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Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
Welcome to the Comic Book Animation Thread. In this thread, we get to discuss the like twelve good adaptations of comics, and then the endless sea of poo poo that we’ve experienced for nearly a century.

But first, here is a handy guide to what is on and what is coming.

What’s On


Jeph Loeb and Steve Wacker’s Boring Animation Bonanza, Disney XD

The primary thing on TV right now in terms of superheroes is Disney XD’s take on the Marvel Universe. These shows are pretty generic, and I really don’t like them. But here they consist of the following programs:




Avengers Assemble

The rather generic usurper of the mostly fabulous Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. It originally veered closer to the movies, but has veered a bit closer to the comics. They’re apparently doing a Secret Wars storyline with Jane Foster Thor.




Guardians of the Galaxy

Not connected to the film, but it sure wants you to think it is. It’s a pretty alright facsimile of the tone of the movie.




Ultimate Spider-Man: Something Something

Not really based on the comic book series, and very up and down in quality. Like Avengers Assemble, each season has its own thing, and the seasons are even named in a similar way to say American Horror Story. The last season was Ultimate Spiderman vs the Sinister Six.

While it focused on Peter, it also features a lot of Miles Morales.




Hulks Agents of SMASH

There was also the Hulk show that was much more boring than its premise of all the different Hulks teaming up and its title suggested. It’s dead now.




Justice League: Gods and Monsters Chronicles, Machinima/Youtube

Sort of an odd-duck, this an offshoot of the direct-to-video movie Gods and Monsters that recasts Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman with different people taking on those roles and a darker world.

Originally, three mini episodes were put up revolving around Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman. A second season was ordered will feature a longer episode order.




Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Nick

Continuing the trend of nearly thirty years of almost continuous Turtles cartoons and TV shows, the most recent version cuts the difference between the classic 87 series and the 2003 series in terms of tone.

It features a lot of the usual stuff, and the most notable change is April and Casey being teenagers. It’s been very well received and is very fun.




Teen Titans Go!, Cartoon Network

Teen Titans Go is similar to the Teen Titans series from earlier in the century with the same voice cast and similar designs. It abandons any pretense at being an actual superhero story and has none of the pathos of its predecessor.

Instead it’s closer to Regular Show or Adventure Time in tone, but darker than those shows. Honestly, I don’t find the show to really have the heart that makes Cartoon Network’s other tweenish aimed programming work. But it’s worth a few chuckles.




Vixen, CW Seed (CW’s Streaming Service)

Vixen is in continuity with The Flash, Supergirl, Arrow, etc because you know those are more or less cartoons anyway.

It’s been praised for quality animation and a fun little addition for those who enjoy the CWverse.



What’s Coming?!

Hahahaha not loving much.



Big Hero 6, Disney XD

Based on the successful animated film loosely based on the Marvel Comics series, Big Hero 6 continues the adventure of the team. Probably not as well animated.


[IMG][/IMG]

Justice League Action, Cartoon Network

Justice League Unlimited and Brave and the Bold had a baby I guess.

It looks pretty fun, a more lighthearted take on the Justice League compared to the boring Young Justice. Also Wonder Woman’s hair is dope as gently caress.



Coming to a DVD and Your Dad’s HBOGO Account… MOVIES

For the past ten years, both Marvel and DC have produced a slew of direct to video films. Honestly, most of them are very, very bad.

DC’s selection has mostly been based on classic stories. Here are some better examples:




All-Star Superman

A great adaptation of the graphic novel with some smart changes. It definitely doesn’t capture the magic of the book, but it might come as close as possible.




Batman: Year One

A strict adaptation of the classic Miller novel retelling Batman’s fist year in Gotham.




Justice League: New Frontier

Based on the graphic novel, it tells the story of the Justice League coming together in a world where the Justice League characters first appear in correlation with their real world first appearances, culminating in the birth of the 1960s.





Hulk vs Wolverine

The only genuinely good Marvel Movie, Hulk vs Wolverine is pretty solid. It came in a double feature pack with two stories. One featured Wolverine versus Hulk and the other with him versus Thor. The latter is pretty poor, but the former is a fun time.



