footage and trailers (I loved it in the end, but yeah, that was definitely a divisive moment for Batman fans)
I never got into any of the other Batman cartoons, but what I did watch of “The Batman” was stupid. Penguin and Joker are both hyper-bad ass kung fu experts? WTF?
Joker was never really a badass kung fu expert, he just moved in a really unpredictable way and used his gimmicks to amplify that unpredictability. Pretty much the Joker’s defining trait, just in a series that focused more on action.
You really do need to go beyond the first season. What got me into it was The Batman vs Dracula. Before then, I was much like you.
Vampire Joker is scary as hell.
Also, about the guns and stuff: Batman’s rule varies from adaptation to adaptation and era to era.
I also have no trouble with Alfred having guns because he was in the British army for fuck’s sakes.
My initial reaction to the style is “Aw hell no!” but I have to stop and remind myself that I thought Brave and the Bold’s promo image made the show look stupid as hell.
Never so glad to be proven wrong. (Still kinda wish the Batgirl show had been a real thing…)
Stupid as hell is kind of the Brave and the Bold’s thing, though. It’s got more in common with pre-Kirby Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olson with a dash of Superfriends than much else. It doesn’t stop being stupid. It just does stupid very well.
I love The Brave and the Bold.
I’d just like to say that after all of this talk, I feel very old compared to the rest of you.
That said, I’ve watched all the shows named here except for Prime (no access to the HUB and haven’t taken the time to stream it yet), and loved all of them for different reasons.
I don’t dislike the new artstyle, but Alfred shooting dual pistols? Seriously? Reminds me of that All Star Batman crap with the super buff Alfred, who at first glance I thought was Bruce Wayne.
Anyway, gotta be better than The Batman, since that show’s villains ended up going back to the stupid camp stuff. I have to say, it’s ironic that people here want others to accept The Batman’s one-dimensional villains while lambasting still others for wanting one-dimensional badass transformers characters. As an example, having Mr. Freeze turn out to be a tragic, sympathetic character then returning him to be a borderline retarded villain is going to rub a lot of people the wrong way, like it or not. I have to wonder if people here would cry foul if Beast Wars was remade and Megatron was a bumbling, screaming oaf instead of the megalomaniacal genius he used to be.
You’re right. Dual pistols is all wrong. Needs to be a shot gun.
Shotguns and dual pistols imply different things, though, and are handled vastly differently due to their difference in size, pull back, firing spread, etc.
Dual pistols are – in addition to being incredibly impractical – mainly used in gun fu style battles like The Matrix or any film that stars Chow Yun Fat. Alfred’s generally too old to do that kind of stuff (well, in my opinion; most of the time he looks too elderly to be jumping around doing kung fu stuff).
Shotguns, however, require strict foot placement, careful aiming, a good posture, etc; it’s more of a weapon that you use to stand your ground with, which fits Alfred – when he needs to fight it’s probably a “you shall not pass” moment – something that has defeated Batman or reached the Batcave will probably not be hurt by dual pistols.
Shotguns fit Alfred better.
Shotguns may fit today’s comic book Alfred better.
But handguns might fit a different version of Alfred better. And different versions aren’t always bad, or else BTAS Mr. Freeze was a wrongheaded idea for diverging from the source material. I’m perfectly happy to see the Batman mythos continue to be experimented with. BTAS changed the way we thought about a lot of Batman’s world. Other shows should be allowed to attempt the same thing.
I don’t disagree. I was going on one image because one image is all we have. If Alfred is this guy who’s in his mid-40s to 50s while Batman’s still in his 20s, I could see how it could maybe work out.
Still though, I always thought of Alfred as the ‘holding down the fort’ type (since he’s a butler and all). I do agree that it cou change how we think about the Batman mythos, however I really think that some things can’t be changed, otherwise you risk upsetting the innate themes of the characters (as an example, a Batman show where his parents are still alive? Everyone would go WTF).
Nevermind Mr Freeze. Just look at how BTAS completely changed Clock King! Without his time stop powers he’s just a schmuck whose most impressive ability is reading the train schedule.
Though I guess counting frames from the intro animation was pt coo.
As an aside, I find it really irritating that you decide to act like a snarky asshole whenever anyone DARES question something, or dislikes something you don’t, or vice versa. I can respect your opinions, but I can’t respect you when you act like a smarmy hypocrite.
