Thursday, December 31, 2009

December with the Doctor: Redemption

If you haven't seen "The End of Time: Part 1" yet, there's a spoiler ahead.
I've been watching the previous Master trilogy ("Utopia"/"The Sound of Drums"/"Last of the Time Lords") both in preparation for "The End of Time" and as research for another post I'm writing.

So, as silly as I thought the "Master race" cliffhanger was, given how the Master was defeated in "Last of the Time Lords," it's actually kind of genius. The Doctor restored himself (as silly as that was) using the focused psychic energy of the vast majority of the human race. Now, the Master has become the human race, not only eliminating them as potential allies for the Doctor, but also providing himself with some of the means to supercharge himself with the focused psychic energy of billions of people. Although there's always the chance that it wouldn't work, or that it'd be spread out over billions of Masters, but it's either a very lucky or very clever solution.

Also, while some seem to be bothered by the "Secret Books of Saxon," I can't say that I am. After all, the Master ruled the world for a whole year; he had to do more than just humiliate the Doctor, order the Toclafane to kill humans, and smack around Lucy. It's fitting, given his past and his obsessions, that he'd spend a good chunk of time seeking immortality and looking for ways to extend his lifespan and plan for his own death. After all, that's been his schtick since day one.

Wednesday, December 30, 2009

December with the Doctor: Nomenclature

"Doctor Who" has followed many different conventions for naming new alien species. Sometimes it's been adding "oid" to various word parts or random syllables (Krynoid, Mechanoid), sometimes it's been putting together something that just sounds cool (Dalek, Forest of Cheem), and occasionally it's been taking potentially-appropriate words from science and adapting them (Silurians, Adipose). I've collected a small list of other science terms (mostly biological) that I think would make good names for Doctor Who aliens. Steven Moffatt, you can thank me later.

Feel free to add your own!

Friday, December 25, 2009

December with the Doctor: "The End of Time: Part 1"

Yeah, this whole thing is pretty much all spoilers. Non-spoilery: very interesting, Wilf was great, sad to see Tennant leaving (especially after this performance).

I'm just going to post some short, mostly random thoughts, if that's all right. There's no way I'd be able to review this until after part 2 anyway.
  • Interestingly, John Simm got second billing in the opening credits sequence, the spot usually reserved for the Companion. Bernard Cribbins came third.
  • New aliens the Vinvocci were pretty cool-looking, and I liked the (unexpected) explicit callback to Bannakaffalatta and implicit callback to the Abzorbaloff/Slitheen relationship. I can't say I'm entirely sure what purpose they're going to serve.
  • As I said, Wilf was brilliant. So was Donna, for that matter, and it's good to see her starting to remember--even if it means bad things for the Doctor-Donna. It's also interesting to see the Doctor's admiration for her, something that got lost a bit in the end of the fourth season.
  • Wilf has a nice subtle callback to his last time in the Tardis. This is especially interesting given that production shots for Season 5 appear to be bringing back that era's TARDIS exterior.
  • The Doctor wonders why he and Wilf keep running into each other. Wilf keeps seeing a woman, who tells him strange things and disappears. Wilf's also the only person on Earth who remembers his dreams of the Master. I think it's pretty safe to say that Wilf is a Time Lord in hiding, but we'll know next week.
  • As long as I'm on about Wilf, the best scene in the episode is where Wilf and the Doctor share a heartfelt conversation over coffee. It's touching, and it's the only place you can go to see the Time Lord Lacrimose!
  • Lucy Saxon shows up in the beginning, an unwilling part of the process to resurrect the Master. She gets her last revenge, though, when she screws up his revival and leaves him in the desperate state he's in throughout the episode.
  • This take on the Master requires some getting used to. He has some nice moments of lucidity (the best being when he laments that the one-time master of disguise is now trapped with the easily-recognizable face of the former Prime Minister), but spends large portions of the episode stark raving mad. He rambles so incoherently that Dalek Caan looks like Hemingway by comparison, and his deteriorating condition has him frequently eating like a cross between a pig and a savage, ravenous barbarian pig. He jumps around like Spider-Man and shoots energy from his hands, and by now you've all seen his skin go all transparenty. Initially, this seems like it diminishes the threat posed by the Master, but ultimately it's fairly similar to the situation he was in in "The Deadly Assassin," where he was effectively decomposing and engaging in a last-ditch effort to gain immortality and stop the Doctor. Except now the relentless greed and desire for power is translated into actual, physical hunger. He ends up being a disgusting figure, raw and inhuman in a way that the typically dignified Master hasn't really been before, which rather underscores the desperation of his character.
  • The Master also presents a kind of counterpoint to the Doctor (as usual), who is also fearing his imminent demise and looking to postpone it. The Doctor is more somber than usual in this outing, dreading his coming regeneration and sobered by his frightening abuse of power in the previous special. The Master fears death, and so he tries to accumulate power; the Doctor fears death, but fears power more.
  • All that aside, however, the Master's world-conquering plan ends up being more than a little silly. It's not just the sight gags either, it's the whole bizarre concept. I'm curious how this will play out in the next episode.
  • The Naismiths, who appeared in the previews to be relatively significant, really don't play much of a role here. They serve to push the plot along, and they make decent patsies, but they don't have any personality to speak of.
  • Russel T. Davies has this weird fanboyish habit of tying up loose plot threads that almost no one would otherwise notice. The mention of Bannakaffalatta is one, and connecting Torchwood's Gwen to "The Unquiet Dead"'s Gwyneth in "Journey's End" is probably the most obvious example. Here, though, it's a callback to "The Shakespeare Code," explaining why Queen Elizabeth was so angry at the Doctor--turns out he married (then left) her. He mentions that she won't have her nickname anymore, though it's left unclear if that means she's not "good" Queen Bess (the name he uses), or that she's not "the Virgin Queen" (the more commonly-used nickname in my experience).
  • There's an interesting pace to this episode, which has a kind of mini-climax in the middle (where the omniscient narration starts up again). It felt a lot like watching two episodes of a classic serial, and I'm curious if that will carry through to the 75-minute finale.
  • So, the Time Lords (and apparently Gallifrey) are back, in what looks a lot like the Senate chamber from the Star Wars prequels, and led by James Bond. Clips from Part 2 suggest that we'll finally get to see some of the Time War, which gives me (almost certainly unrequited) hope that we'll get a glimpse of Paul McGann as the Doctor again. If nothing else, it's going to be interesting to see what happens in Part 2 and in Season 5 if the Time Lords manage to reassert themselves as the arbiters of time. What this means for "the end of time" is still unclear.

So, overall, a good episode (though prior experience has me wondering if Davies will be able to maintain the quality through to the end, without resorting to deus ex machina) that has me salivating for the next one. This is significantly less bloated and meandering than "The Stolen Earth," so that's a plus, and I'd say so far that it's at least the equal of "The Waters of Mars." It's going to be a very long week.

December with the Doctor: Doctor's Orders

And now, a very special message from the Doctor.

Courtesy of WhoSprites, a fan project designed to animate some of the Doctor Who episodes that have been lost due to BBC's shortsighted purges.

Happy holidays, everyone!