Coming to a Theater Near You




Batman: The Killing Joke

Finally for a limited time, you can hear uncomfortable nerds clap while the Gordon family is sexually assaulted, tortured, and humiliated by the Joker.The Batman story nobody likes anymore finally comes to life. See the vision of a man who once wrote a novel where Harry Potter kills a man with his flaccid cock, but this is the thing he regrets.




The Lego Batman Movie

Will Arnett's Batman from the Lego Movie returns! The truest version of Batman since 1966.


Spider-Man Animated Movie that Probably Won't happen

Before Spider-Man showed up in Civil War, Sony just didn't even know what the gently caress they were doing. And even after they made the deal with Marvel and decided to go for another reboot of the character, they still decided to make an animated movie. Lord and Miller of Lego Movie fame were attached, but are now gone. Also it might star Miles Morales. I don't feel this is ever actually going to happen.

CARTOONS!

Timeless Appeal fucked around with this message at 04:18 on Jul 25, 2016

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Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

redbackground posted:

pssst your pics aren't showing
Really? It's working for me.

teagone posted:

Just would like to note that the 2009 Wonder Woman animated movie is really good and underappreciated imo. There's like a million Batman-centric animated movies, but only one solely about Wonder Woman. The eff WB Animation.
It's good. There's a scene that sort of skeeves me out. The Green Lantern movie, First Flight is also pretty decent. It comes with a really neat idea of ripping off the formula of Training Day and replacing Denzel with Sinestro.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

teagone posted:

After the panel gave a response to a fan's question, saying that they felt Babs was still a strong female character in the film, I think the audience member sarcastically/mockingly blurted out, "yeah, by using sex and pining for Bruce" or something to that effect.
Like look, I'm sure the dude in the audience was being a snarky nerd. But

1) It's a stupid change, and his answer was complete bullshit. Like Timm gave a better answer, and to be fair, I do agree with him. I think the notion that Batman and Batgirl have a father/daughter relationship is straight up false. And I think it's fair to say that the crush was there on Batman 66. Honestly, I don't necessarily have an issue with the relationship in general.

What we've seen is infinitely more stupid and poorly written than what was shown in Batman Beyond

2) But also grown rear end men shouldn't be shouting and calling people pussies like loving idiots. Even if the nerd was being a huge rear end in a top hat, Azz was being a child.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

redbackground posted:

Yeah, I'm not swapping https poo poo just to see some gifs.

It's a small thing, but can't you swap 'em to Imgur like the rest of the internet?
Yea I'll switch stuff over tonight

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
See, Paul Dini was smart. He just went ahead and literally married Zatanna and got all of his fanboy weirdness out of his system.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

ToastyPotato posted:

Was he the one with the website that had the semi/mostly-nude cartoon women or was that Timm? Dini is the one with the DCAU drawing style right?
Dini is the overcredited writer.

Timm created the DCAU style and is under-credited for story contributions. And also had the website with a lot of nudes. To be fair, his nudes are pretty great. And despite the DCAU being known for having one body for women, he can actually branch out.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

ToastyPotato posted:

His artwork was fine, but taken into this new creepy context, I start to wonder if his drawings were less about "Art" and more about "pleasure".
Yeah... that's not really in question. Timm's nudes are mostly erotic and it's clear he just likes drawing naked ladies. It's not really creepy and his statement is creepy for other reasons.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

ufarn posted:

On a more SFW note, was the Batman-WW pairing in JLA Dini's or Timm's preference? As far as I recall, they had to axe the romance, because it conflicted with the future Batman Beyond continuity.
Dini had very little to do with Justice League. JL was McDuffie's baby.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

redbackground posted:

The Arkham games were hit and miss on how they handled certain characters, but they got it absolutely right when at the end of City, Batman says he would still have tried to save Joker's life with the antidote, even after all that had happened.
See, I'm someone who finds this incredibly stupid especially in the broader context of the game where Batman questions saving the people in Arkham City and Oracle argues that it's okay for Deadshot to kill Arkham inmates and doesn't really refute her.

I get Batman not killing, but you know what, let the Joker dying of an illness thing play itself out. It's like if Superman used his X-Ray vision to find out that the Joker had cancer and Batman captured the guy to force chemo treatment on him.

