'The Dark Knight Returns' Reviews (Spoilers Probable)

Watched this last night. It wasn't bad, but it just wasn't what it COULD HAVE BEEN.

First off, the animation is too "clean". It needed a grittier look to it, but I can only assume they want to market it to kids. I also noticed some of the lines start out verbatim to the book, and then changes for some odd reason. And not like the "I hope he goes after the homos next", which I can understand. It's just...odd.

Also, while watching, something feels like it's missing. And it IS. The books are FULL of inner-monologue, which furthers the story and gives character motivation. This is absent, and it is extremely noticeable. Why they cut it ALL out, I'll never know.

The movie is decent, but not nearly what it should have been. It just seemed like it was rushing to hit plot points out of the books, so it all seemed "familiar". Voice acting, for the most part, was good. Some of the Mutant voices weren't quite what they should have been. Others were spot-on. Batman's size yo-yo'ed up and down, which was head-scratching. One minute he is just a large-sized Bruce Wayne, and in the next he is a bulky, hulk of a Batman. Unless he was wearing 150lbs of body armor under his suit, it doesn't come across very believable.

Anyway, as always, judge for yourself. As for me, I was hoping for a LOT more.

Apologist Puncher wrote:Watched this last night. It wasn't bad, but it just wasn't what it COULD HAVE BEEN.

First off, the animation is too "clean". It needed a grittier look to it, but I can only assume they want to market it to kids. I also noticed some of the lines start out verbatim to the book, and then changes for some odd reason. And not like the "I hope he goes after the homos next", which I can understand. It's just...odd.

Also, while watching, something feels like it's missing. And it IS. The books are FULL of inner-monologue, which furthers the story and gives character motivation. This is absent, and it is extremely noticeable. Why they cut it ALL out, I'll never know.

I can see it both ways. As you say, they're marketing this to kids. Some might think it's a bit much to ask kids to follow simultaneous onscreen action (gun fights and the like) while also absorbing inner monologues. Or maybe that they don't want to hear that stuff. Frankly, I think that sells kids short.

The other thing is the weirdness of Batman having a quarter of a script page of dialogue considering the seven defensive positions while he's just seconds away from being attacked by that punk kid.

As you say though... a LOT will get lost that way.

Personally, I'm starting to wish WB Home Video or whoever produces these things would just pick a fucking audience already. Adults, tweens/teens, young children, SOMEthing. There were parts of that Superman vs. The Elite thing that I wouldn't want small kids seeing/hearing (suggestive one-liners and stuff) even though the animation style is pretty kid-friendly. Batman Year One was kind of the same way. Kid-friendly line style but Catwoman is still pretty obviously a hooker, she wears a corset, it's got that drabby coloring style from the comics, etc. Trying to make these things all things to all people has had pretty mixed results. There's a lot to be said for something that transcends age boundaries (Pixar, for example) but a lot of the source material WB is adapting usually has a pretty specific target audience. Making these things to appeal to everyone just isn't working for me.

Well we do still have the other part to be released soon to wrap up story. But it does suck when they do these dtv based off a story and cut out things from the books. I still like to check it out when I have the chance.

webhead2006 wrote:Well we do still have the other part to be released soon to wrap up story. But it does suck when they do these dtv based off a story and cut out things from the books. I still like to check it out when I have the chance.

It comes out the same day as 'The Avengers'. September 25th.

Sweet I forgot when it was due. So thanks for heads up on it ap.

thecolorsblend wrote:

Apologist Puncher wrote:Watched this last night. It wasn't bad, but it just wasn't what it COULD HAVE BEEN.

First off, the animation is too "clean". It needed a grittier look to it, but I can only assume they want to market it to kids. I also noticed some of the lines start out verbatim to the book, and then changes for some odd reason. And not like the "I hope he goes after the homos next", which I can understand. It's just...odd.

Also, while watching, something feels like it's missing. And it IS. The books are FULL of inner-monologue, which furthers the story and gives character motivation. This is absent, and it is extremely noticeable. Why they cut it ALL out, I'll never know.

I can see it both ways. As you say, they're marketing this to kids. Some might think it's a bit much to ask kids to follow simultaneous onscreen action (gun fights and the like) while also absorbing inner monologues. Or maybe that they don't want to hear that stuff. Frankly, I think that sells kids short.

The other thing is the weirdness of Batman having a quarter of a script page of dialogue considering the seven defensive positions while he's just seconds away from being attacked by that punk kid.

As you say though... a LOT will get lost that way.

Personally, I'm starting to wish WB Home Video or whoever produces these things would just pick a fucking audience already. Adults, tweens/teens, young children, SOMEthing. There were parts of that Superman vs. The Elite thing that I wouldn't want small kids seeing/hearing (suggestive one-liners and stuff) even though the animation style is pretty kid-friendly. Batman Year One was kind of the same way. Kid-friendly line style but Catwoman is still pretty obviously a hooker, she wears a corset, it's got that drabby coloring style from the comics, etc. Trying to make these things all things to all people has had pretty mixed results. There's a lot to be said for something that transcends age boundaries (Pixar, for example) but a lot of the source material WB is adapting usually has a pretty specific target audience. Making these things to appeal to everyone just isn't working for me.

Finally watched the movie. Hate to say it but I'd never really gotten the impression that Gordon knew who Batman was from those comics. But looking back on it all... well, it's ambiguous in places.

As to the rest, I stand by the above reply in most respects. There are things in there that are a bit too harsh for small kids but I'd argue the line style is meant to be somewhat appealing to them. So in the end, you get a mish-mash of stuff kids might dig (a female Robin, a Miller-lite line style) along with content they don't need to see.

I enjoyed the movie and I'll definitely check out the next part but this neurotic "everything to everyone" approach really needs to stop.

I watched Part 2 last night, and besides the sorely-needed internal monologue missing again, this movie was almost perfect. Hit all the important story beats, voice acting was top-notch, and the animation was less jarring after watching Part 1.

Now, I will say that in the Superman/Batman fight at the end, the fight was a little more one-sided than I think it needed to be. But that's a small complaint. The Joker/Batman "Tunnel of Love" showdown was amazing.

The Bros. Warner NEED to cut this into one long film, and put that out eventually. It would flow perfectly as one movie, instead of being spread across 2 discs. I know, I know. Less $$ for them is the reason why they didn't do that in the first place. But hey, a guy can dream right?

5 out of 5 from me.

Can't believe I didn't reply to this already. Anyway, watched the movie quite a while ago. The sequence where the Joker runs in to the Tunnel of Love is basically perfect. He just randomly shoots. At one point, he punches a woman right in the face. This is the same Joker we saw in the comic. In fact, the whole TOL thing is good.

In the end, I think this was definitely worth doing. And it was also worth splitting the movie up like this so that nothing would get sacrificed. The cast and crew brought their A game and it shows.

I can't believe no one else has caught these. Seriously.

Like I said above, they are really well done films. They just NEEDED that inner dialogue from the books. It only would have added to the films.