Thursday, December 24, 2009

December with the Doctor: Monk-y Business

Every Who down in Whoville liked Christmas a lot, but the Monk, who lived just north of Whoville did not.I'll be honest: I kind of like a universe with only one Time Lord. It's similar to why I like a universe with only one Kryptonian1. That being said, I'd really like to see one of two things happen:
  1. More exploration of the ramifications of a universe sans Time Lords.
  2. A return of the Time Lords--one at a time, or en masse.

The former has been touched on a few times, here and there. In "Father's Day," the Doctor says/suggests that the Time Lords kept the Reapers from entering the timestream. In "Rise of the Cybermen," the Doctor suggested that the Time Lords made it easier to travel between alternate universes. In "The Waters of Mars," the most recent special, the Doctor takes charge of the laws of time, attempting to alter even a fixed point in time without a Time Lord infrastructure to stop him.

The nice thing about this is that it's given us some idea about what the Time Lords actually did, besides generally practicing a doctrine of noninterference--except when it came to the Doctor, where they were mostly bureaucratic obstructions. I'd like to see more of this kind of thing, if the status quo is to remain as it is, with only one2 remaining Time Lord.

However, one of the biggest sources of rumor-fuel has been new showrunner Steven Moffat's "THEY'RE BACK" comment, which could be referring to any number of things--his Weeping Angels, River Song and Jenny, the Daleks (possibly in older-series style), the original Cybermen, (highlight for potential spoiler) if pictures of shooting are accurate, the Silurians, and the Time Lords. If the latter is the case, I think I'd rather see a slow trickle of Time Lord revivals than a full-fledged restoration of Gallifrey and such.

And if we're going to have a slow trickle of Time Lords, the first one I want to see is the Monk, from the First Doctor serial "The Time Meddler." I've been reluctant to watch some of the older Doctors' serials, knowing that they tended to be padded out, and knowing that the low-budget cheese factor would be at a maximum. But I thought it'd be interesting to see our first glimpse of another Time Lord (Susan excluded), and I wasn't disappointed. I'm not going to review the episode--it's entertaining, showcasing the Doctor's cleverness and recklessness in a way that would stick with the series for the duration. It also worked in some history about William the Conqueror's invasion in 1066, as a reminder that the show started out as an educational series.

And this is where the Monk becomes really interesting; his reason for being at the Battle of Hastings is to supply future technology and knowhow to the Saxons in order to defeat the invading Vikings and win the inevitable battle--all for his own personal gain, apparently. The Monk is one of those rare Doctor Who characters whose alterations to the timeline have apparently been necessary for time to go ahead as expected3--he helped build Stonehenge with antigravity devices, he met with Leonardo da Vinci (doesn't everyone?) regarding powered flight, and he's taken advantage of compound interest like a certain Philip J. Fry.

And this is what I find so compelling about the Monk: he's out for himself, but he's not particularly destructive like the Master (though the impact his actions have on the Web of Time might be deleterious). Like the Doctor, he bucks the Time Lords' non-interventionist stance, but he does so for (apparently) purely selfish ends. Ultimately, this makes him surprisingly human for a Time Lord, with easy-to-understand ambitions. Add onto that his cavalier attitude, the façade of geniality he presents, and the way he functions as mild comic relief (while still seeming like a threat), and you have a relatable, interesting, entertaining Time Lord running about.

Plus, the guy got defeated when the Doctor made it so his TARDIS wasn't bigger on the inside anymore, and that's just awesome.

The Monk could be a great foil for the Doctor and a great way to explore various aspects of the Web of Time that haven't been touched yet--at least in this series. If any Time Lord is going to return, I'd like it to be the Monk.



1. With one caveat: Superman's uniqueness is artificial, while the Doctor really is the only person in the series who can do the things he can do. Being the last Time Lord actually does confer uniqueness on the Doctor; being the last Kryptonian only confers in-name-only uniqueness to Superman.

2. Ignoring the Master, who appears to be returning, and Jenny, who will likely be returning.

3. For instance, Scaroth was necessary for the start of life on Earth, Adric caused the extinction of the dinosaurs, the Racnoss ship catalyzed Earth's formation, the Doctor caused the eruption of Vesuvius, etc.

Wednesday, December 23, 2009

December with the Doctor: "Dreamland"

Starring David Bowie as the Doctor.A few days ago, I watched the new Doctor Who animated adventure, "Dreamland." And I must say, it was a pretty good audio drama.

The video, on the other hand...

Spoilers ahead!

It's a shame, because there's a lot to like about "Dreamland." The story is set around Roswell in 1958, which means the whole thing centers around the typical American Roswell/alien mythology. There's something particularly interesting about seeing such a thoroughly British show tackle such a thoroughly US-centric myth, and I think the "Doctor Who" sensibilities bring a different flair to this otherwise well-worn territory.

So, all the usual pieces are present: the Roswell crash, flying saucers, the Men in Black, Area 51, gray aliens, a military cover-up of alien visitations and alliances, a distrustful and belligerent Army leader, the Cold War, even Native Americans and a '50s diner. There are some interesting twists: the MIB are alien robots, the Army is allied with one faction of aliens against another in a plot to wipe out the Soviets, the belligerent Army leader is in league with the evil alien bugs in order to wipe out the Soviet threat, etc. The Doctor brings a lot more running and talking to a story that would traditionally be focused on technobabble, explosions, and violence, so that's a nice change of pace.

And the pacing works well, too. The story was broken up into six-minute chunks for a total runtime about the same as a typical episode of the new series. That format kept the story moving along at a good clip, with plenty of compression.

The best thing about it, though, is the central conflict/Macguffin. The gray aliens were at war with the insectoid Viperox, and had developed a biological weapon to wipe out all of their enemies. The Viperox, naturally, are after that weapon, which was lost in the Roswell crash. The Americans assist the Viperox, because the bugs have promised to alter the weapon so it kills off all the Russians. And finally, the Viperox are reproducing underground to invade the planet. All this--plus a little romance plot--comes together quite well. Not only that, but all the American accents are convincing (though Georgia Moffett's meanders occasionally). Take that, Peri.

Seriously, the Viperox Queen is pretty impressive.Really, the only thing to dislike about "Dreamland" is the animation. The stylization isn't bad, but the stiffness is. It's fine for the aliens--who look incredible--but as soon as humanoids start talking or emoting or running, the stiffness and awkwardness really sticks out. "Beast Wars" had better animation a decade ago; there's really no excuse for this.

Overall, "Dreamland" is worth a listen, and it's nice to have this kind of story that would be difficult to do on a BBC budget--big, inhuman aliens, non-British settings, etc. Just don't look at it too closely.

Saturday, December 19, 2009

December with the Doctor: A little light reading

Apologies for sparse posting. It's been a busy couple of weeks. Better-than-regular posting will resume shortly. In the meantime, here's a really cool article about David Tennant. Enjoy!

Thursday, December 17, 2009

Oh no, you won't get me that easily.

Art courtesy of the '90s.Superboy is returning to Teen Titans. Now, my love for Kon-El is no secret, and I've been greatly enjoying Kon-El's return to the land of the living.

That being said, it's going to take an awful lot more than Superboy to get me to read "Teen Titans" again. That book was broken well before Johns left, and never quite recovered its...what, third foray into an evil counterpart team. It's similar to how Mon-El on the Justice League isn't enough to get me to resubscribe to that chronically broken book (especially with increasingly inconsistent James Robinson at the helm and the Cry For Justice status quo in place).

