I have
no idea how to begin this review.
There's that damned obsessive truth telling again.
Most review of Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker start out with some comment like, "While Joel Shumacher was farting all over the live-action Batman movies, Paul Dini and his troop of animators managed to turn out quality Batman products on one-one thousandth of the budget." This is true. They proceed to give you an abridged history of Batman: The Animated Series through its myriad incarnations. The Animated Series became Adventures of Batman and Robin became Batman/Superman Adventures became Batman Beyond. Something like that.
Me, I'd planned to give a living history of the animated series, dropping little crumbs of info as I reviewed the three (or four, depending on how pedantic you wish to get) movies the series has produced.
Well, a shrinking personal budged and already shrunken amount of free time torpedoed that plan. So I decided to review the one animated Bat-movie I have close at hand.
First, some obligatory background: Batman Beyond, the series, takes place about 40 years ahead of the current DC Comics continuity. It follows the adventures of an eighty-something Bruce Wayne (Kevin Conroy), and seventeen-year-old Terry McGuinnes (Will Friedle), Wayne's latest protege. Terry's no Robin, though. He's a headstrong, arrogant, spoiled brat child of the twenty-first century; a punk kid who actually had the gall to steal the bat-suit right out of the cave. Conflict, anyone?
So, with Wayne directing operations from inside the Bat-cave, Terry dons the new-and-improved Batman suit and ventures out into a Ridley Scott-ish Gotham City. And while the show is still kid friendly (at times annoyingly so) it's delved into some surprisingly mature subject matter on a number of occasions. Sometimes the series throws everything out the window and dives head first into very disturbing territory, stuff so close to horror I'm surprised they network censors let them put it on TV.
But we're not talking about TV now, are we? No. This is The Return of the Joker's time to shine.
Fun begins as Bruce finally decides to take Wayne Enterprises back from the shifty corporate weasels that've been running things since his "retirement." Bruce's coming out (of retirement, dumbass) party is in full swing when who should appear? Why it's good ol' Jack Napier, the clown prince of crime himself. And while the original Batman may be pushing 80, the Joker doesn't seem to have aged a day since their last battle all those years ago.
You don't need me to tell you the plot revolves around the Joker's reappearance and the mystery behind his age defying secrets. He isn't using Lorial of Paris, that's for damn sure. But there's also the question of what happened during Batman's final fight with his cackling arch rival, and what could've happened to break up the original capped crusader team? What made Commissioner Barbara Gordon (Angie Harmon) and Tim Drake (Dean Stockwell) hang up their costumes, leaving Bruce to fight his crusade alone? These are questions that have plagued Batman Beyond from day one and by movie's end they'll all be laid to rest. More or less.
If you're one of those people who turn their noses up at we who still watch cartoons, then you can just get out of my dance party right now, Buster. The rest of you can pick up this tape/disc with no fear. The boys at the WB have set the bar for American action 'toons and Return of the Joker is no different. The animation is crisp and smooth, with more than a hint of Japanese anime floating around. Which is all well and good.
Still, it's the writing and the voice acting that really shine through. (Save those few instances where characters make expository speeches. They feel awkward and annoying, as if they were tacked on purely for the benefit of those who don't watch the TV show...which they were.) Bruce, Terry, Barbara...even the Joker; these are all well explored characters who (while they may not be totally realistic) are at least truer to themselves and to each other than any vile creation springing from Akiva Goldsman's word cruncher. In this one flick, writer Paul Dini manages to delve further into Bruce Wayne's character than the combined production staffs of four live-action Batman movies. And Wayne isn't even the central character.
If pressed, I'd hand that role over to the Joker. He is, after all, the MaGuffin. And the best parts of the movie come when Paul Dini uses the Joker to showcase the contrast between Bruce's Batman and Terry's Batman. The Joker was a perfect foil for Bruce (a rich, privileged, methodical nutcase vs. a gutter punk who fell down the rabbit hole and became a true monster) but Terry...Terry's a wise ass, middle class white kid whose never fought anyone who even came close to matching Joker in the "blithering insanity" department. This new dynamic between Batman and the Joker is refreshing to see and much appreciated.
Though, I'll tell you what I don't appreciate: I don't appreciated it when the people who make animated movies pussy foot around the portrayal of violence. When Return of the Joker first came out much was made of how key scenes were edited out at the last minute so as not to hurt the "chillin's" sensitive little eyes. Hell, you guys know I'm all for animated violence, as long as it serves a plot. In their rush to avoid the Vengeance of Mothers Against Cuss Words (or whatever damned organization is springing up these days) the WB deleted key scenes that would've added resonance to the events of the movie (and shown the final, horrible depths of the Joker's madness).
Still, the cuts aren't obvious enough for the uninformed to notice and the damn sequence is only ten minutes long. What am I bitching about, when there's so much good stuff going on here?
I mean, look at this voice cast. Kevin Conroy is and ever shall be the best possible
man for the role of Batman. He's in rare form as the stoic elder Bruce, and, since he
isn't the one in the Bat-suit, he gets to grace us with much more of his dulcet tones. As
Terry, Will Friedle continues the great tradition Conroy began during his first tenure as
the Voice of the Bat. The vocal contrast between Friedle-as-Terry and Friedle-as-Batman is
a great touch on the part of the actor. I miss the cape too, but with Friedle as the Voice
of the Bat, I can get over it.
Inevitably, though, the Best Voice Acting credits go to Mark Hamill. Hands down. Sorry, Jack, but nobody does the Joker like good ol' Luke Skywalker. With Hamill's voice box, the Joker is more demented, more dangerous and more...well...funny then he's ever been before. And Hamill gets the full two hours to show off and parade. If it were any other role this would be called "overacting" but it's the Joker for Christ's sake.
Writing this review was a long, hard road. It took too damn long and for that, I apologized. It just hasn't been my week for writing. Still, it amazes me how long it took me to say one simple thing: Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker is worth your hard earned dollar, despite its flaws (both the ones that were already there and the ones the WB created through heavy handed editing). So get out there and start exchanging some money. There. That's all I have to say.
Except this: If, like me, you're the adventurous type whose all for cartoon violence, then instead of driving all the way to the video store, you should probably stay home and surf the net awhile, if-ya-know-what-I-mean-and-I-think-you-do.
