Batman: Gotham Knight

You think you know the story of Gotham City. You know the story of Thomas and Martha Wayne, the most generous and altruistic wealthy people since Mansa Musa, who tried to clean up the city while taking the high road. You know of their son, the sole survivor of their homicide, who donned the cape and cowl rto continue their work on the low road. You know about the secret society that tried to bring Gotham to ruin, the district attorney who fell from grace, and the clown who tried to usher in a new society of chaos. You know that tall muscled dude in a mask who spoke like the lovechild of Adam Sandler and Sean Connery. You think you know the road Bruce Wayne travelled to become a symbol of hope, and you think you know the way his presence drove the city to madness, but there are countless untold stories, and every time you walk the streets of Gotham, you run the risk of writing one of them yourself. From the teenage skaters recounting their encounters with a legend, to the true evils lurking in the depths of the sewers, here you’ll find six tales that will give you a better understanding of a city drenched in despair, and the man who has vowed to protect. Here you’ll find six untold stories... Of The Batman.

Batman: Gotham Knight is a very curious entry into the caped crusader’s legacy, as it’s one of a long line of animated DC comics films, but it’s not officially a part of that line up. Technically speaking, this OVA is canonically a part of the Christopher Nolan Dark Knight trilogy, and it supposedly takes place between the first two films, as a sequel to Batman Begins, and a prequel to The Dark Knight. Taking a cue from The Animatrix, Gotham Knight is an anthology that’ meant to expound upon the fictional universe it’s a part of, adding to the established lore and, at the time, building hype for the second movie in the franchise... Although The Dark Knight wound up being way more successful than Matrix: Reloaded, we’ll get to that. Much like The Animatrix, Gotham Knight consists of stories that were written and conceived by Americans, and then directed and produced in Japan, by established anime production companies, making it an official anime... Not to mention the first Batman anime, beating Batman Ninja by over a decade.

Compared to The Animatrix, which wound up being probably the peak of its franchise before things started going downhill, Gotham Knight is almost the exact opposite, sandwiched between two genuinely great films before itself being forgottn by time. There are plenty of reasons this might have happened... We were already used to animated Batman by the time this OVA came out, and while Batman the Animated Series is arguably one of the greatest cartoons ever made, Mask of the Phantasm did extremely poorly in theaters, despite being an awesome movie in it’s own right. So, is the fact that Gotham Knight has faded from the zeitgeist a result of people not taking animation seriously, or a result of people not wanting to sit through over an hour of something they’re getting for twenty minute episodes? Or considering just how fondly remembered The Animatrix still is to this day, is it just the result of Gotham Knight not having all that much to offer? Well, the only way to find out is to revisit it, and that’s what I’m going to do. Much like my Lucky Star OVA review, I’m going to go over each of the six segments, see what I like and dislike about them, and figure out what my thoughts on this OVA are as a whole.

Before I do that, though, I should address one aspect of the film that marks it as distinctly western, and that’s the dub. One of the biggest differences between American and Japanese animation is that in the west, we use a style called Prelay, which is where you record actors reading their lines, and then animate over it. In the east, they use ADR, which is the opposite... The animation is done first, and then the actors record their lines to lip flaps. Gotham Knight was done first in prelay, with the studios in charge of animating it basing their work around already existing dialogue, with almost universally positive results(segment four has some obvious lip-synch issues). As far as the cast goes, they didn’t really hire any anime voice actors for this... Batman himself is played by his most legendary voice actor, Kevin Conroy, as this was years before Deidrich Bader would assume the role. He is just as amazing as you remember. Certain other well-known Batman actors are also present, although they’re not always playing their iconic characters... Scott Menville doesn’t play Robin, and Will Friedle isn’t playing Beyond, and it is weird hearing them play multiple non-white teenagers apiece. Kevin Michael Richardson is awesome as always, and there are stand-out performances from less recognizable actors such as Parminder Nagra, Jim Meskimen and George Newbern.

