Batman: The Animated Series

Next to the Fleischer Studios Superman cartoons of the 1940's, Batman: The Animated Series is one of the best animated cartoon series ever produced. Before 1992, action-adventure animation was all but dead on American television. Following the success of its new comedy series Tiny Toon Adventures, Warner Animation President Jean MacCurdy made it known that they were looking to develop a new animated Batman series, a result, no doubt, from the success of the first Tim Burton Batman film.

Tiny Toon Adventures storyboard artist Bruce Timm and background painter Eric Radomski were chosen to put together a sample reel, and their two-minute short won them the jobs as the producers of the new series. Veteran animation producers and writers like Alan Burnett and Paul Dini were brought in to spearhead the scripting of the series. Burnett and Dini shared Timm's vision of how the character should be portrayed: dark, serious and brooding.

The intentions for this new Batman series were made very clear in the series' pilot, "On Leather Wings." This Batman was unlike anything that had been previously seen in television animation. Batman was a dark, psychologically driven detective character, just as he was in the original and modern comic books.

The series was able to get away with a lot of "real world violence" such as punches, kicks and real guns being used. It also utilized serious and dark themes in its stories. This was groundbreaking for what ultimately amounted to a children's cartoon, as that level of seriousness and realism had never been achieved in animation before.

The character design, primarily the work of Bruce Timm, along with artists Lynne Naylor, Kevin Nowlan and Mike Mignola, among others, eschewed the detail-heavy, ultra-real style favored by adventure cartoons that came before, in favor of a more cartoony approach, for lack of a better word. This served to better animate the show. This sense of design combined the barrel chests and square jaws of the Fleischer Superman cartoons of the 1940's with the clean design work of comic book legend, Alex Toth. The influence of such Batman artists as Bob Kane, Dick Sprang, Frank Miller and David Mazzuchelli is also evident.

Furthermore, the entire series was given a moody, timeless feel, in which 1940's architecture, wardrobe and roadsters co-existed with modern-day technology, making the series feel instantly nostalgic yet never dated. The moody out-of-time world gave the show a dramatic flair and sense of pathos that has rarely been in American cartoons.

The acting on the series was also top-notch. Series voice director Andrea Romano opened the auditions up to the best actors available. The casting for this show resulted in what I believe to be the most talented cast ever assembled for an animated series. Voices included Kevin Conroy as Batman (the definitive voice of Batman in many people's minds), Mark Hammill as Joker (the definitive Joker voice), and Lauren Lester as Robin and Bob Hastings as Commissioner Gordon among others.

This series also had an incredible score. Danny Elfman wrote a theme that was enhanced and expanded upon by the incomparable Shirley Walker with a full orchestra. She composed most of the music, in fact. The soundtrack was another factor in the show’s greatness and the various themes are still stuck in my head to this day. The expertly crafted, operatic compositions helped to showcase its timeless appeal.

The series, at least in its first incarnation, focused primarily on Batman fighting various rogues, with an 18-year-old Robin (attending college upstate as Dick Grayson) appearing occasionally and in a supporting role. The Robin design combined the Dick Grayson character of the 1970's and early 80's with the current costume of the time worn by the comic books' third Robin, Tim Drake. This series was also partly responsible for bringing a greater visibility to Batgirl.

Much like the comics, however, Batman is only as good as his villains, and this show did a marvelous job of translating Batman's Rogues' Gallery for animation, with far more hits than misses. In many cases, their version wound up being far superior to earlier versions, and often supplanted them not only in the public consciousness, but in the source-material comic books as well. Familiar characters like The Joker, Penguin, Two-Face, Catwoman, The Riddler, Clayface, Killer Croc, Poison Ivy, Man-Bat, The Scarecrow and Scarface were all featured with notable new characters like Lock-Up and Harley Quinn, who would become so popular that she would be featured as a mainstay in the DC Universe eventually.

In its original run, eighty-five episodes were produced for the Fox network before the series was taken off the air. A few years later, the studio ordered 27 more episodes that coincided with the Superman animated series on the WB Network. In The New Batman Adventures, characters were slightly re-designed, with the addition of a new Robin, Tim Drake as well as Nightwing being introduced and Batgirl taking on a more prominent role in a new costume. These new episodes were sleeker and even more cartoony than the first show, a result of budget cuts, but these were still very entertaining.

All in all, this series helped make many children and adults (myself included) into lifelong Batman fans and comic book fans. In this reviewer’s opinion, no animated superhero show will ever top Batman: The Animated Series.

Citation

All info pertaining to this series comes from: 

The documentary, ‘Batman: The Legacy Continues’ (2004).