This week I had the opportunity to write about a couple of different Warner Brother animated series that have hit DVD shelves. Earlier this week it was "Justice League Unlimited", now I'm here to shell out a little dirt on "Batman Beyond: Season 2." Both shows were spin-offs of sorts of "Batman: The Animated Series", the most notable connection being the carrying over of actor Kevin Conroy to do the voice work for Bruce Wayne / Batman. Since the days of the earlier animated series, which I still consider being amongst the best work the animators and writers at Warner have ever done, Conroy has been considered to be THE voice of Batman. And I couldn't agree more. The network's newer series, "The Batman", uses a different voice actor, is completely different in style and pales in comparison.

Where "Justice League" naturally carries over in the same time frame, giving us a mature Batman, "Batman Beyond" takes the story into the future. We are shown a Batman whose age and injuries have made it nearly impossible to continue his crime fighting crusade. He is only able to fight with the use of a powered batsuit, but finally has to retire after being hit with a debilitating heart attack. The series then flash forwards several more years and introduces us to Terry McGinnis, a high school student with a slight penchant for getting into trouble. When his father is killed by a mobster, he vows revenge. He meets the elder Bruce Wayne and ends up stealing the batsuit in order to exact his revenge. But Bruce steps in and helps him decide to do the right thing and eventually, though begrudgingly, allows him to take up the mantle of Batman.

When I first heard about the series, I thought it was just going to be some kind of rip-off of the original animated series, but I couldn't have been more wrong. It ended up being an incredibly well-written and animated series. And just as McGinnis took up the mantle of the Batman, this series took up the mantle of the original. Each episode brought McGinnis face to face with futuristic villains and genetic mutations. The roster of bad guys (and girls) was as interesting and colorful as anything the original Batman had to face.

Interestingly enough, "Batman Beyond" was so popular that it spawned a straight to DVD movie "Batman Beyond and the Return of the Joker", in which our new hero had to go head to head against the Batman's greatest and deadliest nemesis. Unfortunately, the release of this film also caused some ripples of controversy as the original version of it was much, much darker than Warner Brothers thought it should be. It seems before it would be released, the creators were forced to go back and re-animate certain key scenes and soften it a bit. This did not sit well with the creators or the fans of the series, but there wasn't much to be done. Shortly after the situation died down, Warner Brothers pulled the plug on the second best animated series they ever produced. If I remember right, the claim was that they were just going in a different direction with their kid's programming. Right…

Anyhow, the only way in the past to get any of the episodes of the three seasons was to buy them as individual DVDs, each one containing and episode or two (something they also did with "Justice League." They finally got the right idea and released complete seasons (of both shows) in full DVD sets. This was great news for those of us who held out and didn’t buy the earlier releases. The new set for "Batman Beyond" contains all 26 episodes of the 2nd season, and like all of their transfers of animated shows to DVD, they look and sound superb. And to make matters even better, they included a couple of extremely interesting commentaries (which I listed below) as well as a panel featurette moderated by Jason Hillhouse. The panel is made up of the show's producers Bruce Timm, Alan Burnett, Glenn Murakami and Paul Dini, who all dish the dirt as it were about the series.

"Batman Beyond" was a terrific show that deserved better than it got in terms of being allowed to tell its full story. When it was cancelled, there was certainly more to tell. Ah well, at least Warner Brothers has finally gotten on the ball and realized that fans want full season sets of their favorite animated shows and not just a couple of piecemeal episodes from time to time.

Episodes:
Splicers (Commentary by Producers Bruce Timm and Glenn Murakami, Storyboard Artist James Tucker, Voice Director Andrea Romano and Voice Actor Will Friedle)
Earth Mover
Joyride
Lost Soul
Hidden Agenda
Blood Sport
Once Burned…
Hooked Up
Rats
Mind Games
Revenant
Babel
Terry's Friend Dates a Robot
Eyewitness
Final Cut
The Last Resort
Armory
Sneak Peak
The Egg Baby (Commentary by Producers Bruce Timm and Glenn Murakami, Director James Tucker, Voice Director Andrea Romano and Voice Actor Will Friedle)
Zeta
Plague
April Moon
Sentries of the Last Cosmos
Payback
Where's Terry
Ace in the Hole

Starring (the voices of): Kevin Conroy, Will Friedle
Extras: Inside Batman Beyond - The Panel
Specifications: Full Screen, English Dolby Stereo
Studio: Warner Brothers
Release Date: 10/24/2006
Region 1
MPAA Rating: NR
Website
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We'll give Batman Beyond: Season 2 an A.