BanGos - Heaven is a Place on Earth

BanGos Performing Heaven is a Place on Earth

The DC Animated Universe Weekly Review - Batman: The Animated Series

Batman: The Animated Series

Episode 4

The Last Laugh

Another Joker episode only two episodes after we last saw him.  It’s such a good episode, it doesn’t matter though.  It works because it helps solidify him as Batman’s main villain. 

 

The Joker is spreading a toxic gas all over Gotham making people go into laughing fits.  As that occurs Joker and his gang rob the locations where the gas spreads.  Batman uses his detective skills to track the Joker and stop him.  It’s filled with nice action and great Joker jokes.  

 

It’s hard to find anything to truly criticize in these early episodes.  The show was made so well, there could be some slight character inconsistencies as the years of story telling progress, but very inconsequential. 

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 3

Episode 59 The Shipment

 

Finally an enjoyable episode!  The Enterprise crew tracks down a Xindi settlement which is hooking up the bad Xindi with some sci-fi McGuffins that will help create the device which will destroy earth.  

 

Archer has to win the trust of the guy running the settlement and learns a valuable lesson that not all Xindi are evil.  It’s an important episode that “humanizes” the people Captain Archer and friends are hating on.  It shows that in any war the bad guys are different than the people they supposedly represent.  

 

In the broader vein of Star Trek it sets up the possibility the Xindi conflict can be resolved peacefully by the end of the season.  Enterprise started the season alone and has made at least one friend while traveling around the Delphic Expanse 

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

BanGos - We Got the Beat

See the BanGos perform We Got the Beat live at the South Huntington Library. 

The DC Animated Universe Weekly Review - Batman: The Animated Series

Batman: The Animated Series

Episode 3

Nothing to Fear

The first episode with the Scarecrow.  As the universe progresses his costume becomes more menacing.  His early incarnation is lack luster.  There’s a heavy subplot about Bruce Wayne trying to live up to his father's legacy after being doused with some fear toxin. He overcomes it and defeats Scarecrow.  It’s a nice intro episode to a villain that gets better as the series go on.  It’s not as epic as other episodes but these first few episodes were world building shows and there was no need to rush into anything too heavy.  

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 3

Episode 58 Exile

 

It’s as if the writers purposely take one of their least liked characters and write boring episodes for her so fans have something to complain about.  This is no exception.  Ensign Sato forms a telepathic bond with an alien that can offer Xindi information but only if she visits him in-person.  At first he seems kind of cool.  Turns out he’s a total creep.  She wants to be let go, he loves her so he does, reluctantly.  The Enterprise picks her up, they go on with their mission.  He hooks them up with some helpful data.

 

It progresses the season’s storyline but it’s real painful to sit through.  Why couldn’t they give Sato an action packed episode where she fights her way through a mob of aliens to save a captured telepath she has feelings for?  Because people might enjoy that episode and her character.  

 

TV writers can be stubborn to listen to fan complaints and Star Trek is one of the worst.  They allowed Neelix to exist on Voyager.  He’s truly the worst character ever created on TV ever.  So why would they try to salvage or make Sato a character people like, or have an episode that’s actually enjoyable instead of a lame alien love story.  

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

The DC Animated Universe Weekly Review - Batman: The Animated Series

Batman: The Animated Series

Episode 2

Christmas with the Joker

How do you follow-up the visually stunning On Leather Wings?  You go strong on one of Batman’s biggest villains.  The Joker escapes Arkham Asylum during the holiday season.  Batman is obsessed with catching him and his sidekick Robin wants Batman to lighten up.  

 

Here we meet The Joker voiced by what would become his second most iconic career performance, Mark Hamill.  Hamill is the definitive Joker.  Even if it’s just his voice, it far exceeds Jack Nicholson’s “interpretation” of the character.  Nicholson’s joker was just a meaner version of Caesar Romero.  Nicholson added some psychopathic tendencies and weird noises but ultimately it is just jack Nicholson playing the joker and not actually Joker. 