Look, DC, you're heart's in the right place. Can we just get your writers and editors to that place too?

Monday, December 14, 2009

It's been done before, but...

All the nuclear weapons, you say?I'd really like to see a return of the Metropolis Mailbag--you know, the old tradition where Superman would take Christmas Eve to answer all the letters sent to him over the course of the year and do his best to fulfill those wishes? I can't remember the last time it happened, though it's entirely possible that it was during the "World Without a Superman" arc, where various heroes filled in for the Man of Steel's annual duties while he was temporarily deceased.

Granted, since Superman's absent this time too, it might feel like a re-hash. But I think it would be a good opportunity to explore some of the current status quo in a more laid-back setting. Mon-El's portion of the story would naturally be about him trying to fit in and understand Earth culture better, Nightwing and Flamebird's story would be about trying to fight against anti-Kryptonian sentiments, and it'd be nice to cap it all off with a big, solemn Christmas dinner at Ma Kent's house, with Conner, Kara, Lana, and Lois, all remembering everyone they've lost in the last year.

I'm enjoying the whole World of New Krypton arc, and I look forward to "War of the Supermen" in spite of the hideous cover and the dodgy concept of making it a Free Comic Book Day book, but it'd be nice if the Superman books would remember that the low-key character-building issues are a major component to making a memorable and high-quality crossover event. It's not much use having a new status quo if you're not going to use it.

Friday, December 11, 2009

December with the Doctor: Getting Psyched

The Doctor *Hula* Dances!I've really enjoyed David Tennant's turn as the Doctor. The first episodes I saw of the new series were a few of Tennant's, and I enjoyed his take so much that I was reluctant to even give Eccleston's episodes a shot, being sure that they wouldn't stand up (they did). I've been dreading the end of Tennant's run as the Doctor. It took me months to finally sit down and watch "The Next Doctor," because it was as if that brought me one hour closer to the end of Ten.

But all that has changed recently. I was counting the hours until I could watch "The Waters of Mars," and "The End of Time" can't come soon enough for me. Why the change of attitude? Season Five, that's why.


Admittedly, I like this look better than the tweed-and-tie.I was reluctant to accept Matt Smith at first (after all, the first promo shots, with that ridiculous pompadour weren't exactly awe-inspiring) but everything I see from the upcoming series, every semi-spoiler that leaks out, from the return of River Song to the redesigned TARDIS and sonic screwdriver, has me amped up and ready to see what crazy-awesome stuff Steven Moffatt is going to throw at us. I'm sure I'll love "The End of Time"--even if it does end with another patented Russell T. Davies Deus Ex Machina--but at this point I want to get it out of the way so we can move onward and upward.

And hopefully they'll announce a nice, nearby premiere date for Matt Smith's first go-round soon...one that's a little more specific than "Spring 2010."

Monday, December 07, 2009

December with the Doctor: Great Quotations II

Lucie Miller: Well, you know, there's nothing wrong with the TARDIS...
The Doctor: No.
Lucie Miller: Apart from all the things that are wrong with the TARDIS.
The Doctor: Admittedly.
Lucie Miller: Just, it's not so much a spaceship as...a shed.
The Doctor: A shed.

Later...

Lucie Miller: What did you say it stood for again? Time And Relative Dimensions...
The Doctor: Yes.
Lucie Miller: Time And Relative Dimensions...In Shed.
The Doctor: That is not what it stands for.
Lucie Miller: Yes it does. It's a shed.
--Lucie Miller and the Doctor, Max Warp

Sunday, December 06, 2009

December with the Doctor: Great Quotations I

"Ah. Well, you're a beautiful woman, probably."
--The Doctor, City of Death

Saturday, December 05, 2009

December with the Doctor: The (Stair)Master

Okay, I'm as excited about "The End of Time" as anyone. I'm really looking forward to David Tennant's last go-round as the Doctor, some more quality time with the Nobles (and hopefully a less depressing end for Donna), and even the return of the Master. I really enjoyed John Simm's take on the character, and I wonder if they'll be regenerating a new version for Matt Smith.

But while some of the latest promo shots have been intriguing and impressive, and while the trailer has me counting down the days, I can't help but be a little underwhelmed by this image:
I'll destroy the universe, but first I'm going on a quick nip down to K-Mart.

This doesn't feel like the Master, the menacing villain who traveled from the end of time to conquer Earth with an army of decapitated humans. This doesn't feel like the Master, the megalomaniacal sociopath who once destroyed a sizable portion of the universe. This feels like the Master, a guy who just got done with his Saturday morning jog and is now contemplating breakfast at a coffee shop. This is the Master who has had a bit of a stomach bug the last few days, and so he's using another sick day and just kind of lounging around in sweats. In "The Waters of Mars," we saw the Doctor as the Time Lord Triumphant, it looks as though "The End of Time" will be giving us The Master Unemployed.

I'm still excited about the next episodes, and all, but really...a hoodie?



Edit: Forgot to mention: photo courtesy of Blogtor Who.

Friday, December 04, 2009

December with the Doctor: Spin-Offs

A couple of brief thoughts:
  • "The Sarah Jane Adventures" is a far better show than "Torchwood." Maybe it's because "Torchwood" rarely feels like it fits comfortably in the Whoniverse, maybe it's because the tone of "SJA" is closer to the tone of the parent series, all I know is that it's just a shame that a great character like Captain Jack has to headline the inferior show. Not that Sarah Jane should be headlining an inferior show; I'd just like "Torchwood" to be better.
  • And I don't have much hope that the forthcoming 13-episode series of "Torchwood" (is it the third or fourth season? Does "Children of Earth" count as a season?) will be much of an improvement. I mean, the actual Torchwood Three team is down to two members, one of whom is in the family way. Either the season is going to have to have a recruitment drive--which might be interesting, since Gwen started out as the POV character for the uninitiated audience and would now be playing the veteran--or it's going to have a very small pool of people left to kill off in the finale.

    Perhaps I'm just a little bitter, but Tosh and Ianto were my favorite non-Jack characters on the show, and I'd really like them not to be dead.
  • Which is not to say that I can't think of any way for the series to improve. Maybe they could begin the show with finding (and absorbing the members of) the lost Torchwood Four, maybe Martha and Mickey could join up, maybe the larger Torchwood body could demote Jack (for frequently going AWOL and getting the vast majority of his team killed, not to mention allowing a civilian to participate in classified activities) and bring in someone to take charge and create drama (in my dreams, it'd be UNIT transfer from the old series--Mike Yates, Liz Shaw, Jo Grant, or Sgt. Benton). Maybe we could get a sense that there is a larger Torchwood organization, because that really hasn't been present in the series so far.
  • Seriously, if "SJA" ends without someone--anyone!--making reference to the fact that a main character's name is Rani, I'm going to go nuts. I don't necessarily think that she should turn out to be the Rani, but I definitely think that the name shouldn't go unnoticed. It'd be like naming a character "Cy Lurian" or "Mac Ra." Letting it hang is just frustrating.
  • I have no desire to watch the new "K-9" series, although I hope it doesn't mean the absence/rumored death of K-9 from the next season of "SJA."

What are your thoughts?

December with the Doctor: A Capital Idea

So, is it "the Doctor" or "The Doctor"? Same question for "T/the Master."

Thursday, December 03, 2009

December with the Doctor: Vwhat?