Like imagine living in Gotham and finding out the Joker was dying of supervillain AIDS and Batman saved him. That's insane.

And I'm someone who hates the Snyder stuff for the killing.

ImpAtom posted:

That isn't what happened in the book. We have actual script pages showing that.


No it isn't. We have the script of The Killing Joke.


It isn't ambiguous. The reason it became a 'thing' is because Grant Morrison brought it up.
Dude chill. I'm not fond of the Batman kills the Joker thing, but it's a work of art and it's open to interpretation. It's a Black Gatsby type deal. There's nothing on the page to explicitly support it, but it's not an invalid reading.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

redbackground posted:

"I'm squeezing your arms as hard as I can, why are you still breathing?!"
I think it's more the vanishing of the light that makes people think the Joker died and the fact that the book begins with Batman saying eventually one of them is going to kill the other.

quote:

I don't think Batman would do anything like that, as saving the Joker throughout the game is not a goal. It's just he wouldn't have kept the antidote to himself if he knew he had the option to administer it.
I get that for a normal person, but it's more or less a serial killer.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
I said this before, but my read on The Killing Joke is that's it's more of a story about how we cope with the world. Batman exists less as a character and more of a coping mechanism. He's the part of our brain that is trying to find order in the world to keep ourselves sane. The Joker on the other hand is eroding that in all of his forms. Chris Sims talks a lot about how Batman 66 is about the villains trying to prove Batman's fallible. It's something that I think has been lost, but that's exactly what the Joker is trying to do. He's trying to prove that given the right circumstances that Gordon can break too; abandon order. He's trying to prove that Batman and him are the same thing, opposite and equal reactions from the same action.

The most important thing is that Gordon asks for Joker to be brought in by the book. The most important thing for Gordon is that his sense of order is maintained.

And that's why trying to build up Babs is so wrongheaded. This story is one where Babs is a prop. You could have started the movie with a complete two hour adaptation of Batgirl: Year One, and at the end she is still fridged. It's still a problem.

The movie has two choices if it honestly wants to deal with Babs being used as a prop.

Have something else happen to Gordon entirely.

Have the Joker try to break Babs. Rewrite the story. Have Gordon open the door. Go as dark as you want to with what happens to Babs, but have her be the one who tells Batman to do it by the book. Have her be the one to prove she can't break.

But you know, we need to get that iconic scene of a children's cartoon character raping someone.

Franchescanado posted:

Has there ever been a Batman comic where Bruce is confronted by his parents who see his life as Batman and ask him why he used his life spending their money and using their legacy as a vigilante?
Yep! Death and the Maidens, one of the most sinfully forgotten Batman stories ever by Greg Rucka. It actually includes an interesting counterpoint to that mini-debate RedBackground and I were having earlier where Ra's claims that Batman is murdering him by destroying the Lazarus Pits.

But there is a possibly hallucinated scene where Martha and Thomas talk to Bruce, and they're mortified by what he's done with his life.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

ToastyPotato posted:

To be fair, they gave up in Rises, and just used a coTempletely untouched NYC for the wide shots. Which is really jarring if you are familiar with NYC at all.
It is honestly less jarring than the Dark Knight if you're familiar with Chicago.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
The one thing I do honestly adore is the Wayne Tower change in The Dark Knight

In the first film, Wayne Tower looks like this

http://imgur.com/a/VLVX3

http://imgur.com/a/035pX

Bruce changes Wayne Tower so it's dressed like Batman.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
I think Conroy has a lot of range, but they really really should have considering getting West in for The Killing Joke.

I just finished it by the way. It's such a huge mess although I dislike the Babs stuff a lot more watching it. It's a train wreck, but its intentions are very clear. It's still a mess.

The biggest bummer is that Hamill knocks it out of the park. His pre-Joker is really great, and honestly they should have done more with it.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

Lurdiak posted:

Yeah, if someone wanted to "pad out" The Killing Joke because they're a dumb rear end in a top hat who thinks an animated film needs to be a certain length for people to feel like they got their money's worth, you'd think they would've added more down-on-his-luck comedian Joker scenes instead of what they added.
It would be nice to show his wife as more of a character, really sell that for all the poo poo in this guy's life, he loves her. Have a slower descent into poo poo. Maybe do weird stuff where her haircut and name is changing from scene to scene to actually reenforce the multiple choice comment. Maybe include a scene early on where he's saved by some muggers by Batman or play up the Red Hood a little more.