Your first post in this thread included passive-aggressive snark. Are you the only one allowed to be smarmy? Is it unfair that other people can respond in kind?
Grow some balls and take what you dish out.
There’s a difference between being smarmy towards a form of media and people. As an example, “this Batman show looks horrible” and “the people who made this Batman show are horrible people” imply different things. I made a halfway snarky statement about a TV show (not even your opinion about the show), you made a smarmy statement about ME and my opinions.
You were being smarmy towards people, is the thing. “I have to say, it’s ironic that people here want others to accept The Batman’s one-dimensional villains while lambasting still others for wanting one-dimensional badass transformers characters.” How is that about the show and not the people here? Your first comment was focused on the opinions of others.
I responded with three comic book scans. I am so sorry.
Maybe you just automatically talk in snark and don’t realize it. It happens to me, too. Opinions can definitely be wrong, but when you attack others’ opinions for allegedly being stupid and hypocritical, you should maybe allow for a little blowback, and not be so shocked when it happens.
(You’ll notice that I’ve matched the tone of your posts when I respond to them. The snarky ones I snark back. The less snarky ones I debate more evenly. If you don’t want snark, start with no snark.)
I don’t see how that’s snarky. There’s no passive-aggressive behavior, I just threw it out there. I wanted to highlight the incongruity and incompatibility of the two lines of thought, is all. I wasn’t judging or whining or anything, really. Just making an observation about some of the opinions held here. Note that I didn’t imply or say how that’s stupid or dumb or what-have-you; just that it’s ironic. Maybe I should have used a different word (I only used ‘ironic,’ as ‘hypocritical’ was insulting and I didn’t want to do that), since you still took it the wrong way.
Regardless, it wasn’t about the scans. More about your implication that my opinion was wrong/stupid. “Alfred has used guns on several occasions” would have worked just as well without implying anything insulting.
Someone’s a sensitive little thing.
It was the great (and FAR more snarky than Willis) Harlan Ellison who said: “you are NOT entitled to an opinion. You are entitled to an INFORMED opinion.”
Posting pictures as a refutation is snarky somehow? That doesn’t make a lot of sense. If anything, a simple image refutation would be one way to completely remove all emotion out of the response and just present facts. If you’re reading snarkiness from that then you’re a bit oversensitive, hon.
Not exactly disproving my point, fellas.
Yeah it is. Problem exists between chair and keyboard.
I think what lets B:TAS age so well is it was designed to look old and classic from the get go, being inspired by the Fleischer Bros Superman cartoons. On another note, I just realized that next year will be the 20th anniversary of B:TAS, and I am old.
Batman the Animated Series has not aged well. The animation is still very archaic by today’s standards, and fluctuates even within the same episode.
It really didn’t get a solid animation down until The New Batman Adventures that eventually became the same style used in Superman The Animated Series and Justice League, etc.
I admit my initial reaction is skepticism, but that’s just because the promotional image looks like a generic action movie poster with the Batman logo slapped on it. Also, though I love Katana as a character, WTF is she doing as a major character in a Batman cartoon? WHY NOT CASSANDRA CAIN?!?!?! *capslock raeg*
(Oddly enough, Alfred as a gun-toting badass doesn’t bother me.)
I’ll give it a shot, though, despite my trepidation. Promotional images are never a good indicator for the quality of the final project.
Now see, I don’t think the chosen art style has any bearing on the ultimate quality of the show whatsoever. “Beware” could suck, could be awesome, we won’t know until we see it.
That being said, I think it looks hideous. Just don’t like the art style. Just like I didn’t like the later DCAU art style, circa “Batman” and JL/JLU. That big chest, tiny legs, extra-long ears stuff . . . ick.
Didn’t make the show bad. Just ugly.
After reading Willis’ comic I did a web search to find the offending image. And yeah, that is pretty darn ugly design. No comment on what the show will be like since I don’t have any information on that, but the character design is not appealing.
I don’t like the style. That being said, I didn’t initially like the style of Teen Titans.
Don’t have a problem with Alfred using guns. It’s not terrible. There’s a difference between protecting your home and gunning down someone in the streets. We don’t know where this is going to lead, so I’d sit on it.
