Twenty Years of D.C. Animation: Batman '92

  The D.C. Animated Universe was a highly popular family of shows kicked off by the beloved, game-changing Batman: The Animated Series in 1992. The show’s creative team spun off related shows for the likes of Superman, the Justice League and, er, Static Shock, building a sizeable continuity that managed to be both accessible to new viewers and rewarding to long-time fans. At a time when the mainstream comics these cartoons were based on were languishing in the infamous Dark Age, for many 90s kids the DCAU was their main touchstone for the iconic properties of the 20^th century.

  The Batman cartoon that started it all began as an ambitious attempt to piggyback off the success of Tim Burton’s lucratively dark Batman movie, even borrowing the iconic opening theme. Ironically, Danny Elfman’s epic chords would ultimately become far more closely associated with the plucky little kid’s show than with the bombastic blockbuster. It was quickly established that this show was no lazy cash-in, but a hugely audacious attempt to batter down the walls of the animation ghetto, while still providing non-patronising entertainment for its young demographic.

  Even on their best day, Marvel’s contemporary animated output was simply outclassed, hamstrung by dopey censorship. While Spiderman and the X-Men featured cops and gangsters armed  with  laser pistols instead of pistol-pistols, and voice actors required to force out the most contorted sentences to avoid acknowledging the existence of death, Kevin Conroy’s Batman was snarling threats at 1940s-themed mobsters with tommy guns and explosives in intense confrontations. Not only did Conroy’s brooding voice represent the definitive Batman for a generation of comic fans, but also B: TAS turned out to be one of the most effective attempts at juggling the conflicting elements of the character’s world. Schumacher might turn the whole thing into a winking, smirking joke, and Nolan’s version might trumpet its po-faced darkness while awkwardly holding its fantastic conspiracies and outlandish characters at arm’s length, but a creative team headed up by Paul Dini and Bruce Timm used the opportunities of the animated medium to successfully mesh both the gothic grimness and the clownish absurdity of the Batman mythos.

  Though there was a fair amount of dud episodes, questionable writing decisions and, in the early days at least, inconsistent animation, at its best Batman was a brilliant, famously non-condescending gateway into a world of all-ages fun that frequently outstripped the Dark Knight’s big-budget live-action incarnations for entertainment value. This Batman was fierce and driven, every line delivered with a very adult sense of steely conviction that showed up the exaggerated bleating of many of his cartoon contemporaries. He was motivated by angst and grief, but it was pitched to make him appear sympathetic rather than suffocatingly self-indulgent. He was a clear-cut hero, chivalrous and fearless and organically cool, rather than some bizarre, posturing anti-hero showing off a forced edginess. His supporting cast were also well-executed; Alfred, Robin, and Commissioner Gordon did their jobs of providing better-adjusted, more human presences to offset Batman’s intensity, and the Rogue’s Gallery managed to come across as fairy-tale monsters and horribly damaged people at the same time. The villain origin stories provided some of the show’s most memorable moments, showing genuinely terrifying breakdowns and descents into criminal madness that added a tragic flavour to the ensuing brawls.

  With the show’s popularity soaring, an unprecedented step was taken; a feature length movie based on the show was made. Amazingly, it would actually have a theatrical release, bringing a generation’s Batman to the silver screen for the first and only time.