The thing is that the actual Killing Joke adaptation is incredibly stilted in places because they're straight adapting what's on the page. Like the moment where the Joker snaps and realizes what's happened to him really doesn't have much gravitas to it. Like show him trying to rub it off, getting more desperate, clawing at his face, realizing what's happened to himself. Have him get desperate and start to crack. Have the laugh start small and get big.

The ending moment itself is incredibly lacking as well. Conroy and Hamill do a good job, but the voice direction was way off. The Joker should be caught in a bad belly laugh, crying laughing, like he can't control himself and Batman just gets caught up in it. Like that initial "Heh" should be really small and build up.

Hamill knocks it out of the park when he has that lucid moment and tells Batman that he's too far gone.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
And for something that might actually be Mark's performance, he never gets a chance to do his trademark Joker thing where he gets serious and talks to himself in a low, considering voice before just snapping up into crazy excited Joker.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
Greg Weissman is all about the long game, and to be fair he's mostly good at it. Spectacular Spider-Man hurts because it could've had a clean ending, but instead plants hooks for stuff that will never come. And there's Gargoyles Season 3.

I'd really love to see him be able to actually follow through with something.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

SonicRulez posted:

Is that the way kids are in this day or is that just how execs perceive kids to be? I'm just looking around and we don't have very many teenage superheroes anymore. The only two I can think of that are popular would be Damian to some degree and I guess the most recent Spider-Man himself. But I'd imagine kids are looking at Iron Man and Thor.
More kids are reading Smile and watching Steven Universe than reading superhero comics and cartoons about adult characters.

But anyway, it's always been the common wisdom and part of why Robin was created.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

Kurui Reiten posted:

It's also been almost universally wrong. If I remember correctly, the general reply to that has been "Kids didn't want to be Batman's kid sidekick, they wanted to be Batman". Marketing people think that kids need someone to embody as the tagalong to the hero, but they forget that kids want to be the coolest fucker in the room, not their idiot friend.
But it's also not universally wrong? And it's not marketing people. It's a principle of writing for kids despite obvious exceptions. And while yes Batman is technically an adult, look at YA fiction and notice how absent parents are. It's because you don't want your story to have the safety net of parents. You want the child hero to both me more empowered and tested by the lack of parents. Ya know... like Batman. It's also not like the impetus for this conversation is rooted in Spider-Man who literally shook the entirety of comics when he showed up as a teenage hero or X-men and Teen Titans completely dominated sales in the 80s.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

purple death ray posted:

I don't think it's satire. It is a movie of mostly very talented actors (as well as Chris O'Donnell and Alicia Silverstone) just going full ham and chewing the scenery and just having a great old time. It's really the closest thing to the Adam West series and their "special guest villains" who were Hollywood icons given the chance to just go nuts and act like a cartoon.

Is it a good movie, maybe not. But it is a good time.
The Batman 66 comparison is a bit flawed because Batman 66 is just a better production. It has some Arrested Development level jokes and some of the earlier episodes look drat good. And as much as people spent the better part of the 90s whining about how it ruined Batman, the performances left a lasting impression. The villainous actors really set the tone for those characters--especially Catwoman--and Frank Gorshin set the bar for supervillains in general.

Batman and Robin has some fun moments, but it's just really cheap and shoddy. The aesthetic and look of the thing just become more grotesquely gaudy over the years than anything else.

What I will say is that stuff like the bat-rear end shots and the bat nipples are properly worth the least mockery because that stuff wouldn't stand out as much in 1997 movie about a superheroine. It's a gay-male-gaze of Batman and that's interesting. But the movie is so unsexy that it doesn't really matter. And we have Thor that is able to relish in how hot its lead is while providing a more fun experience.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
I do miss the good old days of listening to every Simpsons DVD commentary.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

achillesforever6 posted:

Then they kind of ruined Mr. Freeze with New Adventures episode "Meltdown", but then saved him in Batman Beyond.