If Batman starts using a gun, I’ll be a little mad. Yeah, he’s used a gun before, and in most of the instances that come to mind, that was a last ditch effort that still had him questioning what he had done.
I’m just mad that they’re using Katana as a sidekick.
If you’re going to use a teen Asian girl martial artist as sidekick to Batman why not just go with friggin Cassandra Cain?
I’m guessing the reason for that is they’re avoiding Batgirl and Robin. That’s only a guess at this point.
Clearly they didn’t want to spill the beans yet that Steph’s gonna be Robin.
*living in a dream world*
Not Carrie Kelly?
While I respect Carrie’s status as first girl Robin, that’s pretty much all she is to me: a name, an image, and the title “first girl Robin”. I know nothing of her as a character, as I haven’t read DKR.
On the other hand, I know Steph, and I love her. Especially when she and Cass are working together, they’re such perfect BFF in both harmony and contrast. That same contrast she has with Bruce is what makes her a good Robin. Like Dick, she’s light and upbeat to Bruce’s dark. She’s the type of Robin Bruce should have.
(Tangentally: Damian worked as Dick’s Robin, not a fan of him as Bruce’s)
So not that I’d be against Carrie, but if I’m living in a fantasy world, mine’s Steph-Robin.
I’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that it’s the same reason Robin was initially absent from The Batman – with Young Justice currently airing with Robin as a main character, it’s possibly a similar restriction to The Batman and Teen Titans being on at the same time. As for Batgirl, no idea. Maybe she’s planned to show up in some later YJ episodes (Barbara has already made a brief appearance).
No, I don’t at all remember people disliking Batman the Animated Series before it came on. Because I didn’t have a computer or internet access back then.
So not only am I old, but I grew up poor. Thanks for the reminder, jerk!
huh. Is it just me or is Ethan’s hair graying here?
Typo in panel 2.
“They’re obviously slashed the budget” should be either “They’ve obviously slashed the budget” or “They’re obviously slashing the budget”.
“Remember when Batman: The Animated Series was an anime abomination that is going to ruin Batman forever because it should look like a real cartoon for adults and not babies?
“I do.
“Because I’m old.”
I’m older than you, and I don’t remember anything of the sort. Of course, I wasn’t online as long as you . . .
I wanted to find one of those old Usenet threads and link this strip to it, but the earliest griping I could find on Google Groups was from 1997, which is entirely too late for BTAS: http://groups.google.com/group/alt.comics.batman/browse_frm/thread/24acb871748377a/0275ab76294eff23#0275ab76294eff23
I don’t recall any hate for the original BTAS, but there was plenty when Timm gave all the characters bigfoot designs to keep the animators from bankrupting themselves putting all their manpower on one project.
I don’t like the way Batman looks in the picture but I am going to try to be fair to the cartoon when it comes out, after all I didn’t think I’d like Brave and the bold due to its light hearted style but after watching it I love it.
If Disgruntled Guy had been talking about the upcoming CREEN LANTERN cartoon, he’d have been right on the money. Ugh. I’ve seen first generation Playstation ONE videogames with better graphics than that show. Hell, I’ve seen Super Nintendo games with better graphics than that show!
But then again, it’s Hal Jordan…and no one outside of Geoff “Captian Yesterday” Johns gives a flying fuck about him, as the movie’s box office numbers shows (#11 in the worst box office BOMBS of all time, BTW).
…Now would be a bad time to say Im slightly interested in the upcoming Green Lantern show, and that I like Hal Jordan, right?
I think the GL movie was less a bomb because it was a Hall Jordan movie and more a bomb because it sucked Donkey Balls. Terrible writing and direction is universal, regardless of the character.
In all fairness, Hal Jordan is still the more recongised Green Lantern character of the two (Though I’d wager that John Stewart may be more so). More then likely reactions to a Kyle Rayner GL movie would have been along the lines of “Who’s this guy? I thought he was a pilot!”
I thought the same from the first creapy images of Spectacular Spiderman.
I still find their eyes creapy as hell….but holy fuck that cartoon was awesome.
People criticizing animation when they mean to criticize art style drives me crazy.
But all of those cartoons were terrible!
