Vinnie Ortez
The Bruce Timm era of animation is dead. I will say it until I am dead.
One thing that has been boiling inside of me for a while now is the lack of creativity and dignity from DC comics and Warner Bros. Entertainment. Their animated projects have not changed from their stock template character design and blocky new wave adaptation of the classic Bruce Timm ‘92 style since 2010 and even THEN is was outdated. It’s hard to still enjoy the new animated DC movies being such a huge fan boy of everything the east has to offer.
Yes, I am avoiding saying “anime” because I don’t want to turn anybody off. There are more than a handful of fantastic examples of original animation style and story that has all been translated from the manga, comic books. The same thing DC/WB is doing when they remake iconic graphic novels like the Dark Knight Returns. The only difference is that the DC/WB way is to gloss over it with a paintbrush that’s a decade old to maybe make a small cash grab?
There have been a few good animated projects to come out of the duo. Young Justice, JL vs TT and both parts of the Dark Knight returns are all worth watching but still lacking something. Even though it’s still so familiar and you’re watching your favorite characters, there’s a small element of cringe.
Batman Ninja is the one exception. Out earlier this year, it was a great collection of different animation styles and a story all of its own. However, I won’t count it because it was made by big names from the east. Names who worked on Afro Samurai and Kill la Kill. I’m not looking for DC/WB to outsource their work or even copy anime, I just something new and gripping. For example, Sony’s animated movie coming out this fall, Into the Spider-Verse. A new, exciting take on the many spidey characters that has non-comic book by-standers pumped to see it. I’m sure there are unknown animators with styles and visions of their own who could reimagine iconic graphic novels in a animated movie that would be worth buying, never mind just streaming.
I can understand that specifically, maybe the Dark Knight Returns style of thin pencil outlines and water colors wouldn’t have translated to the screen as well as it reads on paper. But I would have loved the risk of seeing old man Batman in a different lens rather than the one DC/WB is scared to get rid of because this is the only thing that is still somewhat working for them. Maybe they’ll finally do something new with their newly announced animated adaptation of Hush, the Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee classic. But I won’t get my hopes up.
I’m not mad anymore, just disappointed.
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