 

When comparing other Joker performances post BtAS, Hamill is the go to source.  One is left to wonder how brilliant Heath Ledger’s Joker would have been without Hamill’s voice work.  Ledger’s is truly the best live-action incarnation.  A unique, sadistic character, who lives for anarchy.  Hamill’s Joker is the kid friendly crazy, has silly jokes, can be menacing, but since it’s a kid show, never really kills anyone.  At his worst, he puts a permanent catatonic grin on a person’s face.  That never ending smile is actually more cruel than just killing the person. Leave it the TV standard and practices to have rules that cause creative results which are far worse.

 

We also get introduced to Robin for the first time in this episode.  It’s a brilliant setup to the character.  Robin is away at college and therefore will not be in every episode.  The audience is basically told they will be treated to the occasional Robin appearance but this show is about Batman. 

 

What’s more interesting about this approach is the show is really more about Batman’s rogue gallery.  As the series goes on there is a little character development about Batman but it’s more about how the villains grow around him.  They either become more evil or fail at trying to do good.  The one villain that never evolves in the series is The Joker which makes him more sadistic.  He’s consistently evil and his goal is to make Batman’s life miserable.  

 

One of the few items which actually ages the show is its reference to It’s a Wonderful Life.  A film which was on every channel five+ times a day during the Christmas season in the 1980s and 1990s due to a copyright issue. It caused the film to become a Christmas classic in that tenure and resulted in being mentioned in many Christmas shows through the 1990s.   Since the copyright issue was cleared up, the film isn’t broadcasted as often during the holiday season and references make it appear dated.

 

This actually leads us to the bigger visual look of the show.  We didn’t discuss this in our intro article because there was just too much to cover but BtAS style is one of many unique choices which make it stand out.  The Film Noir/Art Deco visuals make the show ageless.  The characters aren’t trapped in the 1940s, it’s not a period piece. The show is supposed to take place in the 1990s.  The style in Gotham City is the 1940s with access to contemporary technology (not counting the advanced tech used in specific episodes for story purposes).  That’s a bold choice for a kids show.  Would kids understand or appreciate this style?  They did buy into it.  But we have to go back to Tim Burton for his hybrid gothic/noir take on Batman which allowed for this.  If Burton’s Batman failed we wouldn’t have these great undertones.

 

The creators were able to lean into the stylistic choices which worked in Burton’s Batman films and filter out the stuff that didn’t.  So Art Deco and Film Noir are great style choices.  Gothic style is not the right tone for children.  Burton’s influence is riddled throughout the entire early run of the series.  The creators were smart in what they chose to include and perhaps lucky that they were making a kids show which allowed them to cut the gothy items Burton uses in all his films.  

 

Meanwhile in the episode, The Joker hijacks the airwaves with some kidnapped key cast members from the show.  Batman and Robin show up and save the day. 

 

We swear the follow-up reviews will be more focused on the individual episodes instead of the entire series.  

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 3

Episode 57 Impulse

 

The weird anomalies generated by the Delphic Expanse can be prevented on star ships with something called Trillium-D but of course Vulcans are allergic.  So in this episode the Enterprise comes across a bunch of Vulcans exposed to Trillium-D and they become zombies.  Its actually a rather fun episode despite how absurd it is.  Enterprise has enough components to make Trillium-D but cannot use it because it’ll mess up their resident Vulcan T’Pol.  So the Enterprise has to wait on using it until Dr Phlox can make a vaccine or serum for T’Pol to avoid the poisonous affects.  

He never makes the vaccine and we find out she starts using it as a drug later on. 

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

The DC Animated Universe Weekly Review - Batman: The Animated Series

Batman: The Animated Series

Episode 1

On Leather Wings

The episode that kicks off the best animated show of all time (the best animated universe ever).  The creators made certain to pull out all the stops for this series and make an impression.  The first episode’s animation is by far the best in the entire universe.  This is clearly a deliberate choice by the creators to sell the show to the studio, network, comic book publisher.  There were a lot of eyes on this first episode and the think tanks needed to deliver.  The quality is so far above anything in animated TV it rivaled Disney features at the time.  