/kidding
//loved all of them
///including the new one cause I have a time machine
I hated the still image myself. I think my reaction was “ugh” or something.
Then I went to a streaming site to watch some anime and moved on. When the show actually airs, then I’ll care.
the only thing that bothers me about “beware the batman” alfred is that he appears to be helping batman in his normal clothes. wouldn’t gothamites start wondering why bruce wayne’s butler is prowling the streets with batman?
the press release for this show says that it will be part of an hour long block called DC nation. that means there’s only room for two DC cartoons, which makes me a little worried about young justice. have they already decided it’s going away when BTB starts up?
Actually, Young Justice has already been confirmed for a 20 episode long second season.
yeah, but that could take us as far as the premiere of BTB which starts in 2013.
To be fair, THE Batman did suck
Flip the chalk board over Robin, your handy work is still there. I’m telling you this angry guy who comes in every so often is TOTALLY Ethans wet dream. (LOL) Just kidding.
I don’t know where people got this impression that “animation” means “art style.”
And now I’m wondering why Rob Corddry is on the board.
‘Cuz Ethan’s still hot for him.
I’m sad to say, it took me a second to figure out it was the SP-version of Rob– at first, I was like, ‘Charlie Brown sure likes Ethan!’
As far as the new show, I will reserve judgement until I see it. I recall a bunch of Wonder Woman fans (often a contentious bunch, even by geek standards) complaining about the promo illustration of the direct to DVD Wondie and her ‘butterface.’ Just because she had a nose that wasn’t a perfect aqualine form, they were ready to tear apart everything about it. Ah well.
Oh, also, in regards to ‘The Batman’ I agree that the later seasons were better. I hated the character designs (mostly), but loved some of their more clever plots/ideas. Joker pretends to be Batman? Awesome!
I just looked at the promo. Anyone think they wanted to use Cassandra Cain and DC management said no. That would explain why Katana is the new Robin.
The original pitch for the next show had Cass in it and was gonna be 90s~early 00 Comics based. I imagine Katana is what was left over from Cass. I’m guessing they didn’t wanna use Cass because either Barbara was more recognizable (which is because she’s the ONLY ONE WHO’S BEEN SHOWN OUTSIDE THE COMICS) or she was gonna be in another cartoon and they wanted to have the same type of thing and settled on Katana. Or possibly Katana got popular amongst the staff or fans from B&TB and they wanted to use her? I’m not quite sure but that’s what I remember.
That was a different show. The first rejected pitch revealed to the fans was a Batfamily show with Cass, Damien, Dick, Selina, and Bruce dealing with a No Man’s Land like crisis. It was deemed to dark and was rejected.
Another I’ve read about was a Quantum Leap-like show about Batman being guided back to his own time by The Phantom Stranger after getting hit with Darkseid’s omega beams.
Both sound pretty awesome if you ask me, and it’s a real shame they were passed over. Especially the first one since it was exactly what I wanted in a new Batman cartoon.
On a sidenote, much like Ethan I get irritated when people say the animation is bad when they mean the art style is bad. It’s a huge pet peeve of mine.
Ah, well I do agree. I really wanted the batfamily one because that’s exactly what I was hoping for. :C
And on the art style thing…yeah that’s a major pet peeve of mine too. Animation = / Art Style and Artstyle = / = Quality of a show
You’d think people who’re familiar with video games would know that the look of something doesn’t mean it’ll be good or bad (two different mediums, but really, whether you like the aesthetics or not, that doesn’t make the show wholly bad or good on it’s own)
You’d think people who’re familiar with video games would know the look of something doesn’t mean it’ll be good or bad, and yet everyone threw huge fits over that celshaded cartoony Link video game. D’oh well.
Yeah. Reminds me of the comment string on Tformers for the first promo image of Transformers Animate.
-d
I don’t remember anyone saying Batman:TAS was going to be shit because I was four. I only remember watching it with my dad on Saturday mornings and having him tell me a whole bunch of other Batman stories during the commercials.
My dad’s pretty cool.
I’m surprised to hear (almost 20 years later) that there were haters for B:TAS when it was announced. I remember seeing a trailer for it at a con (the aerial battle with Man-Bat, as a matter of fact) and the audience loved it.
Just the notion of an animated adventure show where there was, y’know, action, seemed positively revolutionary in 1992. And, hey, the cops and the villains used real guns that shot bullets and everything!
