[7.3/10] Batman: TAS wants to do the whole “he who fights monsters” thing with Batman, and it’s not a bad tack. More than one great Batman story has involved questioning whether after spending so long fighting all these mentally disturbed people, Batman would devolve into that himself. This show frames that question as “maybe Batman has spent so long in the darkness that he’s succumbed to it.”
The problem is that it has a pretty lame way of dramatizing that for the most part. There’s a minor charge from seeing Batman in Arkham, wrapped up in a straight jacket, but what ensues is Batman just explaining what happened in voiceover for a while in a way that feels out of character. Batman just doesn't talk that much, and definitely not in raw exposition.
On top of that, the plot is overly standard. The Scarecrow has semi-escaped. (Again! You’d think the doctors would have less doubt that Batman’s telling the truth considering this same sort of thing happened just a handful of episodes ago.) And now he wants to lace the water supply with his fear toxin. There’s nothing wrong with that scheme, but it’s not much to build an episode around and ends up feeling kind of perfunctory. (Though, come to think of it, Batman Begins pretty much goes for the same thing, so this is a good example for “it’s not what you do, it’s how you do it.”) It’s just the same basic plot we’ve seen from Scarecrow three times now, so it loses some of its luster, especially when it ends with the same “Crane is exposed to his own toxin” thing again.
And yet, those dream sequences are worth the price of admission on their own. The first one, with Batman seeing his parents racing into a tunnel in crime alley, unable to move fast enough to stop them, and then seeing it turn into a gigantic, blood-dripping revolver is a sequence that grabs your attention and makes you feel for Batman’s pain in a dramatic way. At the same time, the sequence in the third act with villains popping and bleeding into one another, is an appropriately impressionist way to communicate the idea of Batman’s villains (and allies) having gotten into his head. As standalone clips, both are great.
But from there, his hallucinations fall into generic green monsters and venomous snakes, which takes some of the oomph out of it. And his subsequent defeat of Scarecrow and vindication by the Arkham doctor feels inevitable. That’s part of the problem -- the episode never really commits to the idea that Batman might legitimately be crazy or confused. As soon as he declares that something’s happening, the show cuts to something to show he’s right, so the whole “has Batman lost it?” bit never has a chance to play out.
Still, the closing imagery is nice. Batman declaring that he feels at home in the dark is a little on the nose as a final line, but the bat casting its shadow on our hero as he falls asleep and recovers is a nice picture to go out on.
Overall, this is an episode with a good theme and some incredible sequences, but which falters in the nuts and bolts story department.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2019-10-26T14:35:54Z
[7.3/10] Batman: TAS wants to do the whole “he who fights monsters” thing with Batman, and it’s not a bad tack. More than one great Batman story has involved questioning whether after spending so long fighting all these mentally disturbed people, Batman would devolve into that himself. This show frames that question as “maybe Batman has spent so long in the darkness that he’s succumbed to it.”
The problem is that it has a pretty lame way of dramatizing that for the most part. There’s a minor charge from seeing Batman in Arkham, wrapped up in a straight jacket, but what ensues is Batman just explaining what happened in voiceover for a while in a way that feels out of character. Batman just doesn't talk that much, and definitely not in raw exposition.
On top of that, the plot is overly standard. The Scarecrow has semi-escaped. (Again! You’d think the doctors would have less doubt that Batman’s telling the truth considering this same sort of thing happened just a handful of episodes ago.) And now he wants to lace the water supply with his fear toxin. There’s nothing wrong with that scheme, but it’s not much to build an episode around and ends up feeling kind of perfunctory. (Though, come to think of it, Batman Begins pretty much goes for the same thing, so this is a good example for “it’s not what you do, it’s how you do it.”) It’s just the same basic plot we’ve seen from Scarecrow three times now, so it loses some of its luster, especially when it ends with the same “Crane is exposed to his own toxin” thing again.
And yet, those dream sequences are worth the price of admission on their own. The first one, with Batman seeing his parents racing into a tunnel in crime alley, unable to move fast enough to stop them, and then seeing it turn into a gigantic, blood-dripping revolver is a sequence that grabs your attention and makes you feel for Batman’s pain in a dramatic way. At the same time, the sequence in the third act with villains popping and bleeding into one another, is an appropriately impressionist way to communicate the idea of Batman’s villains (and allies) having gotten into his head. As standalone clips, both are great.
But from there, his hallucinations fall into generic green monsters and venomous snakes, which takes some of the oomph out of it. And his subsequent defeat of Scarecrow and vindication by the Arkham doctor feels inevitable. That’s part of the problem -- the episode never really commits to the idea that Batman might legitimately be crazy or confused. As soon as he declares that something’s happening, the show cuts to something to show he’s right, so the whole “has Batman lost it?” bit never has a chance to play out.
Still, the closing imagery is nice. Batman declaring that he feels at home in the dark is a little on the nose as a final line, but the bat casting its shadow on our hero as he falls asleep and recovers is a nice picture to go out on.
Overall, this is an episode with a good theme and some incredible sequences, but which falters in the nuts and bolts story department.