Poor Clayface got hosed over pretty hard in the DCAU
"Meltdown" is fine on its own, and there's a lot I like about it.

It's just that the ending of Sub-Zero is not only good and conclusive, but the notion that Freeze presumably goes onto live like an immortal God of the North with his polar bear friends is great.

I think "Deep Freeze" is also incredibly under-credited. It's a great episode that follows through with a trend of B:TAS/TNBA/BB of taking the gimmicks and powers of the villains to interesting extremes. What happens when The Ventriloquist is cured, what happens if Two-Face develops another personality, what are the results of Bane's years of venom usage, how far is Ra's willing to go to be immortal, can Clayface make sentient off-shoots of his own body. Deep Freeze makes the leap of, "Wait, isn't Mr. Freeze technically immortal?" and then brings evil Walt Disney into the mix.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

NikkolasKing posted:

So I'm gonna be reading The Dark Knight Returns for the first time in a bit.

Should I check out the two part movie adaptation?


Also I re-watched X-Men Evolution recently. I still liked it a lot.
It has all the problems of Miller's work with none of the pluses. But it's fine.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
It's very clean animation. The problem is that it's just very plainly directed with obviously pretty boring storyboards and no sense of style.

Take its version of the Super Mutant fight

Now compare it to the TNBA version

Just take the "I'm the surgeon" moment alone. In the confines of Kids WB, TNBA is able to get across a much more brutal moment.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
I don't think you really need the narration. There are tons of ways to get across the notion that Bruce wants to die--and it's an important notion as its his actual arc in the story. Or as Skwirl kind of points to, you don't really need it to be the car race. The problem with the TDKR is that it's going through the motions of what's on the page without getting to the actual purpose. The issue isn't so much that it doesn't have a narration but more that it doesn't fully get what Bruce's story arc in the book is.

haitfais posted:

in a 7 minute segment doesn't necessarily work over 3 hours of movie.
This is kind of diminishing what's happening in the TNBA scene. It's not in anyway a straight adaptation of the book and that's kind of my point. It makes changes to make a more dynamic scene and make this new look that evokes the book while working on the screen. What the actual film should have done.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

haitfais posted:

This might be the only thing we actually disagree on. I'm of the opinion that the film did exactly what you're describing, changed the scene to make it more dynamic and cinematic. I think it managed to convey Bruce's borderline-suicidal recklessness through his actions (the smashing of the safety thing,) and the grim ennui that fuels it (the bored, deadpan tone of his dialogue in that scene.) I won't argue that it was as effective as the print version, since it clearly didn't work for everyone, but I will argue that they were as successful as I could reasonably expect them to be. I won't claim you're wrong if you feel otherwise.
The thing about Bruce is that he's not so much suicidal as he is in search of a satisfying ending. i do agree that they get across the notion that Bruce is not so invested in living anymore, but not the nuance of wanting a good death. I don't think they get across that hesitation and assessment of this as a potential ending for him.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
As big a fan I am of Superman: The Animated Series and feel that TNBA is wildly underrated, I think the version of the DC Universe that the original B:TAS series constructed was a really interesting one centered around pulp over superhero tropes. I would have loved to see what that world's Superman was like.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

Reinanigans posted:

Probably a lot like the Fleischer Superman, I would imagine, no?
True, but the Fleischer toons came so early on in Superman's life that while they nail Clark and Lois, not a lot of the other elements we associate with Superman are there. One of the interesting things about B:TAS it that it takes a lot from Batman's history from Ra's, Bane, Killer Croc, the Tim Drake costume, the older Dick Grayson, Batgirl, etc and fits them in this 1940s aesthetic pretty seamlessly. The fact that Dick's 90s rear end Robin costume works on that show at all is impressive.

I'd be interested how they'd fit a more wholistic Superman in the Fleischer style.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

notthegoatseguy posted:

Probably Batman and Superman. Don't they both have a bunch of radio series from the 1940s?
Yeah but should we really count them at this point? Serials in terms of format are just proto-TV shows. They're not really movies and we're moving into a era where what we call a TV show isn't really a TV show anymore anyway. So we might as well unify serialized film into one category. Also serials didn't really go into the origin stories anyway.