Now, granted, I was 28 when I saw that trailer and basically hadn’t watched any made-for-TV cartoons in almost 15 years (my first job was working on Saturday mornings, so that broke my habit pretty fast). And I remembered the last animated Batman: The one from 1977, that had Bat-Mite and used the 1966 Filmation model sheets.
I did think the retro design with modern tech was a little weird at first, but the rest was just so damn good I accepted the 1940s-looking police cars and modern computers side-by-side. And the show just got better and better-looking over its run, too.
Batman Beyond, I kinda liked too. Still looked good, Terry wasn’t irritating.
The Batman, now, I never got into. Didn’t care much for the design (mainly on the villains. THE JOKER DOES NOT REQUIRE A RESDESIGN) of the series, and I thought the non-ballistic guns the cops used were just plain stupid. I’m sure that was a standards-and-practices thing, but it still bugged me. “Hey, there’s the bad guy! I’ll just step out of my Chevy Corvair and blast him with my ray gun!” Bah.
Haven’t seen much of The Brave and the Bold, either, but I caught the “Elseworlds” one and it was a blast to see the Wally Wood MAD parody animated.
So I’ll go watch the promo for the new one and see how it looks, and when it airs I’ll watch it and assess the actual finished product (novel approach, I know, but I’ll stick with it).
I realize that there were shows during my vacation from Saturday morning (and weekday afternoon) cartoons that had action, despite what I wrote above, but I don’t really look at robots fighting the same way as I do humans fighting. Remember, I had last watched during the period where Popeye wasn’t allowed to hit anyone (seriously!) and the Justice League of America (aka “the Super Friends”) sat around the Hall of Justice discussing–at great length–the best way to talk the villain of the week –who was rarely if ever actually evil, just misunderstood– into seeing the error of his ways. So, yeah, an animated Batman actually trading punches with a flesh-and-blood villain and getting shot at with real bullets was a big deal in 1992.
Same here. Where there fanboys writing strongly worded letters to the new Wizard Magazine back then?
I was 11 or 12 when Batman: TAS debuted and I thought it was great right from the start. I was already used to the visual style from the Max Fleischer Superman cartoons. As someone who grew up with the cartoons in the 1980s, Batman: TAS was like a natural progression for me to appreciate more serious forms of animation. The series even gave me my ideal version of Batman and his universe which still holds today. Nothing the movies do, not even those by the revered Christopher Nolan, can ever match the ideal I have based on Batman: TAS.
Yes, yes there were.
http://www.comicsalliance.com/2011/09/08/angry-fan-letters-comics-batman/
It’s kind of funny to think that at some point in order to vocalize your dissenting to the masses you had to actually take pen to paper, send it through the postal system, and wait for an arbiter to decide if your opinions were worth reading. Worth charging for no less.
I’d be all critical of Duncan, but to this day I have avoided The Batman because I didn’t like the art style I’ve seen in its still images and DVD covers.
Never could get behind “The Batman.” Ick. Just… ick.
There are plently of good Batman cartoons out there though, if one does not float my boat no harm done, right?
“The Batman” had its moments. It certainly wasn’t anything groundbreaking, but it was enjoyable.
The Batman Vs Dracula rocked, much better than the comic book encounters with Dracula!
I will cop to enjoying that movie, if only a little.
Is it just me or is Ethan going gray?
David: “Because I’m old.”
Oh, cry me a frickin’ river.
Thanks for this strip, Willis (THANK YOU, WILLIS!!!!(?))
I’m not entirely sold on Beware of the Batman, but I’ll certainly give it a chance, and I like them using newer characters like Professor Pyg, though they’ll obviously have to tone him down a lot.
Now please do one with Ethan telling the same guy that not all Batman and Joker voice actors are automatically inferior to Conroy/Hamill, and that Conroy/Hamill are not automatically always the best choice to voice Batman and Joker. A lot of the time they are, and I’m really looking forward to Arkham City, but I also really like the other people to voice Batman in recent animated efforts, John Dimaggio/Jeff Bennett’s Jokers, and really hope to God we get Michael Ironside and someone other than Hamill for the DKR movie.
Michael Ironside for Batman and Tim Curry for Joker!