So, in my recent flurry of watching, listening to, and otherwise absorbing all things Whovian, I've purchased a couple of Doctor Who Magazines and I've finally gone back and read the first two IDW miniseries. The quality of the comics therein has been pretty mediocre1 (though I also got the collection of Grant Morrison stories, so that ought to raise my impressions a bit), but something has really stuck out to me: the TARDIS materialization sound. The onomatopoeia is typically rendered as "Vworp vworp" or "vwaarp vwaarp." Now, I'm all for distinctive sound effects--"snikt," "thwip," "bamf," etc.--but I'm also a little peeved when such sound effects are discarded (see: almost any time any of those has been rendered in film. I mean, is it really that hard to have Wolverine's claws make a metal-sliding-against-metal sound like "snikt"?).

So it's interesting to see the dissonance go in the opposite direction, from film to text. See, here's the TARDIS dematerialization sound:



I don't know about anyone else, but I certainly don't here anything in there that sounds like "vworp." It's certainly a difficult sound to render into text, but listening to it several times, I can't imagine translating it without some e's and probably a ch. "Vreeench" doesn't quite do it...maybe "vreeunnnnch."

But "vworp"?



1. This is, of course, excluding The Ten Doctors, which rocks my socks. I'm enjoying The Stalker of Norfolk too.

Tuesday, December 01, 2009

The Doctor is In!

Who, me?Seeing as I am a glutton for punishment and self-disappointment, I've decided to do one more theme month before the year is out. The decision came naturally out of my currently-waxing Whovianism, which cut just a little into my Bat-Month posting. I'll admit, there were times when I was paying too little attention to Gotham City and too much attention to "City of Death." On the plus side, this means I have a bunch of things to post about already. And just to be fair, I'll see about working a couple of Batman leftovers in here and there...it'll be like time travel!

So get ready to spend December with the Doctor!

Monday, November 30, 2009

Bat-Month: Turning off the signal

Bum bum bum BUMMMM...bummmmm.Well, that appears to be the end of a belfry-sized Bat-Month. There were an awful lot of things that I would have liked to have done and didn't get around to, due to various factors--as usual. At the very least, I have a wealth of ideas for future posts, both for now and for any Bat-months in the future. Some Bat-leftovers will likely be getting posted in the coming weeks, popping out of the shadows when you least expect it.

I hope you enjoyed this journey through Gotham as much as I did, and I hope you're looking forward to one more theme month before the end of the year...

Bat-Month: "The Cape and Cowl Conspiracy"

More a caper than a conspiracy.Let's get this out of the way right off the bat: "The Cape and Cowl Conspiracy" is not a good "Batman: TAS" episode. It's a terrible mishmash of different concepts, none of which really work together, and the plot not only makes very little sense, but comes off making Batman look like an inefficient jerk, while everyone else just looks like an idiot.

I think the biggest problem with the episode is also the reason I decided to review it rather than some more deserving Animated episodes. The plot centers around a villainous scheme to steal Batman's cowl, much like "The Contaminated Cowl." Such a scheme, you'd think, would be a ploy to expose Batman's secret identity, or a manifestation of the Mad Hatter's twisted obsession, but it's neither of those things. But what is clear to me from watching the episode is that this idea--a criminal trying to steal Batman's mask--was the core concept around which the rest of the episode was based.

Sometimes that kind of plot-anchoring concept can work, other times, not so much. Remember when I talked about the various deathtraps in "Almost Got 'Im"? When I said that any plot designed to lead up to such a trap would almost inevitably be silly and disappointing? "The Cape and Cowl Conspiracy" is proof of that.

He even looks like the Riddler.Take, for instance, the villain of the story, Josiah Wormwood. He's called "The Interrogator," because he's a master of torturing information from his victims with elaborate death-traps. How does he lure victims into these traps? Why, by leaving them clues in the form of rhyming riddles.

Which brings us to our very first problem: Wormwood is a cheap knock-off of the Riddler, who had yet to appear in the series. He uses his riddles and a quicksand trap to catch a diplomatic courier, in order to extract the location of a large cache of bearer bonds.

The theft brings him under police scrutiny, which naturally gets Batman involved. Batman goes after Baron Wacklaw Jozek, one of Wormwood's associates, hoping to find out Wormwood's whereabouts. To this end, Batman abducts the Baron from a society dinner, where he has just started giving a speech, in front of dozens of high-class patrons. I can understand the need for speed and the desire to publicly embarass Jozek, but it seems like it would have been in Batman's best interests to pick up Jozek in a slightly less public venue. He dangles Jozek by the suspenders from a billboard until Batman gets the information he needs.

It's Batman's Glamour Shot!Shortly thereafter, the Baron calls in Wormwood to offer him a job: steal Batman's cape and cowl. He does this with a poster-sized portrait of Batman, which opens up vast new questions. Wormwood is curious as to the Baron's reasons, so Jozek offers a trade: he'll explain why he wants the cape and cowl if Wormwood tells him about the bearer bonds.

At this point, any mildly intelligent criminal would have been searching Jozek for the wire that he's clearly wearing, but instead Josiah plays coy and agrees to the job. His first attempt to catch Batman--involving an amusement park and a woman tied to train tracks--failed miserably to produce any new headgear. Consequently, he lured Batman to a wax museum--which at this point I believe are frequented more by supervillains than by patrons--where he assaulted him with a hot lamp (to melt the wax, you see) and then some deadly nerve gas. Finally, Batman removed his cape and cowl to give them to Wormwood.

Now, here's a scene that should have been tense and suspenseful. Batman's in the shadows, having removed his mask, and Wormwood is forcing him to step into a spotlight to deposit it! How will he protect his secret identity? As he stepped into the light, the viewer would have seen the unexpected--Batman's wearing another mask underneath! Unfortunately, all that suspense was spoiled long before Batman reached the spotlight, thanks to this image:
Oh hey, it's Bloodsport!

Even before Batman reaches the spotlight, it's trivially obvious that he's wearing another mask. A scene that might have brought this episode up from bad to mediocre and memorable, thanks to a stunning example of Batman's foresight, was robbed of all drama by this poor direction, lighting Batman just enough to see the trick.

Wormwood takes the prize back to Jozek, asking again why he wanted them. Jozek reminds him of the quid pro quo agreement, so Wormwood spills the bearer bond beans. Jozek then reveals his reason for wanting the cape and cowl: to wear them! Because he's Batman in disguise!

Naturally, the place was bugged, and Jozek had fled the country after his run-in with Batman. So the police got Wormwood's confession, and after a too-long fistfight, Wormwood got apprehended.

Unfortunately, this episode spectacularly fails the fridge logic test. If the information about these bearer bonds were so important, why waste so much time setting up this overly elaborate cape-and-cowl scheme? If Batman were behind the plan the whole time, why did he defeat Wormwood's first deathtrap? If Wormwood is so intelligent, why didn't he realize that he was being bugged? If Batman knew he was going to get Wormwood to confess--on tape!--then why didn't he have any police standing by, rather than letting Wormwood fight him through the penthouse and its rec center?

But the real nail in the coffin for this episode, as far as I'm concerned, is the thematic one. You have a villain who is expressly said to torture people with deathtraps in order to get information from them, a villain known as "the Interrogator." You have the Batman, who routinely--including in the first act of this very story--puts criminals and informants into potentially life-threatening circumstances in order to make them confess or otherwise give up their information. The thematically satisfying plot would be to have Batman out-interrogate the Interrogator, to pit his own deathtraps against him, and to ultimately turn all of his careful plans back in against him. This doesn't happen--despite being wildly foreshadowed--instead proffering a silly plot about stealing Batman's mask.