Anyway, let’s get started with the first tale, “Have I Got a Story for You.” This is the story of four teenage skateboarders telling each other tall tales about a Batman fight that they each only witnessed part of, and their experiences are shown to us as they remember them from their own unique perspectives, with each tale giving us a different version of Batman. The first kid, the only girl of the group, talks about Batman as a living shadow, referring to his stealth tactics. The second, a young boy, describes him as a literally bat monster, referring to his brutal and often monstrous appearance. The third one, likely the youngest of the group, describes him as a robot, a reference to his use of gadgets and superhuman abilities. Finally, the fourth kid, after expressing disbelief at not having an experience of his own to share, is given the opportunity to save Batman from his enemy, showing us the mortal human Batman really is. What’s notable about this segment is that it bears a strong resemblance to one of the most popular episodes of the animated series, which can’t be a coincidence because that episode is included on the DVD, and it’s a really strong concept to open the OVA on. Having said that, it also has a really distinct visual style that feels heavily dated. I remember quite a few anime from the mid-2000s that had this really ugly, Klasky-Csupo character design style, and animation that used broken and inconsistent models to keep costs down, and surprise, a lot of those titles were all directed by the same person.

If you haven’t heard of Michaels Arias, he’s one of very few non-Asian, American born anime directors, even if he only has a few titles under his belt. He was involved in some of the segments of this OVA, along with portions of the Animatrix, and he directed a film I was able to get about five minutes into before turning it off, Tekkonkinkreet. Yeah, I figure there are people out there who like the runny eggs aesthetic, and I can tolerate it in small doses, but if you use it more than Toradora did, I’m not a fan. And Michael Arias used it a lot in his few directorial efforts. The characters are kind of hideous as a result, but in contrast, Gotham City looks amazing. It feels appropriately dirty and overcrowded, but with plenty of signs of futuristic technological progress. It feels weird seeing such uly characters populate such a beautifully grimy world, but I don’t know, maybe the dissonance of that juxtaposition was what they were going for. Also, while I think the story and concept of this segment are really strong, the dialogue feels distinctly like an old white writer trying to capture some kind of stereotypical urban teen flavor. The slang on display here can get pretty awkward, but thankfully it’s just in this segment.

The second segment is titled Crossfire, and it tells the tale of two members of Jim Gordon’s MCU(Oh, the irony), or Major Crimes Unit, transporting a criminal to Arkham. One of these cops is whingeing about Batman, until they wind up in the middle of a turf war between two of Gotham’s major gangs, and Batman himself swoops in to save them. One thing you’ll notice is how much better this segment looks than the last one, which is primarily down to the fact that it’s animated by Production IG, and while it doesn’t look like a very expensive short, it still looks pretty good with the way it’s directed. There isn’t a whole lot to it story and plot-wise, until you realize who most of the characters are. To start, this segment stars Salvatore Maroni and Yuri Dimitrov, two gang leaders who were set to appear in The Dark Knight, although they look nothing like their film counterparts. One of the cops is Anna Ramirez, also from the film, and her partner... Well, his name is Crispus Allen, and while he has nothing to do with the Nolanverse outside of this OVA, he’s a pretty interesting character in DC as a whole. He has connections to Batman, Superman and Green Lantern, and would go on to become one of the hosts for antihero The Spectre. It’s nice to see him get some representation outside the Gotham TV show, but he does feel low-key wasted in a role that doesn’t even acknowledge a fraction of his lore. Anyway, it’s a fun segment, but kind of forgettable outside of introducing some minor characters for The Dark Knight.

Segment three is called Field Test, and I’m gonna say right off the Bat, this one has charm to spare... And I’m not talking about how bishounen Bruce Wayne’s design is. Lucius Fox invents a device that uses magnetism to block bullets. Bruce tests it out by essentially using it to fuck with a land developer during a golf tournament, whom he also suspects of murder, before donning it in costume to intervene in yet another gangland turf war between Maroni and Dimitrov. I’m not familiar with the studio Bee Train... I know they were a short lived subsidiary of Production IG who went under in 2011... But their work in this segment looks pretty crisp and polished, a far cry from the way the OVA started. In addition to the highly attractive character designs, they do a lot of work with shadows and fog to make the environments feel immersive. It’s a somewhat light hearted story that has quite a few laughs to offer, especially in the way Batman resolves the feud between Maroni and The Russian, it might be my favorite... And because I don’t have a lot to say about it, I might as well use this opportunity to point out that while Kevin Conroy is consistently good throughout the OVA, he sounds especially cool playing as Bruce in his playboy persona, reciting what is probably some of the best sounding dialogue in the entire film.