Every time there’s a new Batman property I always say a little prayer that Tom Waits will be the Joker this time.
No, I like Hamill – he is smart enough to change his voicework a bit to suit the
mood of what he is doing. Not all his jokers sound the same.
Not that others are neccesserly/automaticaly bad, of course, but I love the idea of one “canical” voice.
Totally Off Topic:
Joystiq reports a fanmade My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic fighting game.
http://www.joystiq.com/2011/10/08/fighting-is-magic-in-fanmade-my-little-pony-fighter/
I’m less worried about the “animation” and more about the tone, a gun-toting Alfred just makes this sound Frank Miller-y, and in an All-Star Batman & Robin way, not in a Batman Year One way.
BUT, I’ll give it a chance. After all, we’ve still only gotten a very small description and a solitary promotional image.
I’m not impressed with the art style buyt I wasn’t impressed with Brave and The Bolds art style either I’ll give it a shot just like I did BaTB.
My initial impression is that it’s ugly. It may look better in motion, but I don’t expect it to. I’ll give it a chance, though and it may surprise me.
The only Batman cartoon I never cared for was The Batman.
I don’t watch The Brave and the Bold, but I am glad that it exists. I think little kids should have a fun version of Batman as their introduction to the character, as I did. Heck, prior to Batman: TAS, that’s pretty much all there was.
The only Batman I haven’t liked is Brave and the Bold, but I can see it being great for youngins. It was just too…I dunno, maybe I watched the wrong group of episodes, but something was off for me.
when it comes to “The Brave and Bold” I don’t watch it because of how little it takes itself seriously, and I guess it could be called a more morden version of the real old cartoons.(?)
and these are all good things for ppl who like this kind of stuff.
I don’t, at least not in Batman. I prefer the darker “Batman: The Animated Series” that still has it’s moments of humorus stupidity.
Since I’m young, I also am not that well learned about what by majority is called good or bad in Batman history, I’m just sayin’ what I think.
plz don’t juge me^^
That’s entirely legitimate. Personally I like both darker batman and campy fun batman, but it bugs me how hard it is to find a balance.
That was one of my favorite things about The Batman though. It had a few places where it managed to bring in the best of both worlds with shocking effectiveness. Like its’ rendition of The Joker. He had all the silliness of Prankster Joker, but still managed to come across as a crazy sociopath and did some legitimately fucked up stuff. He didn’t just kill. He destroyed lives. He’d be doing the humor thing being the life of the party and quite legitimately hilarious when you’d suddenly see a bit of the anger when something displeased him and remember why this fun loving individual was someone you wanted to keep a distance from. He’s the kind of guy that makes you cut off your laughter with a gasp.
I personally view The Batman’s Joker as the greatest Joker. It struck a balance that I haven’t been able to see elsewhere and did so deliciously. There are a few points in that series I view that way.
So looking at the strip before this one, Ethan appears to have greyed quite significantly…
Am I the only one who saw the image thought “wow this looks like CGI Batman: The Animated Series.” and thought AWESOME.
I wish I saw a previous image of doom patrol. I am looking forward to all three series they are doing.
Peppridge Farm remembers.
I liked Batman TAS from the get-go, but I also watched the Fleischer cartoons when I was younger and I had read that it was going to be a serious Batman “like the movie” (because it took longer to get animated shows on the air then, production started before the second Burton film). I can’t imagine any fool thinking it would be bad. And it led to a good Superman cartoon and several other shows and movies and is the whole reason we have Young Justice and Teen Titans and Justice League and Brave and the Bold.
“The Batman”, on the other hand, I started watching … and immediately quit when Mr. Freeze turned out to be a cheap hood in a getup.
Thank god it wasn’t serious “like the movie”, or we’d have had endless episodes with nonsensical plots and a Batman who murders an awful lot of people.
Yeah, the movie was pretty awful. There, I said it. Again.
I forgive most of the 1989 movie’s flaws, but only because of the soundtrack. Not the Elfman score, the Prince soundtrack.
Presumably meaning not campy like the previous TV show or juvenile like most of the 70′s & 80′s animated Batman. I don’t think I’ve seen the first Burton movie since 1992.
I remember the promotional images for TF Animated were ridiculously exaggerated, with this over the top foreshortening.. made it look friggin terrible.