As far as my count, Spider-Man origin is told in Spider-Man, retold and retconned in Spider-Man 3, Spider-Man: TAS, Spectacular Spider-Man, and Amazing Spider-Man.

Batman's origin is told in Batman, retold in Batman Forever, Mask of the Phantasm, Brave and the Bold, Justice League Unlimited kinda, Batman Begins, Batman v Superman. I'm assuming The Batman and Beware the Batman touched on it. And I'm sure some of the lovely direct to video films adapted it. I know Year One does at least.

So Batman for sure. Spider-Man games also rarely touch on it whereas Arkham VR puts you right in the middle of the Waynes' murder.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

Jack Gladney posted:

Batman is a child's power fantasy and the Miller version is Miller's childish power fantasy.
Miller's fantasy isn't a child fantasy. The thing that makes Batman a compelling concept is that he's a kid who experienced murder said, "Well that shouldn't happen," and followed through with trying to eradicate the notion of crime. And there's tons of ways to spin that, but it's at the least a compelling and relatable fantasy.

A lot of Miller's fantasy is rooted in him being a kid from Vermont who moved to NYC at a rough time and got mugged a bunch. And look, let's be clear, that sucks. But Miller's fantasy isn't a child's fantasy. The fantasy of Batman is rooted in unfairness and a child's ability to see something that adults accept being unfair or illogical. Miller's Batman work, especially TDKR, is more patriarchal. It's about an adult telling these young super-predators the way it is.

And I think the ultimate thing that really breaks Miller as a Batman creator is that despite writing about big grimy cities, I think on a fundamental level Frank doesn't have a love for New York or at least doesn't have a love for the parts of it that he doesn't get. A lot of his career has been reconciling that with tough white men who can control New York. And that extends to his Batman. His Batman does not love Gotham. His Gotham is a pretty detestable thing. And I think that's actually something key to the character. Batman has to, on some level, love Gotham. Like Snyder's run or the Nolan films, that love can be a self-destructive thing. But for Miller, Gotham isn't something that Batman saves. It's something that Batman must defeat.

It's impossible for it really be a child's fantasy, because Miller's Batman fantasy is one that requires a level of insecurity a child cannot possibly have.

Also, I've said this before, but Batman's not killing rule is fine as long as you just don't think the Joker has killed hundreds of people. It's sort of this arbitrary thing that TDKR declared and we all just agreed with.

Timeless Appeal fucked around with this message at 05:02 on Apr 30, 2017

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
The honest reason that Batman doesn't kill anyone is because he's devoted his life to stop people from being murdered. It's his thing.The reason that Superman doesn't murder is that his whole existence is thanks to his parents having the hope and faith in people they'd never met on a faraway planet not being monsters and instead loving and caring for their son as one of their own. To kill is to give up hope on someone, and that's not Superman's thing. The thing that's broken about Batman is the Joker. Because everyone got a hardon for the Killing Joke and despite The Dark Knight doing a better job at refining that book's themes, people still just want to write Joker being all about CHAOS and some loving point that's boring. Like we get it. There's nothing else you can do or say. And honestly just bring him back to being a comedian who doesn't see the law as being a boundary to his humor.

But also, smugly saying "Well don't you just kill the Joker" makes no actual sense in a comic book universe. These motherfuckers live in the DC Universe. Kill him? Why? So he can become the King of Hell? So he can come back as a ghost and possess Alfred? So Batman can find out that he had some hosed up contingency plan to trigger one last joke upon his death? As lovely a game as Arkham Knight was, it's a pretty goddamn realistic depiction of what would happen if you actually killed Batman. Honestly if you want the actual TACTICAL REALISM thing Batman should do it would be to essentially keep him in a big terrarium at the very bottom of the batcave. But he'll probably find a motherbox down there somehow because comics.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
But it's not the real justification for not killing the Joker. The real justification is that Batman just doesn't kill. And I get why that notion doesn't mesh when you have Joker killing swathes of people every time he shows up. But the solution to fixing that problem isn't breaking Batman, it's fixing the Joker. My post was more mocking the attempts at trying to be logical and tactical in a story about a man who seeks out to eliminate all crime.