Not only does this insanely circuitous plan make Batman look like he's just toying with both his enemies and the police, but his abduction of Jozek and the way he casually belittles Commissioner Gordon when they're examining Wormwood's riddles ("of course! Isn't it obvious?") makes him come across as a bit of a dick.

Overall, "The Cape and Cowl Conspiracy" is a less-than-mediocre episode hampered by its generic, cobbled-together villain. It suffers worse from comparison to better episodes in the same season, featuring the villains who The Interrogator evokes.

Bat-Month: "The Contaminated Cowl"/"The Mad Hatter Runs Afoul"

Consider this part of a trilogy of Bat-Month reviews. I'm breaking from the pattern of looking at early episodes of "Batman"--and specifically villains' first appearances--to take a look at one of the very few episodes of the series that I remember in detail from my childhood. "The Contaminated Cowl"/"The Mad Hatter Runs Afoul" is the Mad Hatter's second outing, from the show's second year. I remember even as a kid thinking it odd that Batman's cowl would turn bright pink when irradiated (after all, aren't radioactive things green and glowing?), and I no longer remember what led up to that particular plot point, except that the Mad Hatter wanted Batman's mask for his hat collection.

As it happens, the only other big plot points I recall from watching the series over a decade ago are Batman playing matador against a bull1, Batman and Robin being strapped to a giant grill by Catwoman2, and the wall-scaling scene where they meet Green Hornet and Kato.

So it'll be interesting to actually see how this story plays out. It opens, strangely enough, with David Wayne's mustachioed Mad Hatter entering Bon-Bon's Box Boutique to buy 700 empty hatboxes. I expect to see all this referenced in an upcoming Grant Morrison story.

Go-Go Gadget Hat-Eyes!Naturally, the Hatter's hat opens to reveal mechanical mesmerizing eyes, which he uses to knock out the shop owner so that he can freely abscond with the...empty boxes.

Meanwhile, Bruce Wayne presents a Professor with a check for his research with the Gotham City Atomic Energy Laboratories. The meeting is interrupted by a call on the Batphone. Bruce is a little incredulous at the report of 700 hatboxes being stolen from Bon-Bon's Box Boutique. Surprisingly enough, Gotham's finest actually know who the culprit is this time, and note that the Hatter escaped from the prison during a softball game. Will Warden Crichton never learn?

Batman and Robin have a largely uneventful and unhelpful meeting with Gordon and O'Hara, then leave for the Batcave to do some pondering. After their departure, Commissioner Gordon becomes surprisingly self-aware:
Gordon: Looking back, Chief O'Hara, it's hard to remember how we operated at all before those two masked samaritans appeared on the scene.
O'Hara: It's not hard for me to remember, Commissioner: things were a mess!
I'll bet they were, Chief O'Hara. How many crimes went unsolved while Gotham cops fruitlessly contemplated the difference between their posteriors and holes in the ground?

The Mad Hatter is packing up his hat collection, musing over the crazy adventures that led to these trophies. He talks a bit about the cap stolen from a British Royal Guard, mentioning that the King ordered his execution. Sometimes, since Elizabeth II has been queen longer than I (or my parents, for that matter) have been alive, I forget that there was a King in the relatively recent past.

The Hatter has decided to box his hats because stealing them has lost its luster. Of course, this doesn't mean he's going straight--after all, he still hasn't stolen Batman's cowl--but he's also going to change his modus operandi, using hats to steal instead. His assistant, Polly, doesn't understand what that means, but the Hatter isn't going to explain it very well. Somehow it involves a headdress ball, a ruby, a spray-gun full of radioactive material, and a water tower are involved. This is going to be the most complicated game of Clue ever.

Batman discusses the Headdress Ball with Robin, noting that it's being held by Hattie Hatfield, owner of the Hatfield Ruby, which will be held in her headdress. Presumably, this is all happening at the Hatfield Hilton in the Hat district, and it's being held as a charity benefit fer Dora.

Oh, it's in the Top Hat Room? I never would have guessed. The Hatter is planning on infiltrating the Headdress Ball as some sort of fez-wearing foreign military leader. In the meantime, Batman and Robin climb up the sheer glass wall, and Batman dryly remarks that "people in glass hotels shouldn't throw parties." Oh Batman, you card.

At the party, Hatter's assistant is working the hat check table, which firstly seems unnecessary at a party devoted to the wearing of hats, and secondly makes one wonder, if Hatter could get one mole into the party, why he needed the Pasha disguise at all. I guess it allows him to get closer to the ruby he's trying to steal.

Batman and Robin enter through the window, spot the Mad Hatter, and decide to sneak around for a closer look. Despite not being concealed by anything at all, and despite wearing their gaudy costumes, Batman is certain that they'll be unnoticed.

I am the klutz who knocks things over in the night...He then promptly bumps into a serving cart. Ladies and gentlemen, the Dark Knight.

All the servers acknowledge Batman and Robin's presence, but remain quiet about it. I can't help but wonder if Batman has formed a branch of Project Mayhem in Gotham, full of civilians who are secretly loyal to the Bat. Or perhaps it's more like the Shadow's organization. Or maybe Batman just tips really well.

Oh, nevermind, they're also working for Mad Hatter. Again, with this kind of penetration into the party, why bother with the masquerade? Hatter has more than enough henchmen here to cow the high society types into compliance, and he has a hat that can hypnotize people! This isn't even a "why doesn't the Joker just shoot Batman" kind of question, really, it's a "why isn't the supervillain making use of his considerable supervillain resources in a typically supervillainous way" question.

Oh well, it leads to a fight where henchmen get pied.
What kind of high society function serves cream pies?

Repeatedly.
I mean, I appreciate good slapstick as much as anyone, but this stretches disbelief.

So, that's cool. Anyway, the Mad Hatter tosses his fez, which releases some kind of gas. He also reveals the dire consequences of a life of hat-related villainy: terrible hat hair.
How do you get hat hair from a fez anyway?

The smoking fez gives him the perfect opportunity to whip out his perfume atomizer full of radioactive spray, which he uses to mace Batman's cowl. Hatter beats a hasty retreat, and Batman's mask becomes almost neon pink, something which wouldn't happen again until the "Batman Forever" toyline.
Still less ridiculous than rubber nipples.

Batman explains that the color change is due to a form of virulent radiation; I'm just curious why it didn't affect any of the rest of his costume. That's some well-targeted spray. He suggests heading back to the Batcave "before it is too late," which I imagine means "before I get face cancer."

Back at the Batcave, Alfred informs him that all the other cowls are in the "Home Dry Bat Cleaning Plant," if I heard that right, and won't be ready for at least a couple of hours. Naturally, then, Batman continues to wear his radioactive cowl. Oh no, the face cancer has metastasized to his brain, it's too late.

Actually, he's just confident that the anti-radiation bat-pill he took will last him at least a little longer. While you add that to the list of technology that Bruce Wayne is maliciously withholding from the world at large, you may also consider that it'd still be a good idea to take the mask off. This is the equivalent of repeatedly shooting yourself in the chest because you're confident that your bulletproof vest can take a little more punishment.

