The Adventures of Batman
Score: 50% Rating: Not Rated Publisher: Warner Brothers Home                   Entertainment Region: 1 Media: DVD/2 Running Time: 377 Mins. Genre: Animated/Classic/Comic Book Audio: Dolby Digital Mono: English,            Spanish, Portuguese Subtitles: English (for the Deaf and Hard            of Hearing), French, Portuguese
Features: Trailers: Beware the Batman Teen Titans Go! All 34 Episodes
There was a time when comic books were considered to be for children and the weak-minded. These days, comic book characters are made into blockbuster movies, but The Adventures of Batman came before that time. Evidently, it was also made before there was a recognized link between bright flashes in video and seizures; the intro animation features some scenes that flash between red and blue that are very hard on the eyes. The show's animation is riddled with errors, from a scene where Batman's tights are missing (with no story-based explanation), showing just how similar his outfit it to Robin's, to scenes where a chunk of the Joker's car is evidently missing - again, just because of an animation goof, not anything to do with the story. Mind you, those are just the actual errors, not to mention the details that are just plain wrong - like the many times that Robin throws his Bat-rope with grapple... throwing the whole thing without keeping the end of the rope in his hand... then, in the next scene, swings from it... somehow. At times, it's hard to overlook some of these gaffs; the plot of one episode revolves around the fact that Batman and Bruce Wayne have the same birthday... which would be quite damning... if there was any way for the baddies to have come about that information. Which they hadn't - it was completely out of the blue. But you sort of have to accept it and just keep watching, or stop the cartoon. Included Episodes: Disc 1: How Many Herring in a Wheelbarrow? A Bird Out of Hand? The Cool Cruel Mr. Freeze The Joke's on Robin Bubi, Bubi, Who's Got the Ruby? Opera Buffa The Nine Lives of Batman In Again Out Again Penguin The Big Birthday Caper Long John Joker The Crime Computer 1001 Faces of the Riddle Partners in Peril Two Penguins Too Many Hizzoner The Joker The Underworld, Underground Caper Will the Real Robin Please Stand Up? Freeze's Frozen Vikings Disc 2: Simon the Pieman The Great Scarecrow Scare My Crime Is Your Crime Beware of Living Dolls From Catwoman with Love He Who Swipes the Ice, Goes to the Cooler A Game of Cat and Mouse A Mad Mad Tea Party A Perfidious Pieman Is Simon Perilous Playthings The Fiendishly Frigid Fraud Cool Cruel Christmas Caper The Jigsaw Jeopardy Enter the Judge It Takes Two to Make a Team Wrath of the Riddler If you don't remember "The Adventures of Batman" from your childhood, but you do remember watching a Batman and Robin animated series in the 60s, that might be because the title screen of this cartoon doesn't actually say, The Adventures of Batman; it says, "Batman with Robin the Boy Wonder." In actuality, the episode represented here as The Adventures of Batman are the Batman half of an earlier cartoon show named, The Batman/Superman Hour, which explains a mention of Superman in one episode. It seems that six and a half minutes is the segment length, as some of the stories are six and a half minutes, while other stories are two-part stories, featuring a first half that sets up a tense "cliffhanger" scenario and a second half that resolves the cliffhanger and concludes the story, each half being six and a half minutes in length. As far as the specific version of Batman portrayed, it seems closest to that of the live action "campy" television series, with very similar sets and about the same amount of "campy" humor. Within these two discs, Batman and Robin go up against the likes of The Joker, The Penguin, The Riddler, Catwoman, Mr. Freeze, Simon the Pieman, Dollman, The Mad Hatter and The Scarecrow, although the intro only ever shows The Penguin, The Joker and Mr. Freeze, who seem to be the main criminals in the show, based on number of appearances. It's not merely Batman and Robin either, as Batgirl is in quite a few of the episodes, as well. I'm not one to recognize actors or voice-actors, but I readily recognized Casey Kasem's (may he rest in peace) voice as Robin, the Boy Wonder. Batman is voiced by Olan Soule, a character actor who had roles in a lot of television shows, but is best known for voicing Batman in this series. The verdict? Highly advised for playing in the background of a retro-themed party. Not advised for introducing someone to Batman. If you're looking for nostalgic, animated campy Batman and Robin antics, they're right here. But, beware - it can be a difficult watch, with all of the bloopers and mistakes.
-Geck0, GameVortex Communications AKA Robert Perkins
Related Links: Batman on Game Vortex The Adventures of Batman on Wikipedia E3 2014: You Gotta Love That New (Bat)Car Smell Game Vortex's Review of Batman: Arkham Origins - Cold, Cold Heart (360)
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