‘Caped Crusader’: A Fresh Take on the Earliest Batman
New cartoon brings the Dark Knight back to his 1939 roots.
Batman: The Animated Series remains one of the greatest superhero cartoons of all time, and it’s easily the best adaptation Batman has ever received. It synthesized the best and most enduring elements of the mythos into a single, timeless package, giving us quintessential versions of Batman, his villains, and his allies.
Bruce Timm developed the 1990s cartoon (as well as the wonderful Justice League animated series), so when I heard he had developed a new Batman animated series, I had good reason to get my hopes up—and even more so when I saw superb comics writer Ed Brubaker listed among the executive producers.
Batman: Caped Crusader is not the grand slam that X-Men ’97 was, nor does it eclipse Batman: The Animated Series. It’s just a good solid Batman cartoon that aims to do something a little different this time around while remaining faithful to the essence of the character. Works for me.
All 10 episodes debuted on Amazon Prime on August 1. You’d think it would be on HBO Max with all the other DC shows, but no, Prime. Why Max passed on this show is a mystery worthy of the Dark Knight Detective himself.
(There will be minor spoilers. I won’t give away everything, but read at your own risk if you haven’t watched it yet.)
Batman: TAS was marketed to kids but contained enough substance to appeal to adults as well. Caped Crusader flips that around—it aims for a grown-up audience, but it’s mostly safe for older kids (maybe not the little ones, though).
Whereas the previous cartoon drew plenty of inspiration from 1970s comics, even directly adapting some of them, Caped Crusader goes all the way back to 1939. Visually, the Batman depicted here is very much in line with how creator Bob Kane drew him in the earliest comics.
I suspect panels like these served as muses for Timm and company:
Caped Crusader ramps up the noir while minimizing any science-fiction elements. The series depicts an early-career but still highly skilled Batman who’s very much a detective. He hasn’t yet amassed an endless array of gadgets and gizmos, and he doesn’t come across as even remotely superhuman. As voiced by Hamish Linklater, this Batman is a haunted and driven man, but there’s still a human being at the core of it all. Linklater infuses Batman’s gravelly voice with a slight weariness, as though the lonely crusade is bearing down on his soul but he persists anyway. No one can replace the late Kevin Conroy, who will forever be the definitive voice of Batman for many of us, but Linklater exceeds expectations and deserves high marks.
The animation style isn’t too far removed from Batman: TAS, which had a timeless, any-year feel to it. Caped Crusader, however, maintains more of a 1939 aesthetic. But it is an aesthetic and not a firm historical setting. Rather, the series mixes modern sensibilities with a retro vibe. And that’s fine. I don’t need Batman to be a historical drama (though that could be interesting).
Each episode is a tight 25 minutes or so, which requires an admirable degree of consistency and discipline in the age of streaming. A different villain takes center stage in each episode while subplots progress and supporting characters are further fleshed out.
The corruption of Harvey Dent simmers throughout the season, leading to his turn as Two-Face in the final two episodes. A recurring theme is the influence that Batman has on his enemies, such as how he inspires spoiled rich kleptomaniac Selina Kyle to become Catwoman and how he inadvertently pushes Dent over the edge. Also, Batman gradually warms up to his allies, and they warm up to him.
For example, Batman addresses Alfred as “Pennyworth” for most of the season, which sounded odd at first, but then I realized what they were doing. It’s Batman’s way of maintaining some distance and protecting himself from his own feelings. In the final episode, it pays off—Batman switches to calling him “Alfred” as he realizes that it’s okay to let himself care.
His other three main allies are Commissioner Gordon, Barbara Gordon (here a defense attorney, not Batgirl), and Detective Renee Montoya. There’s initially plenty of friction—they have no reason to trust a masked vigilante, after all, but the trust builds throughout the season in organic ways. Batman earns Commissioner Gordon’s respect when they work together to save kids from a fire (see the clip below from Prime’s official YouTube channel, but be warned that it shows a key moment of the episode). Also, Barbara earns Batman’s respect by risking her life to save his.
The show takes the most liberties in reinterpreting the villains, and your mileage may vary on each. The Penguin gets the biggest overhaul, as he is now a she—a cabaret performer and a domineering mother. This is basically a new character, one who would be a fine Batman villain in her own right. Presenting her as a replacement for the Penguin, however, merely distracts from the story at hand.
Harley Quinn also departs from tradition, as she’s disconnected from the Joker entirely. Instead of being a therapist whom the Joker seduces and corrupts, she’s a therapist who’s already plenty twisted even without his bad influence. This Harley Quinn acts like a somewhat quirky but normal professional while she secretly subjects wealthy men to cold and clinical psychological abuse to compel them to change their ways. It’s a creepy and chilling take on Harley to the point where she, too, is largely a new character but still a worthy Batman foe.
On the other hand, Catwoman remains very much Catwoman, complete with her 1940s costume. The motivation differs from more modern versions, but the interplay between her and Batman retains much of its charm. She combines the shallowness of Bruce Wayne with the eccentricity of Batman. Her episode is among the strongest of the season.
Clayface, too, looks closer to his original 1940s appearance than the hulking man-monster of the 1990s cartoon. He’s more horror movie villain, less comic book supervillain, and that fits the tone of the series.
The lesser-known villains are where the show can make its mark without stepping on too many preconceived notions. Firebug, Gentlemen Ghost, and Onomatopoeia finally get their time in the animated spotlight, and each brings something a little different to Batman’s world—an unhinged pyromaniac, a spooky specter, and an idiosyncratic hitman. Respectively, they represent psychological horror, paranormal terror, and criminal mayhem, and they demonstrate how versatile a crimefighter Batman is.
The term crimefighter fits this Batman better than superhero. Caped Crusader depicts a world without kid sidekicks, Superman, or the Justice League (or even the Justice Society). The show strips the character to his essence, zeroing in on the original approach that Bob Kane and Bill Finger devised 85 years ago, and it builds around that. Batman appears right at home solving crimes and tangling with freakish foes in the first half of the twentieth century (or something that resembles that era, anyway).
My hopes may have been a bit too high due to Batman: The Animated Series. Nevertheless, I’d be happy to see more of this Batman.
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I've mostly enjoyed it, but many aspects take me out of it. It's also not better than the original animated series, so the whole thing feels unnecessary. This is in contrast to X-Men '97, which really took the original series to a new level in pretty much every respect without undoing or redoing a whit of it.
It is good but not great. Of course, I binge all of it.