And that's all the posts pertaining to cartoons for next six months or more, if I can help it.
Thursday, February 10, 2011
"A Poor Man's Triptych"
This one's for Deinol, who felt cheated by the lack of a third screen capture from the recent episode of The Brave and the Bold featuring Scooby and the gang, along with special guest star, Weird Al Yankovic. If that doesn't satisfy you, I'm not sure what will.
And that's all the posts pertaining to cartoons for next six months or more, if I can help it.
And that's all the posts pertaining to cartoons for next six months or more, if I can help it.
Was this episode set in the sixties or something? Because I've watched some of the Brave and Bold and Batman had a more modern costume. I do get that this is a tribute to that old Scooby/Batman show, but Weird Al?
ReplyDeleteNo more cartoon-related posts? Are you sure you don't want to do one about the Dungeons and Dragons Animated Series?
The episode in question, "Bat Mite Presents Batman's Strangest Cases," is a collection of three short stories, each of which draws on a different interpretation of Batman from different eras (Mad's "Bat Boy and Rubin" parody, Japan's Batman manga, and the 70s-era Scooby-Doo Batman). These are presented as if they were from alternate realities to which Bat Mite has access and he's sharing them with others because of his love of "all things Batman." It's really well done and shows the abiding love the creators of The Brave and the Bold have for Batman as a whole, not just a single, narrow interpretation of the character.
ReplyDeleteAwesome! I win the internets today.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoy Batman: The Brave and the Bold, as it took the old 60s campy Caped Crusader, mixed a bit of the 80s edgy Dark Knight, and made him awesome again! This show is like a great-big homage to EVERYTHING Batman - including the fans. As for "Weird Al" Yankovic in a 60s Batman and Scooby-Do crossover, well... why the hell not! That is freakin' awesome!!! =D
ReplyDeleteI think that Batman: The Animated Series had a broadly similar episode... 3 kids telling conflicting encounters with Batman, each in a different historical style. One was Frank Miller's Dark Knight Returns; as a cameo there was clearly a Joel Schumacher-like character gushing about his sculpted chest, IIRC.
ReplyDelete@ Delta - you are correct. The Frank Miller "Dark Knight Returns" Batman was voiced by Michael Ironside. Then there was a retro 60's "campy" Batman, voiced by Gary Owens (which totally worked), and then a strange kind of "shadow" type of Batman who the kids thought was more of a shadow-being than an actual man. It was a very cool episode, and I think influenced a particular segment in "Batman: Gotham Knights".
ReplyDeleteThe concept originated in Batman #250, but yes, it was Bruce Timm's animated series which did it most famously.
ReplyDeleteIn Timm's version -- "Legends of the Dark Knight" -- you have a Dick Sprang Batman, the Dark Knight Batman, then the Animated Series version at the end. Another highlight was, as Delta suggests, a character called Joel, who talked about Batman's rubber armour and tight muscles, as well the Batmobile going up walls.
The same concept was also used as part of the Batman: Gotham Knight straight-to-dvd release, this time playing Batman as a vampire, a hybrid like the Man-Bat, and as a more robotic figure.
So it's clearly become something of a tradition in Batman cartoons, and I'd expect to see it again in whatever the next incarnation of the character turns out to be. Although they didn't do a version of the story in The Batman, they did do their own take on The Dark Knight Returns in the episode "Artifacts".
That particular part of the episode was on YouTube, and I watched it. Ugh. That was dreadful. Yes, I know it was Bat Mite doing it, but what a waste.
ReplyDeleteI'm much more a fan of TAS.