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Neat find! The face reminds me of the description of the Phantom of the Opera given in the original novel by Gaston Leroux: "He is extraordinarily thin and his dress-coat hangs on a skeleton-frame. His eyes are so deep that you can hardly see the fixed pupils.You just see two big black holes...

For me the over-investment in continuity and the desire to tie a bow on the DCAU were both problematic, since they gave us a season finale based very closely (too closely, I'd say) on events from the second season of Justice League (the Justice Lords get defeated again) and a "final" episode...

I agree that Hawkgirl had good reasons for ditching her old costume. I just wish she'd replaced it with something more visually interesting than a tracksuit. And after she'd successfully reintegrated into the league and had been re-accepted by the wider world, one might have thought she'd adopt...

And it would be hard to write a more through and comprehensive analysis of Hawkgirl than what you've accomplished. I think the use of Hawkgirl in season two of Justice League, culminating in "Starcrossed" (perhaps the most satisfyingly constructed narrative in the DCAU) could not be bettered...

Thanks Yojimbo--does the podcast provide transcripts, or did you go to the trouble to transcribe that quote? (If so, thanks again.)

I remain fine with that DTV being shelved, for the same reason Alan Burnett was.

01/14: Apologies if it's already been mentioned here, but Keyframe magazine ran an informative article on the show last fall. Timm and Tucker were of course interviewed, but so were Storyboard Artist Carl Peterson and Background Painter Mauricio Abril, and VFX Artist Brianne VanTuyle. 03/04: An...

With regard to Two Face in the '66 Batman show, there was a treatment by Harlan Ellison (later turned into the comic Batman ’66: The Lost Episode) proposed for the first season, and a full-length script by Peter Rabe, appropriately intended for season two, which was later rewritten for the...

My paperback copy arrived today. The images are b&w but I'm a tightwad and don't mind. It's a big book and will likely be the last word on BTAS, at least when it comes to oral history. The only thing left for future researchers will be to go though WB Animation's archives, and that probably...

The Other Batman By Patrick Daniel O’Neill (Wizard Magazine #40, Dec. 1994) The creators behind the Adventures version of the Caped Crusader discuss the difference between this Batman and the “real” one, what makes him tick, and the fear of being stereotyped. “In Batman Adventures, you often...

Clipped Wings By Marc Shapiro (Wizard Magazine #40, Dec. 1994) Batman: The Animated Series has been cancelled, and the show’s creative jockeys have mixed emotions about closing up shop. “I felt it was a shame to stop when, with the last season, we finally got all the storytelling and...

If memory serves, the Cartoon Network executive who greenlit Justice League was Mike Lazzo, who programmed the network during its first decade, when it started producing its own content, and also created and ran Adult Swim. So CN definitely had more adventurous executives at the time. The...

Jean MacCurdy's departure as president of Kids’ WB! programming in 1999 might have something to do with the network's change for the worse. We know that she was an enlightened executive, who in her time at WB Animation and Kids' WB gave the DCAU staff a good deal of creative freedom. The link...

I don't think Killer Moth has ever been used to his full potential. The character is widely regarded as a joke, despite having appeared as a very effective villain in several excellent golden age stories. But when he was revived in the silver age the people responsible treated him as a...

All five volumes are now out in hardcover. They can be purchased directly from the publisher, BearManor Media, or from Amazon. The prices are between $98 and $115, but in 2025 the softcovers will be released on a staggered scheule, with prices ranging between $55 and $61.47. The paperback...

One other thing I wanted to add regarding what made BTAS special: unlike almost all American cartoons up to that time, it dealt with tragedy and failure, and in a mature way. Disney's cartoons had traumatic moments but made sure to have thoroughly happy endings, while classic Warner Brothers...

A full listing of the contents and interviews is on the author's website. It looks like a must-buy. I wish the price tag was lower but it makes sense, considering the publisher and nature of the project. Start saving up!

Or Vicki Vale?

The tension between Bruce and Alfred was one of the best parts of the episode. It's always dramatic gold when Batman is forced to face the consequences of his obsessive ruthlessness (as in "Old Wounds") and ask himself whether he's gone too far. And the relationship between Bruce and Alfred was...

To be honest, Batman's behavior was pretty much predictable. It might have been more interesting to have made Nocturna such an energy junkie that she ended up killing some of those kids--that would have made Batman's ethical decision harder for him to make, and would have given it greater...