In the end the art was the worst TF art ever, but that’s still pretty good.. and more importantly it was funny and interesting.
What if, instead of writing on chalkboards, Robin’s schtick was smoking or drinking, would we really be so blase about Ethan stealing it?
hahahahahahahaha
I was unable to give the Batman more chance than the first season to be honest… And still don’t like the designs…
Brave and the bold grew on my, the designs are my less favorita part of the show but it makes laugh so that is a thubsup for me. Pity the cancellation.
And I have to admit Bruce Timm style kinda grew on me as I grew older.. I used to see batman in spite of the designs not because of them…
Of the new series I still don’t know what to think, I don’t mind if they do adaptation over adaptation until we get another one that is great.
Hang on, does that mean you don’t like any designs for ANY Batman show?
WHY DON’T THEY JUST FUCK ALREADY?!!?
… Is it just me, and pardon if someone already said it, but is Ethan starting to go grey?
Ok, totally unrelated to anything at all, save for the cast-
HOLY SHIT IS THAT ROBIN IN TRANSFORMERS TAS: Total Meltdown?!
just about a minute in, the chick who’s gassing up one of the cars.
Pre-Senator days, eh?
Hold up a sec. What exactly about that promo image gives the impression that it will be good?
Batman looks like he was drawn by Piccaso, the new teen sidekick means a wasted opportunity for an animated version of an existing character, and Alfred is going John Woo on people (and is drawn like he belongs in a completely different toon all together).
I’m not interested in any of these things.
It might be a completely awesome show, or, more likely, it’ll probably suck for its first season or two and gradually pick up when they pick up enough of a fanbase to risk trading the stand-alone vanilla stories we’ve seen a thousand variations of for something more interesting and complex.
Like what happened with Justice League, Teen Titans, and The Batman.
Either way, nothing about that promo image has me interested in watching it outside of morbid curiosity. Considering I, like I’m guessing everybody else that reads your strip, come pre-programmed to be interested in Batman by default, that in itself is a pretty big fail.
Nobody said it will be good based on the promotional image, it’s just that it’s premature to make judgements (especially about the animation) based on it.
Also, Katana is an existing character:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Katana_(comics)
She was in the Outsiders episodes of Batman: The Brave and the Bold.
Personally, I’m not a fan of CG animation, but I’m willing to wait until I actually see an episode to judge it. I don’t really care about what I’ve heard regarding the characters, especially since they’re going out of their way to not feature villains or sidekicks that have featured prominently before (in which case, I have to wonder, why make a Batman cartoon in the first place?) but that doesn’t have anything to do with budget or animation quality.
So are there actually people that are saying the animation is going to suck, or is this like the link Willis posted that was actually just full of people making mostly accurate assessments of TAS Season 4 artstyle?
I don’t have a problem with anybody making the assumption that this is going to suck. Anybody that’s paid attention to cartoons for any stretch of time can see the red flags and anybody familiar with DC adaptations similar to this can probably recognize the pattern.
We’ve already done this with The Batman. From the very first promo it looked heavy on style and light on substance and, as far as I can tell, that’s exactly how it turned out at the start.
Nine times out of ten, your first impression is the right one.
So, I just googled the promo image.
It’s….um….I hate it. Why is everyone’s head so flat? Why are the Bloaty’s Pizza Hog mascots hovering ominously in the background?
Granted, that says nothing about the animation or the writing or the voice acting, but I have to say right now this is the first Batman series I’ve seen that literally looks horrible.
‘Cept the backgrounds. Those are cool.
I just see each Batman series like a different run on the comic. Each is a unique interpretation of the character.
Dini Timm felt like Classic Finger/Kane Batman with a little burton thrown in.
TNBA felt a bit more contemporary, like Neal Adams.
The Batman felt a bit like again Neal Adams/70′s in tone and mood
Batman: Brave and the Bold was a Homage to Sprang and the Silver age
Beware feels kind of like Dick Grayson Batman in tone and style.
But I don’t know if I can go for this on though. Too many compromises. Like replacing Damien with Katana and Alfred being another sidekick. The whole idea of Professor Pyg just seems inappropriate for animated series. That character is SICK. Unlike previous bat-rogues who’s psychosis had a charm to it, pyg is just so twisted he could turn off many viewers.