 

When Man-Bat is flying in the air with Batman hanging by a rope behind him, it’s beyond impressive.  The camera follows the movement through the entire sequence.  The time and dedication to that type of children’s animation is unparalleled.  The follow-up episodes were more constrained by time and budget, we really never get to see such vivid animation in the universe again.  The follow-up episodes might not be as visually stunning, they’re still spectacular and do not affect the stories at all. 

 

The episode involves a monster Man-Bat robbing pharmacies and almost everyone thinks it’s Batman.  Batman sets out to clear his name and stop the robberies.  We are introduced to key players in the series like Batman/Bruce Wayne, Alfred, Commissioner Gordon, pre-Two Face Harvey Dent, Harvey Bullock, Mayor Hamilton Hill.  It’s a nice intro to all the characters who will be hashed out in later episodes.  

 

Batman discovers Kirk Langstrom took a serum that made him a monster.  This lovely mutation gimmick will turn up multiple times throughout the DCAU.  BtAS has a werewolf, Catwoman getting mutated into a cat, a man making a cat, a farmer making giant monsters, Batman Beyond has splicers, Justice League had Cheetah.  Comic book TV shows like mutating people into animal/man creatures.  

 

Additionally the episode established the different voice between Batman and Bruce Wayne.  It’s truly a brilliant technique to differentiate the character.  This gimmick dies out as the universe continues.  It was likely easier for the voice actor Kevin Conroy to stick with one consistent style then dramatically switch voice tones.  But the early episodes had two distinct voices and can be seen as a major influence in Christian Bale’s Batman/Bruce Wayne performance.  

 

When comparing this first episode to the prior animated super hero installments from the 1960s – 1980s this was monumental in story telling.  It wasn’t some saccharin Hannah-Barbera watered downed story.  Those old stories were filled with ridiculous cartoon clichés.  Laser weapons because real guns aren’t allowed on children’s TV.  Every time a plane gets shot down the parachute opens.  A PSA at the end trying to educate kids on some lame lesson to tie the episode together.  All of that TV trope garbage was scrapped in this series and On Leather Wings set that tone.  

 

Batman: The Animated Series is certainly a show for kids but remains timeless because it didn’t talk down to them like its animated predecessors.  Adults can easily watch this show.  The fan base remains so strong because of how ageless and compelling the stories are.  As the years went on, rewatches of other popular kid’s shows like He-Man, Transformers, GI Joe, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Thundercats may invoke nostalgia but the episodes do not resonate as well since they were written for a certain age demographic and primarily made to sell toys.  

 

Thanks is owed to Tim Burton’s Batman films.  Burton’s Batman is highly praised by fans but in this web reviewer’s opinion, a bit over hyped.  Without going into too much detail, Burton’s Batman lacked a coherent plot in the first film.  Batman Returns was too gothic.  What Burton did get right though, was he made Batman dark and that allowed the cartoon to be translated into something darker, something which resembled the comics.  In the 13 years Hannah-Barbera produced their DC incarnation of Superfriends (1973 - 1986), they never dared to have the kind of story depth the DCAU tackles.  It’s all thankfully summed up in this first episode.  

 

Even the opening sequence uses a condensed version of Danny Elfman’s Batman theme.  This Batman is telling its audience it’s connected to the films when it uses that music.  As the series progresses Shirley Walker’s compositions take over and become the true music of the show.  But Elfman’s music is clearly a heavy influence and help add to how epic the show truly is.

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com

Episode by Episode - Star Trek: Enterprise

Season 3

Episode 56 Rajiin

 

The enterprise buys a formula for Trillium-D from a merchant on an alien planet.  While there an enslaved woman asks Captain Archer to save her.  So he does. He bonds with her, turns out she’s a spy for the Xindi.  Archer throws her in the brig.  The Xindi attack the ship and free her.  The Xindi use her to start working on a bioweapon.  She seems to have some regrets. But we never see her again.

 

How many Star Trek shows deal with someone falling for a mysterious woman or guy who’s really a bad guy?  Then antics ensue, the person betrays them, sometimes has a change of heart.  It’s a snooze fest on every level.  Skip this episode, the minor enjoyment of humans trading simple kitchen spices for an expensive metallurgic formula is entertaining but wasted on such a bland episode.  

 

Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com