Batman needs a cowl so he can catch the Mad Hatter, so he instructs Alfred to turn the cleaner from "full maximum" to "super instant," which I assume is the dryer equivalent of "it goes to eleven." Were this a sitcom, I'd expect the cowls to come out tiny-sized, while suds slowly fill the Batcave.

Batman decides that he should put in a call--as Bruce Wayne--to the scientist he funded earlier in the story. Incidentally, for all the incredible technology in the Batcave, from anti-radiation pills to a dry cleaner, one thing he doesn't have is a touch-tone phone. Batman rotary dials the Atomic Energy Laboratory, and one spinning logo later, Batman is at the building for decontamination. Professor Overbeck is pessimistic about the possibility of cleaning the cowl. He offers this stunning explanation about the state of nuclear physics in 1967, in a thick nonspecific European accent of course:
Professor Overbeck: So little is known about this radioactivity of radioactive agents. So little is known that we only know one thing: that eventually, they are deadly.
I could spend days talking about what's wrong with that statement. Suffice it to say that I think the Wayne Foundation is seriously wasting its money.

Batman fears that the effects of the anti-radiation pill are wearing off, but thankfully the Professor's assistant--actually, the Mad Hatter in a radiation suit, who has knocked out the real assistant--has brought a spare suit and apparently a lead hatbox for the Dark Knight. Knowing that he wouldn't want to reveal his secret identity, the professor has helpfully set up a changing screen. As Batman goes to change, Robin asks if he needs any help.

...No comment.

Batman hands over the radioactive mask, which the Hatter gladly steals.
This kind of makes me want to see a Batman-themed Priscilla: Queen of the Desert.

Robin tries to stop him, but is foiled by a single kick to the shin. I'd criticize the Boy Wonder's apparent wussiness, but I guess he hasn't yet thought to armor-plate his pantyhose.

Batman comes skipping out from behind the changing screen, wearing another cowl.
I assume this is Bat-skipping.

He and Robin chase after the Hatter, and find him, with his henchmen, having declared a rather premature victory. Seriously, one of the henchmen says that this is the end of crimefighting in Gotham City, which means that apparently none of them think it's possible that Batman would have more than one costume--or the ability to make another mask.

Hatter thinks that it must be a trick, that this can't be Batman. Perhaps his hat's on a little too tight; a man who owns hundreds of kinds of hats is surprised that another man would own two?

And yet, for some reason, Robin still tries to retrieve the cowl. Dude, let it go. Not only is it the only superhero mask in history that is likely to make you sterile and give you cancer, but it can't be all that expensive. If owning Batman's pink carcinogenic cowl is enough to cause the Mad Hatter to give up his criminal ways, then let the dude have it.

But instead, Batman warns Robin that the cowl is contaminated, and the thugs attack. Quickly overpowering the Duo, Hatter's henchmen trap them in a high-voltage X-Ray chamber, with doors that only push in from the outside. This seems like a rather serious design flaw; I hope Bruce Wayne puts a stop on that check to the Atomic Energy Laboratory. I also hope he thought to bring extra anti-radiation capsules.

I never thought I'd be so happy to see someone knocked unconscious.Professor Overbeck, whose fake accent makes him very hard to understand, says something about how Batman and Robin will be "X-Rayed forever" and irradiated in a matter of seconds. Again, the Professor's understanding of radiation is sorely lacking. Thankfully, the Hatter zaps him with his knockout hat and leaves Batman and Robin to their radioactive fate. All because they couldn't just let him keep the cancer-mask.
They really should have listened to Willy Wonka's warning, now they're going to have to go to the taffy room.

Interestingly, the second episode's introductory recap is a lot more cursory than those in the first few episodes. We get a shot of Batman and Robin in the fluoroscope cabinet and an explanation of what this trap signifies, but nothing about what led up to that point, while the recaps for the previously-reviewed episodes gave us a series of shots from throughout the show and dramatic descriptions of what went on. This is less time-consuming, sure, but I wonder what prompted it.

After the theme song, we're treated to this interesting sight:
Batman: The Donner Cut.

I find it strangely significant that Batman and Robin's underwear is more resistant to radioactive bombardment than either their tights or their flesh. Also, I'm reminded of the cover to Superman #66.

The Hatter returns to the scene of the crime, where Polly, his top-hatted henchgirl, is shocked by the sight of the Bat-skeletons. She thinks Hatter has gone too far this time, which I'm sure won't come back to bite him in the butt later on. The Hatter is convinced of the Dynamic Duo's demise, so he thinks the rest of his caper will be a picnic.
Polly: A picnic? At a time like this?
A henchman points out that Hatter could have picked up another cowl from the Bat-corpse, but he feels that the one he tricked Batman out of earlier would suffice.

Commissioner Gordon gets the fateful phone call, and claims that he refuses to believe it, but has an emotional breakdown as he relays the news to Chief O'Hara.
Who will do our jobs now?

At the White House, an old timey phone operator is shocked to hear the news, and implies that the President will fly to Gotham City as soon as he hears. The same scene plays out in London and Moscow before we return to the Atomic Energy Laboratory, where a very much alive Batman and Robin thank Professor Overbeck for his assistance. See, Batman had a Bat-X-Ray Deflector in his utility belt.
Hey Batman, I think NASA might be interested in that.

He also happened to be wearing another cowl under his contaminated one, and had an entire spare costume in the Batmobile, which they draped across a couple of Professor Overbeck's display skeletons.

At the Mad Hatter's hideout, he comments that Batman and Robin were clever to put a tracking device in the contaminated cowl, but he found it and placed it in a water tower. Apparently he's not quite as confident in their deaths as he seemed. Polly is surprised by his inconsistent tactics--why hide the tracker if Batman and Robin are dead?
Polly: Jervis, you sound like the Joker or the Puzzler, or even the Riddler!
Jervis figures that the discovery of Batman and Robin's bodies will involve the police, and he doesn't want there to be anything which leads to him until after he finishes his plan, which has something to do with replacing the ruby in a Buddha's forehead with the cheap replica he stole from Hattie Hatfield's headdress.

Hatter's henchmen rush in to tell the boss that the whole town is shutting down, due to the discovery of Batman and Robin's deaths. "The whole town's at half-mast." Once again, this provokes some trepidation from Polly, and I think the Hatter's response is quite entertaining:
Mad Hatter: Now don't go soft on me, Polly! Who made Batman and Robin famous crimefighters? Criminals, that's who! If you want to show a little respect to the departed, stay crooked! It's the least you could do!
Now that's persuasive.

Back at Wayne Manor, Aunt Harriet muses about how communities come together during times of tragedy. Alfred is wearing a black armband of mourning, and Bruce and Dick are...standing around looking awkward. A large crowd has gathered outside the mansion, knowing that Batman was friends with Bruce Wayne. Bruce tries obliquely to convince Harriet that Batman and Robin are still alive, but she won't have any of it. She talked to Professor Overbeck himself, and he wouldn't lie, right? Eventually, we're led to this:
Bruce: Dick, um, perhaps you and I should have a moment alone in my study.
Dick: I think so, Bruce.
Aunt Harriet: Oh, that's a beautiful way for you to express your respects.
AUNT HARRIET KNOWS.
Holy gaydar, Batman!