Related there was a pretty good gag in Slott's She-Hulk where they were arguing if a ghost could testify at his own trial. He was allowed on the basis that half the court had died during the Infinity Gauntlet.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
It's incredibly be sad, but it wasn't all for nothing.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006
There a few episodes with gags that sexualize Starfire and Raven that are kind of weird.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

TFRazorsaw posted:

I just think it's time we as a people agreed that Bruce Timm needs a balancing force like Paul Dini, Alan Burnett, and Dwayne McDuffie to create good fiction, and that more than likely, crediting him as the guiding hand and chief creative influence of the DCAU was probably a bit much.
Honestly, this rarely happens with Timm. It's mostly been Dini who people imagined as this architect of the DCAU, intricately plotting everything out despite the fact that he has almost nothing to do with a great deal of it. I think most people who recognize that Timm had a greater influence than Dini also realize all the other people who mattered along the way and often mattered more than Dini and TImm.

But it's one thing to say that the DCAU is a collaborative effort and where you get to at the end of your post. Timm is inarguably the guiding hand and chief creative influence of the DCAU. That doesn't mean there wasn't collaboration, but he's the connective tissue of almost every DCAU series. But beyond that, you have to understand that the design work that Timm brought was absolutely revolutionary. Drawing Batman with his big jaw and tiny waist was something novel when you looked at stuff like GI Joe or He-Man with its stiff and relatively realistically drawn people. As much as its propped up as being dark and gritty, the biggest revolutionary act that sparks from Timm is that action cartoons can be better action when you embrace that they're cartoons. By creating more rubbery and exaggerated characters, he was able to make a more dynamic superhero cartoon.

And yes, Mr. Freeze is Mignolia's design and almost none of the Justice League designs are his, but you don't get those designs without that initial spark that comes from Timm. I'd argue you also don't get Samurai Jack, Gargoyles, Spectacular Spider-Man, The Incredibles, or literally the last twenty five years of action and adventure in animation without Timm.

Timm can both me the chief creative force behind the DCAU, only one of many key players in the DCAU, a pervert, wrong about the notion that Batman should date Batgirl, and phoning it in with his current WBA work. All of these things can be true.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

ThermoPhysical posted:

I mean I feel like this is opening Pandora's box...but you're legitimately the first person I've heard that actually seems to dislike him.
A lot of people apparently came out of the woodwork to bash him for his new fiance being too hot and then came out of the woodwork to critcize him--a widowed single father--for getting engaged "too soon."

So ya know there are a lot of assholes.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

bobkatt013 posted:

Blah they are using the house style
Be reasonable. It's not like Mike Mignola designs work well in animation.

Oh wait.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

Skwirl posted:

Am I stuck in a timeloop? That was half of the problem with The Killing Joke.
I mean... let's be clear, it was like 1/4 the problem with The Killing Joke tops.

Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

Lightning Lord posted:

It's kind of funny how I remember crusty jerks being absolutlely furious about the original Teen Titans cartoon not being Bruce Timm styled and ripping into the fans and now those fans are the crusty jerks.
A lot of it wasn't that people were actually upset with the show for what it was. Back in the day myself and other Toon Zone folks connected the new Teen Titans show with a comment that Batman made on Static Shock that Tim was with the Titans. We all assumed from the comment that Teen Titans would be another DCAU show even against reason when it became clear that it wasn't true.

A lot of folks were also bummed in general because there was an assumption of "The Bat Embargo." I don't know if TImm ever officially confirmed it in when he would sporadicly post on Toon Zone, but a lot of people blamed The Batman and Teen Titans for being the reason that Justice League seemed apparently barred from having members of the Bat-Family appear on Justice League. Of course creating many a (stupid) debate around where things took place in relation to the Return of the Joker flashbacks or Bruce's falling out with Dick.

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Timeless Appeal
May 28, 2006

TwoPair posted:

Wow, kinda surprised they did the symbiote so soon. Don't get me wrong, I know it's an important Spider-story, but it seems like most of the cartoons till now have waited a while before introducing it.
It was the finale to Spectacular's first season with Eddie being a big figure from the jump. TAS did it in the eighth episode.

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