Ah yes, finally, the long awaited adaptation of fan favorite origin story "Batman: Year One" written by Frank Miller (back when he actually wrote good stories) following his previous work on Batman (The Dark Knight Returns and Dark Knight Strikes) as well as his work on Daredevil (before he started writing Sin City, 300 and then completely degenerated with his sick, sadistic alleged parody 'All-Star Batman & Robin' - the price of a former visionary becoming trapped in one particular voice, in his case the "Look at me I'm a man!" voice). At one point Darren Aronofsky pitched doing this as a live action film to Warner Brothers, with future Harvey Dent/Two-Face actor Aaron Eckhart being his candidate for Jim Gordon, but for whatever reason he lost out to Christopher Nolan's pitch for "Batman Begins" (some bits & pieces of Year One can still be glimpsed in BB).
PLOT: Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham after some years abroad, training and honing himself to become Batman, the Dark Knight who stands against the criminals who ravage his beloved Gotham City. Jim Gordon is the new cop in town trying to hold on to his principles in the midst of a corrupt police force, but even a man as good as Jim Gordon is not without flaws, especially when it comes to fellow detective Sarah Essen. Selina Kyle is the struggling prostitute/thief destined to become Catwoman. And a whole mess of bad guys are lurking in the background...
I have to admit when I heard they were adapting this I wasn't terribly excited, just as I wasn't terribly excited for "Red Hood", another Batman feature, even though it proved to be an excellent feature, just like this one. Batman's been on top for so long that his overexposure in animation and film has taken some of the fun out of reading and/or watching his adventures. Meanwhile, many other DC heroes still have not gotten their due, let alone a fair chance at making it on their own (example: the Flash still hasn't even gotten one solo feature in recent years and continues to be relegated to ensemble pieces, usually as "the funny one").
It's not that this is a bad feature by any means. It's an excellent adaptation of the book, quite probably the most literal translation we'll ever see of any comic book story in any format, even more so than Zack Snyder's ambitious 2009 adaptation of Alan Moore's "Watchmen". The animation captures the look and feel of Miller's original story perfectly and the voice actors are all spot on. Contrary to the what the "Kevin Conroy is the only voice of Batman" supremacists may say, Ben McKenzie gives a strong performance as the younger, less experienced Bruce Wayne finding his way both as Batman and as his public 'disguise' of a free wheeling, loose living billionaire playboy, and he has a great cast backing him, including Bryan Cranston as Jim Gordon, Eliza Dushku as Catwoman (who gets a solo showcase feature on the side), and Katee Sackhoff as Sarah Essen, not to mention regular working class voice actors such as Fred Tatasciore as the corrupt Flass (Fred is better known to fan boys for being Marvel's go to guy for the Hulk from various video games and animated features), Grey DeLisle as Mrs. Gordon, and Steve Blum (better known to anime fans for his work as Spike Spiegel in Cowboy Beebop and Marvel's Wolverine in more recent years).
Still, I'd much rather see more features for Green Lantern and solo features for the Flash and Aquaman than another Batman feature. We've been to Gotham plenty of times, we know the back alleys and denizens very well. There's only so much you can do to put a new spin on the old town. Here's hoping that next time another DC hero will get to shine.
PLOT: Bruce Wayne returns to Gotham after some years abroad, training and honing himself to become Batman, the Dark Knight who stands against the criminals who ravage his beloved Gotham City. Jim Gordon is the new cop in town trying to hold on to his principles in the midst of a corrupt police force, but even a man as good as Jim Gordon is not without flaws, especially when it comes to fellow detective Sarah Essen. Selina Kyle is the struggling prostitute/thief destined to become Catwoman. And a whole mess of bad guys are lurking in the background...
I have to admit when I heard they were adapting this I wasn't terribly excited, just as I wasn't terribly excited for "Red Hood", another Batman feature, even though it proved to be an excellent feature, just like this one. Batman's been on top for so long that his overexposure in animation and film has taken some of the fun out of reading and/or watching his adventures. Meanwhile, many other DC heroes still have not gotten their due, let alone a fair chance at making it on their own (example: the Flash still hasn't even gotten one solo feature in recent years and continues to be relegated to ensemble pieces, usually as "the funny one").
It's not that this is a bad feature by any means. It's an excellent adaptation of the book, quite probably the most literal translation we'll ever see of any comic book story in any format, even more so than Zack Snyder's ambitious 2009 adaptation of Alan Moore's "Watchmen". The animation captures the look and feel of Miller's original story perfectly and the voice actors are all spot on. Contrary to the what the "Kevin Conroy is the only voice of Batman" supremacists may say, Ben McKenzie gives a strong performance as the younger, less experienced Bruce Wayne finding his way both as Batman and as his public 'disguise' of a free wheeling, loose living billionaire playboy, and he has a great cast backing him, including Bryan Cranston as Jim Gordon, Eliza Dushku as Catwoman (who gets a solo showcase feature on the side), and Katee Sackhoff as Sarah Essen, not to mention regular working class voice actors such as Fred Tatasciore as the corrupt Flass (Fred is better known to fan boys for being Marvel's go to guy for the Hulk from various video games and animated features), Grey DeLisle as Mrs. Gordon, and Steve Blum (better known to anime fans for his work as Spike Spiegel in Cowboy Beebop and Marvel's Wolverine in more recent years).
Still, I'd much rather see more features for Green Lantern and solo features for the Flash and Aquaman than another Batman feature. We've been to Gotham plenty of times, we know the back alleys and denizens very well. There's only so much you can do to put a new spin on the old town. Here's hoping that next time another DC hero will get to shine.