In the study, Bruce dramatically picks up the Bat-Phone. On the other end, Commissioner Gordon and Chief O'Hara are staring out at a crowd of thousands of mourners, when the phone rings. O'Hara suspects a Twilight Zone-esque call from beyond the grave, but Gordon knows they aren't buried yet. A call from the fluoroscopic cabinet then, I guess. They answer the phone, and receive the obvious Mark Twain quote from the Caped Crusader. He explains that he and Robin are "about to nail the Mad Hatter,"3 which prompts this response:
Commissioner Gordon: The Mad Hatter? At a time like this, who cares about that pipsqueak's inconsequential crimes?
Yes, that's right, the GCPD officially stops caring about crime just as soon as they learn of a vigilante's resurrection. Ladies and gentlemen, your Gotham City Police Commissioner.

After Bruce gives Commissioner Gordon a brief lecture on law enforcement and the social contract, he and Dick head to the Bat-Poles.

While Commissioner Gordon and Chief O'Hara rush to call the President, the Mad Hatter is out to steal the ruby, which he does with little fanfare. Unfortunately, Polly rushes up to spoil the mood.
Polly: I was down at the hat-check stand, checking no hats, and guess what I heard: Batman and Robin are alive!
The Hatter is understandably annoyed, but he needn't worry: Batman and Robin are just chilling in the Batcave, apparently trying to puzzle out what to do next.

Excedrin Headache #193: Preposterous Supervillainy.
Batman: Mad Hatter has to be someplace with that contaminated cowl. Ergo...

Robin: Ergo.

Batman: Ergo, the small bug I tucked in the cowl has to be someplace too.
That's some nice deductive logic, there, Batman, but I'm not sure it's helping. Especially since Robin's expression (and tone of voice) and Batman's weary rubbing at his eyes suggests that they've been over this same line of reasoning multiple times. This little bit is one of those great, subtle character moments that I think get overlooked in general assessments of the show.

There's a beeping on...something, but it's clearly from the bug, and it appears to be underwater. After a quick jaunt to the Bat-Computer, they locate the bug at a water tower behind an abandoned Green Derby restaurant. About that time, Commissioner Gordon calls with news of the ruby swap. It seems like they noticed the exchanged jewels abnormally quickly; I wonder how they realized it wasn't the real thing--or that they even needed to check. I guess it's to speed the plot along, really.

Batman and Robin arrive at the Green Derby, where they encounter Polly, who plays naïve about the Mad Hatter. Her terrible lying is exposed when Batman sees the radioactive cowl lying on the floor--and when they see Hatter and his crew climbing up to the water tower out back. Batman explains that Hatter's exposure to the lethal radioactive elements in the cowl means he needs immediate medical attention, which is pretty magnanimous on his part. It'd be more magnanimous if he'd mass-produced his anti-radiation pills, but I'll take my victories where I can get them.

For some reason, Batman and Robin allow Polly to lead the way to the water tower, which seems a little stupid on their parts. Speaking of parts, I'm seeing just a little more of Adam West than I'm comfortable with.
There are two towers in this image.

Batman and Robin ascend the ladder, but Hatter is confident that he'll just whammy them with the mesmerizing device in his hat...which promptly blows away. I think I finally understand the fatal flaw underlying the Mad Hatter's weaponry.

Plan B seems to be to assemble the rest of the gang on the walkway, allowing them to attack in a handy, one-at-a-time fashion.
In hindsight, this was a poor arena.

The fight is pretty slick; in fact, you might suspect that it was done with Teflon, or perhaps some kind of spray-on agent...
Ba-da-bump!

Yeah, that's the stuff. Thanks, ridiculous sound effect!

The fight's pretty cool, and I suspect that by this point in the second season they were looking for ways to spice up the usual warehouse-battle scenes. Consequently, there are some neat places where Batman's getting strangled while dangling partway off the walkway and such, until the police show up. Hatter climbs further up the water tower ladder, to no apparent benefit. Weren't they adapting this into a deathtrap of some sort in the previous installment? Whatever happened to that plot point?

The Dynamic Duo decide to leave the whole arresting bit to the police, and start to leave, pausing only a moment to wave at the rapidly-assembled multitudes of people cheering their apparent resurrection.

They'll go to great lengths to explain what Batman's laundry situation is, but not one word is said about what the hell is going on here.Back at the Manor, Aunt Harriet opens up her thesaurus to ask a pointed question of Bruce and Dick, who appear to be examining a seahorse on a stick:
Aunt Harriet: How did you know, without a shadow of a doubt, that Batman and Robin were alive, when the whole world thought they were dead?

Bruce: Yes, well I um...eh,

Aunt Harriet: Or you, Dick. You were equally emphatic.

Dick: Well, Aunt Harriet, you see, I uh...I...
Alfred suggests that it's time that they tell the truth, then effortlessly spins a tale about an easily-confused friend whose husband works at the Atomic Energy Laboratory.

The episode ends, then, with Aunt Harriet's uncritical acceptance of this story, and a sappy note about how Batman and Robin must now know how much the world loves them. Yay!

Overall, it wasn't as bad as I expected. There are some strange plot holes and dropped threads, and the pacing feels really weird, but those are relatively heady criticisms of a story that I expected to be utter crap. I guess the biggest problem was with the whole "Batman and Robin are dead" subplot, which largely occurred around the periphery of the story and never had much direct effect on the story itself. Such a monumental event deserves a little more attention, both from the story and from the characters involved. So, altogether this wasn't quite the caliber of episode that I've come to expect from those early installments, but it still managed some good character work and jokes, and had the thread of a good idea running through it.

Bonus: Hey, Batman Sound Effects, who's your favorite character from "Death of a Salesman"?
Alternately, who's your favorite member of the Tannen family?



1. He successfully uses his blue cape to lure it, while noting (fairly accurately) that it's the cape's motion, not the color red, which entices them, because bulls are color-blind. They're technically red-green color blind, but I'll give Batman a "close enough."

2.Prompting this excellently punny exchange:
Robin: Holy oleo!
Catwoman:: I didn't know you could yodel.

3. Stop laughing!

Monday, November 23, 2009

Bat-Month: "Mad as a Hatter"

That is an awesome title card.Oh, hey, it's a Batman: TAS episode about date rape!

Which, I guess, is better for the Mad Hatter than various comic insinuations that he's a pedophile or a...chapeauphile.

I really enjoy this version of the Mad Hatter, and I think Roddy McDowall made the perfect voice actor for the character. Sure, I'm a fan of Gail Simone's deranged version in "Secret Six," but I think the "diminutive bizarrely perverted mind-controlling supervillain niche" is already filled by Dr. Psycho. Jeph Loeb's version has never made much sense to me, partnered with the Scarecrow as the two personality-free villains who constantly talk in verse and quotations. At least the quotes make some sense for Hatter; that version of Scarecrow is just weird.

The problem with most of those versions is twofold: first, Gotham City, for whatever reason, is teeming with insane criminals patterned after Alice in Wonderland characters--Tweedledee and Tweedledum, the Wonderland Gang, Humpty Dumpty, and now the White Queen--so it's easy to strip Jervis of the traits which make him stand out as an individual. Second, the foremost of those individual traits is that he has various devices which allow him to control people's minds, and when you turn him into someone so insane that he can no longer speak except in Carroll quotations, then you make him seem like someone who could never have developed such technology.