1. Does anyone watch the various animated Bat shows for the story lines, plots, and themes? Or is it all about the art work and animation skills?
2. One big advantage of the Shortpacked bike aisle is all that room to run away from random jerks (or Mike). Come to think of it, the place has the widest aisles in retail. That’s refreshing, after seeing all the freaking CONVENTION CENTER construction that uses Americans with Disabilities Act related minimum sidewalk widths as the mandated size.
2.1. Yeah, I’m sick and tired of lousy 42 inch wide sidewalks and walkways around the San Diego Convention Center grounds during ComicCon.
“1. Does anyone watch the various animated Bat shows for the story lines, plots, and themes? Or is it all about the art work and animation skills?”
Depends on the show.
Brave and the Bold is, frankly, hillerious at times. Very much watch for the comady factor – specificly normaly what Batman is saying in a deadly serious tone. Sometimes its storys are ok, but normaly they arnt supposed to be taken seriously at all.
TAS, on the other hand, frequently had very worthy plots, quite adult themes too. Other times it didnt, like with anything quality varied.
But certainly it isnt just a case of groundbreaking animation/style.
I am not a fan of these Batman cartoons, other than Batman beyond. The animation is being dumbed down each show, like most animated shows. I liked JLU animation, and YJ, but B&B was horrible.
If you’re not a fan of Batman the Animated Series, then you’re opinion is invalid. On anything.
Sorry.
Burned
Also, it shows that our birthdays are only 7 days apart, kickass
sorry love meeting people with the same month birthdays for some odd reason lol
Awesome. Did you see my comic or something, haha?
It sure does make me angry when people judge things based on materials released by the producers of those things for the explicit purpose of allowing people to judge their things.
Is it just me, or does Alfred look like a skinny version of “Dum-Dum” Dugan in that promo image?
But yeah, the art style looks ugly to me. Then again, so did “The Powerpuff Girls,” and I enjoyed that show immensely.
But The Batman actually did suck.
So, what does everybody think of the preview images for the new Sabrina the Teenage Witch animated series? It’s a much smaller fandom, but I’ve seen the same reactions…
http://herocomplex.latimes.com/2011/09/21/sabrina-the-teenage-witch-will-star-in-animated-tv-series/
Not a fan, but I’m surprised there would be much negative reaction to those images. They look very promising. Salem looks a bit chibi, but if he is suposed to be naughtier than in previous incarnations that sounds good to me. And if it were more action oriented and less “The More You Know!—-*” that sounds like a show worth checking out.
I fukkin love it. Looks great. Should be fun. Not a huge fan of Salem’s new look but that’s hardly gonna make or break anything and I’m sure it’ll seem cool once I see it in action.
The article itself makes the show sound like shit, but it’s Sabrina. You can’t exactly fuck that up.
It doesnt matter if they reboot the design and direction of the TV series but when DC anounced reboot everyone was OK to hate it before hand?
God, I hate you all.
PD: Alfred need a shotgun, he is a kickass butler not some kickass hitman. And The new adventures of Batman had horrible character design, but It worked because It had good storytelling. And The best thing about The Batman was Cameos, thats why the next series was The Brave and the Bold. The Batman “sucked” to gain succes as the other series, Brave and the Bold was a huge hit.
Willis and Ethan´s problems are that they would hold an opinion just to disagree with the comon fanboy or troll, Ethan is more naive than his creator. My own advice to myself is to lisent and care about the criticism but not get in an argument, trolls are full of half truths thats why they are dangerous.
And talking about DC, The New 52 Aquaman and Green Lantern are really cool. My ffavourite adventure of Aquaman still is When he lose his hand (the cover of aquaman going out of the water in a beach is awsome!) and I love Geoff Jhones green lantern, but the new 52 reintroduced Kyle Rayner, who (under Jhones) was too much in the shadow of Hal Jordan.
So for me Didio has 2 in favor and 2 against (teen titans was lame after all, and Catwoman was so so hollywood style of crap), on to superman to break the tie.
Batman TAS had bad reception? But… the internet practically did not exist back then!
It even predates the dancing baby.
THAT IS NOT HOW CHINS LOOK. Oh, wait. This is awesome.