The fourth segment, In Darkness Dwells, has a pretty simple story. A religious figure is kidnapped and brought into the sewers by Killer Croc, and handed off to Scarecrow. Out of the three major Batman villains who appear in Gotham Knight, two of them appear here, so you’d think that it would be really cool, but unfortunately... I really don’t like this one. First and most obvious is the aesthetic, which is bafflingly unappealing. The animation is cheap and derpy, the aesthetic is over-stylized like it’s trying to compensate for the lack of a budget, and the action is sloppy looking at best. When Madhouse gets cheap, they get REALLY cheap, and this drew the short straw. On top of all that, the dialogue is over-written, Batman comes off as way chattier than usual, explaining things to Gordon that you wouldn’t think he would find it necessary to explain, but really, he’s doing it as exposition for the audience. There’s also the idea that Scarecrow’s toxin can transfer via biting, which seems questionable at best... It’s the kind of logic you’re conditioned to ignore in a zombie story, and I don’t see no Solomon Grundy in this segment. Allen and Ramirez are back, though they contribute nothing. Killer Croc looks like shit, and while the inclusion of Scarecrow does make it an official part of the Nolanverse, he also kind of falls flat.

The fifth segment, thankfully, is a lot better. After being shot in the abdomen while traversing the sewers, Batman must try to escape despite his serious wound. While making his way to a point where Alfred can collect him, he reflects on some of the lessons he learned in his travels before becoming Batman... First, from a stint in the middle east performing surgeries without anesthesia, and then a period of several months that he spent with an Indian woman named Cassandra who taught him how to manage his pain. Produced by the same studio as the first segment, and using largely the same style, I have to admit it looks a lot better here. The animation is a lot more grounded, the characters look way more human in their design, and it probably features the best looking action in the OVA, at least so far. As much as previous segments went out of their way to set up characters for The Dark Knight, it is nice to see at least one that offers a serious call back to arguably the best part of Batman Begins... I am of course referring to Bruce’s travels abroad training, a backstory that was so engaging that Man of Steel would later rip it off. We get a further look at his past, and how it has influenced the hero we all know and love, and the best part is that both settings we see him in are extremely interesting, especially his lessons with Cassandra, a character I’m surprised hasn’t appeared anywhere else in DC comics. Or, if she has, please let me know.

And then, Gotham Knight ends with a bang... Literally... With Deadshot, a segment that wraps up a lot of the previous segments quite nicely. Batman has evidence that the man he was golfing with previously hired a hitman to kill a protestor, so he gives it to Gordon to transport, but the Russians hire that same hitman to stop him. If this segment looks familiar, that’s because it was directed by an uncredited Yoshiaki Kawajiri, director of such classics as Ninja Scroll and Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust, and while I don’t know why he went uncredited, it might have something to do with this being his final directorial effort before spending the last thirteen years as a storyboard artist. It’s especially confusing because you can take one look at this segment and see that it looks exactly like Bloodlust... And I mean that in the nicest way possible, like, that style was fucking MADE for Batman, and it’s kind of a travesty that we only got this one brief taste of it. I guess it doesn’t feel quite final enough to be a strong finale... They paired Deadshot’s use of guns to Bruce’s childhood trauma and his overall philosophy on firearms over-all, which kind of adds an extra layer to it, but it doesn’t feel entirely organic or even entirely necessary. In comparison, the previous segment ended on a much more powerful shot making the same point. I know it’s kind of cliche, but I would have expected it to end with a bit more of a Dark Knight tease... Not necessarily a Joker reveal, maybe something involving Harvey and Rachel? Still, it’s a fun segment and it looks amazing.

So now that I’ve gone through the whole OVA for the first time in over a decade, what do I think of it? Honestly, it holds up. It’s not perfect, it has some issues throughout, but as a whole it’s still pretty badass, and it has a lot more to offer than just the novelty of being the first Batman anime. The segments are connected in several different way, both obvious and subtle, ultimately telling a complete story while never straying too far from it. There are also a ton of cool easter eggs from the comics and other deeper lore, and it’s intriguing to see the dark knight explored from so many different perspectives, and in so many different styles. I think what I like most about it, though, is that while every other Batman adaptation goes for the biggest stories and the most exciting spectacle possible in order to drive ticket sales, Gotham Knight feels more like a marriage between the Nolanverse and the Animated Series... A title that takes his recently reinvented character and follows him through some of his lesser adventures, recording the daily grind he had to go through while progressing from one supervillain entity trying to take down Gotham City to another. These are the stories that transformed a sophomoric costumed vigilante scratching away at the corruption of the system into the ass-kicking veteran who tested his convictions against a driven harbinger of chaos, and for that, I highly recommend checking this one out.

I give Batman: Gotham Knight a 7/10.