I am shocked, shocked!, that in this discussion of female Batman villains no one has brought up Queen Bee, aka Marcia Monroe. She brought out Batman's inner swinger-- --And other parts of him too:

For anyone interested, Mystery of the Wax Museum and Dr. X were both recently restored and are available on Blu-Ray and (probably) streaming. The restorations look gorgeous (two-color Technicolor was perfect for horror) and are great fun, with moments that are still disturbing and uncanny.

According to Bill Finger, "Batman was really a combination of Douglas Fairbanks Sr., Sherlock Holmes, and The Shadow and a bit of Frank Merriwell and Nick Carter." So we can add all of them, along with Doc Savage. Golden Age Batman editor Jack Schiff also felt that the Phantom Detective was a...

I watched five episodes on the night of the premiere and the remaining five the next night, then took some time to collect my thoughts. Now I'm looking forward to season two, and since the show is currently the number one series on Amazon, so we might have further seasons to look forward to...

I've always been mystified by the people who go on about Timm being obssessed with Bruce/Barbara. They don't know how TV works and think Timm can just impose these supposed obsessions on his co-producers and staff. Presumably Dini, Murakami, and Burnett approved of the relationship in Batman...

Two important quotes: Looking back at some of his original ideas for “BTAS,” Timm said he was hoping its protagonist would more closely resemble the fiction-magazine heroes that had, in turn, inspired Batman, like the Shadow and Doc Savage. “The thing that those guys all had in common was that...

If I remember correctly, the third Burton film never made it to script stage, so what would be the source of the animated film? Perhaps it could adapt the ongoing Batman '89 comics written by Sam Hamm, but those are more Hamm's vision of Batman than Burton's, and one should remember that Hamm...

Bill Finger once noted that Robin was created because Batman "needed someone to talk to." Alfred afterward came along as part of a 40s trend for humorous sidekicks, but decades later, when Robin went off to college, the now serious-Alfred stepped into the role of the person Batman could talk to...

To be fair, Year Two was a story Mike W. Barr had devised years before DC decided to run it and slap on the Year Two label to cash in on Year One. It wasn't a proper Year Two story, whereas Caped Crusader seems to be.

Batman: The Animated Series: A Look Back By Alan Burnett (Comic-Con International 2017 Souvenir Book) This September will mark the 25th anniversary of the debut of Batman: The Animated Series, a show with which I have some familiarity. As one of the producers, I was late coming into it. Even...

If a critic panned a film he or she hadn't seen, I wouldn't take that critic's opinion very seriously, no matter how experienced they were. If what you're saying is "based on what I've seen and experienced, I don't think I'll like the new version of Catwoman," that's another matter, though it...

I'm curious if other DCAU veterans besides J.M DeMatteis will be among the writers. Alan Burnett is retired, but I presume folks like Paul Dini, Stan Berkowitz, Matt Wayne, Bob Goodman, etc. are still in the business. They might be busy with their other projects, but it would be nice to see some...

So you're still going to dismiss a version of Catwoman from a series you haven't even seen yet, because of a single adjective? "Flighty" could easily also be used to describe Julie Newmar's Catwoman, who was capricious and mercurial, just as the TNBA Catwoman could be "manipulative, sinister and...

Against the rules here to bypass paywall articles.

Considering that no one has even seen the new show, I don't see how anyone can dimiss its version of Catwoman. And if Sean Catherine Derek was so brilliant, I wonder why most of the worst episodes of BTAS were produced while she was story editor. I never thought the animal rights activist...

And the show is already in production of season two!

From a Facebook post by J.M. DeMatteis: "Spending time in Gotham City this week—wrapping an episode for season two of Amazon's upcoming CAPED CRUSADER series and working on the final issue of ROBIN LIVES!"

Considering how many classic Batman comics have involved murder mysteries, whereas BTAS was barred from them, I'd be happy if there are some in the new show. I don't need gore or profanity, but please let Batman solve a murder mystery or two. After all, he is the "world's greatest detective."

We've also seen so much of the mud-monster Clayface over the decades that a return to the Basil Karlo version would be a breath of fresh air. In his earliest comic appearances Karlo-Clayface was quite frightening-looking, not to mention psychotically homicidal. He'd work very well in animation...

So the leaked designs were accurate after all. As a big fan of the first year of Batman--when the pulp influence was strong, before he was toned down for the kids--I'm quite pleased to see the show is set in the 1940s. The designs remind me of the first ones for Superman, back when the crew was...