Batman: The Animated Series
Episode 63
Fire from Olympus
An absolutely amazing episode! Maximillian Zeus is a shipping mogul who becomes delusional and starts thinking he’s the real Zeus. He steals a high tech ray gun and causes problems. Batman is hot on his trail. Zeus thinks Batman is Hades trying to take over Mount Olympus.
Batman enlist the help of Zeus’ assistant Clio to try and stop him. She’s reluctant but realizes Zeus has totally flipped out and helps sneak Batman into the building. Zeus catches her, holds her captive, tries to kill her, attacks a police blimp with the ray gun. A bunch of stuff happens and Batman stops him. What makes the episode so epic is the end when Zeus is hauled off to Olympus and describes many of Batman’s classic rogues as deities from the Greek Mythology and believes he’s truly in Olympus. It’s a comedic twist and brilliant one.
What sells the episode so well is Zeus’ henchmen aren’t blind followers. It is a small layers to the story but they try to challenge and question his reality. One of his henchmen doesn’t want to kill Clio and gets zapped with lightning. The other reluctantly ties up Clio because he doesn’t want to get electrocuted too. The henchmen try to talk Zeus out of attacking the police blimp because of the trouble it would bring down on them. That was a layer of character development never given to other henchmen in the show. In 22 minutes the show didn’t have time to give a backstory or personality to each bad guy. It’s nice to know when they had the time, they added it. A nice change from the “hired thug” trope.
Written by
Joseph Ammendolea
Owner/President
“I Like To Play With Toys” Productions®
ILikeToPlayWithToysProductions@Yahoo.com