So the Animated Series, as it so often does, strikes a balance: Jervis Tetch is a nerdy scientist, and Alice in Wonderland is his favorite story (so he quotes it occasionally) and has mind control cards which are connected to a headband. He conceals the latter in a hat and, for flair, puts the Hatter's fractions on the cards. And then he woos a co-worker named Alice by mind-controlling everyone they come in contact with, providing the perfect date.

And the date actually is pretty thoughtful. Sure, it's clearly a "perfect date" concept that has been rattling around in Tetch's mind for a long time--dinner at a fancy restaurant with VIP treatment, an after-hours trip to an amusement park (with an Alice in Wonderland-themed exhibit), and even a dance. There's always the sinister undercurrent--the mind-control cards in everyone's hats or hair, illustrating the lengths to which Tetch has gone to ensure that nothing goes wrong. Knowing that Tetch is the kind of person who would even consider mental enslavement as an acceptable alternative to mild embarrassment paints him as somewhat unhinged, but he's clearly not malicious or harmful...yet.

But this kind of personality is teetering on the edge of violence, and when Jervis finds out that Alice has forgiven her boyfriend--and accepted a marriage proposal--he goes a little over the edge.

And so the situation escalates until Batman is fighting a mind-controlled army of Carroll-inspired thugs in the Storybook Land Amusement Park, while Alice sits as a glassy-eyed puppet through the whole battle.

The episode ends, fittingly enough, with the Hatter trapped under a fallen Jabberwock sculpture, while Alice is happily reunited with her fiancé. The reunion bit wasn't entirely necessary--Alice and Billy weren't particularly three-dimensional characters--but it's a nice moment, made all the more symbolic by the fact that their happily ever after rescue happens in the Storybook Land park.

In any case, this is probably the best episode about the Mad Hatter. It does for Jervis what the Animated Series tended to do so well, providing villains with sympathetic backstories and moderately comprehensible motivations. It's not the best episode to feature Hatter, however, and I'll see about getting to that one in the near future.

Saturday, November 21, 2009

Bat-Month: "Vendetta"

That's a nice looking title card.In looking at my Batman: The Animated Series DVDs for episodes to review, I've found it interesting what my initial judgments are upon reading the titles. For a lot of the episodes, I think "Oh man, that's a great episode"--"Almost Got 'Im," "Heart of Ice," and so forth. For a few, I think, "jeez, that was a bad episode"--"Christmas With the Joker," "Heart of Steel," etc. And then there are some that make me scratch my head and wrack my brain to remember what the heck they were about. "Vendetta" was one of those episodes, so I decided to cure my curiosity--plus, it's on the same disc as "The Clock King."

As it turns out, "Vendetta" is the introductory episode for Killer Croc. It's interesting, in that the plot turns mostly on the sorts of plot devices you'd find in a police procedural, not a children's cartoon. At the beginning of the story, a convict is getting paroled early for agreeing to testify against Rupert Thorne. Unfortunately, the boat he's traveling on is bombed, and he appears to have died--leading to the only use of the phrase "draggin' the bay" (as in, to search for a body) I know of in children's television. Gordon takes Bullock off the case, in order to prevent conflict with Internal Affairs, since in the past Bullock was accused of working with Thorne. Ultimately, someone frames Harvey for the crime, as well as the kidnapping of Joey the Snail.

I was frankly a little shocked to see terms like "Internal Affairs" get tossed around in a cartoon, especially without any explanation.

Anyway, Batman's role in this is mainly to investigate around the periphery of the plot's main events. At first, the evidence seems to implicate Bullock, and Batman is perhaps a little to eager to accuse the police force's biggest Bat-detractor. Eventually, though, Batman finds a scaly bit of flesh at one of the crime scenes, and--thanks to Alfred's fortuitous discussion of cookware--deduced that it might be from a "croc." Bruce then goes to the zoo, where a helpful recording outside the crocodile enclosure explains that crocodiles live in underwater caves.

Seriously. Batman goes to the zoo. To do research. On crocodile habitats. Unless the zoo is next door to Wayne Manor, I can think of about ten different ways that he could have done that research more quickly and efficiently, and thus less ridiculously. Are you telling me that nowhere in stately Wayne Manor is there an encyclopedia? The Bat-computer database doesn't contain anything from Zoobooks?

Naturally, Batman rescues the criminals, gets beat up a bit by Killer Croc, and eventually clears Bullock's name. The episode is not bad, and surprisingly enough the worst bits in it are the ones with Batman and Croc doing superhero/supervillain stuff. Croc's self-exposition is painful at best, and Batman goes to the zoo. The police procedural parts are great, though, and Bullock really shines.

The other really surprising aspect of the story is how intelligent Croc seems. While the series sometimes plays the character for comic relief, the Croc-centric episodes (this and especially "Sideshow") show him to be a relatively bright guy. Here, he's successfully able to impersonate and frame Harvey Bullock, which is not the easiest thing for a giant reptile-man to do.

It's not one of the greatest episodes of the series, and it has some silly moments, but overall "Vendetta" is a pretty good story. I don't think I'll be forgetting it again anytime soon.

Friday, November 20, 2009

Bat-Month: "Almost Got 'Im"

Almost got this picture uploaded when I first published the post.This probably isn't a controversial statement, but I think "Almost Got 'Im" is the perfect Batman story. Forget "Year One," forget "Dark Knight Returns," even forget "The Dark Knight"--"Almost Got 'Im" is pure Batman, distilled down to the basic elemental components.

If you've never seen the episode, please stop reading this and go find it. I'm sure it's on YouTube or Hulu if you don't happen to own the entire Animated Series on DVD (in which case, I think that's grounds to take away your comic fan license--for shame!).

Anyway, the episode plays out as a series of vignettes told by Batman's rogues around a poker table in a seedy bar. The beauty of this setup is that it cuts right to the chase--Batman escaping from insane deathtraps--without trying to justify those deathtraps or those dire circumstances by building a whole plot around them. We don't have to know how Two-Face got Batman tied up to a giant penny on a giant penny-flipping device, and I think any story they tried to tell which led to that scenario would be disappointingly ridiculous. Instead, we get to see Batman pacify Poison Ivy's perilous pumpkin patch, survive the Penguin's Aviary of Doom, and earn the Batcave's second-most-famous prop. And of course, there's Croc's deathtrap, which while hilariously apt, is also probably the most likely to work.

Yeah, you know the scene I'm talking about.If the episode had just been Bat-villains sitting around and sharing war stories, it might have been entertaining, but it wouldn't have been great. What catapults this episode up to the legendary level is when the framing story takes over as the main plot, and there's that incredible, unforgettable reveal. That twist--and the one that follows it--present us with everything we need to know about Batman: master of disguise, world's greatest detective, and prepared for absolutely everything. This is Chessmaster Batman, achieved so perfectly and effortlessly by the Animated series staff.

And then Batman saves the day again, leaving us with just a taste of the Batman/Catwoman romance, and the perfect end to a perfect episode.

I'd worry about overhyping this story, about raising your expectations so high that they couldn't possibly be fulfilled, and that's certainly possible. It's also possible that you could watch ten seconds of this episode for one screen capture, having seen it dozens of times before, and still be unable to control the wide grin and giddily triumphant giggle at seeing Batman be Batman. I'll let you guess which camp I'm in.