Pretty Good

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

The only reason I gave this entry to the DC animated universe a five is because it's Batman. That's it. What we have here is a futuristic Gotham with the ol' good guys against the ol' bad guys scenario. The basic plot has the Penguin recruiting many of the animal super-villains--Cheetah, Silverback, Killer Croc, among others--to help pull off a heist of, ahem, cosmic proportions. Naturally, the good guys have to stop them and you can guess the rest.First, the good points. Decent music, fast moving, some good fight sequences.And now, the bad. The animation looks like it's been scaled down significantly. I'm not expecting Pixar. I am expecting something decent. This wasn't. Batman's suit (light blue) hearkens back to the late 1960's take and it doesn't suit (no pun intended) this day and age. His gold get-through-the-force-field suit reminded me of some lousy Japanese anime...double ungood.As for the script, again, while War and Peace ain't on the menu, this makes Jack and Jill Go Up the Hill read like a masterpiece. Cheesy, poor humor, poorer lines...the one good thing was the voice cast that did what they could with their parts. I miss Kevin Conroy doing the voice of Batman. He had the bearing. His replacement sounds like a slightly younger version of him, but with no depth.The actress doing Cheetah sounds like a whiny child, and I got zero sense of menace behind any of the baddies. Not their fault, really; 'twas the script that done 'em in.Finally, all the old stereotypes of animals being what they are were trotted out, and quite frankly, that kind of thinking should have gone out fifty years ago.I heard this direct-to-DVD effort was to sell toys. My only question is: How many? Nothing wrong with selling goods to the kiddies, but this video is an insult to any comic book/cartoon fan.

Really, anyone on here who will rant and rage about how "It's for kids" really must be no fun at all because this movie comes out of the same mindset that brought us Transformers, Ninja Turtles, G.I. Joe, Skeleton Warriors, Thundercats, Cow-Boys of Moo Mesa, He-Man, and perhaps the greatest thing to ever come out of the 1990s, King Arthur and the Knights of Justice: it was made to sell toys.Now, that's not to say it's bad, just a bit disappointing. On the one hand, the movie had the perfect opportunity to paint Oswald Cobblepot as a sympathetic villain, being a deformed man driven to villainy in a misguided attempt to garner fear and respect from those who shunned him. However, any sympathy I had for him quickly evaporated in the face of his "wipe out the human race" scheme. If they had made it more about the dilemmas he faced in high society, the movie might have been much stronger without sacrificing its toyetic animal robots.On the other hand, a lot of elements were at play that made this movie a ton of fun to watch. First, the time placement. The film doesn't state it outright, but I'm convinced that it takes place somewhere between Justice League Unlimited and Batman Beyond in terms of in- world chronology. Gotham City looks considerably more high-tech than usual, weapons are much more laser-like, and Batman's batsuit looks like the precursor to the one Terry McGinness would eventually don in Batman Beyond. Yeah, I know it's just more attempts to sell toys, but they didn't have to make said attempts with stuff that of old school Timm/Dini fans would recognize.Second, the cast. Even though Batman is on the front, the movie actually features half-a-dozen heroes. Aside from Batman, we also get Green Arrow (who also pulls a pretty cool stunt out-of-costume as Oliver Queen), Nightwing, Red Robin (Tim Drake), and Wally West as The Flash, further leading to my theory that this takes place after Justice League Unlimited. And there are an equal number of villains, leading to a lot of fun action scenes with various combinations of both sides facing each other.Really, the thing that everyone seems to hate about this movie is that it's not complex and is clearly made to sell toys. Well, I'll admit I'd prefer if they'd done a bit more in terms of story or at least giving one character an arc aside from Nightwing becoming friendlier towards Flash, but as a dumb, direct-to-DVD Saturday morning cartoon that never was, it's not bad, certainly not as bad as everyone seems to be making it out to be.And, like I said, something being made to sell toys isn't a sin. Hell, it's what gave birth to most of today's pop culture. The fun parts, at least. And, really, that's all I ask for from a movie like this.

It's a good movie, for any Batman fan. The reason I am voting it only 6 star is due to the fact that this title almost humiliate world most beloved superhero character known as The Flash!!! I hope many viewers will agree with me on this, even Green Arrow has good looking costume (may be this was inspire by CW TV series) and he was fighting alongside with Batman and his team equally. But The Flash is tag along with Nightwing and even he was showing Batman-like attitude towards Flash...which I don't like...But the overall movie was good...Villains played there roles pretty good. The whole Robotic-Mutant team-up Anamlaitia idea was cool..

I don't typically publish reviews, but after seeing so many negative reviews on this release I wanted to set the record straight. I grew up on Batman: The Animated Series, Batman Beyond, Justice League, and the like, and have delved deeply into every DC Animated feature released since. True enough, this is not the dark, grim, graphic and violent Batman that our generation is accustomed to; but, in fairness, it's not meant to be. This film is meant for kids and their parents to enjoy together, and in that sense, I think it's awesome. I'll even go a step further, and say that this the first animated Batman film in quite awhile that I would say is kid-friendly for all age groups.There's action, there's comedy, there's loud noises and character development and robots and superheroes and just about everything a young batman enthusiast could ever want. If you're expecting Christopher Nolan's introspective take on the Batman or Scott Snyder's detail-oriented writing skill, you're looking in utterly the wrong place. But if you're looking for a fun, family adventure with the Bat Family, Green Arrow, and The Flash, look no further than this installment. Glad to hear that there's a sequel on the way!