REVIEW: Beware The Batman "Tests" - Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, everything becomes chaos
By MrMazz 14 Comments
Beware The Batman S1 Ep03-"Tests" Directed By Sam Liu Written By Jim Krieg
Anarky is set up as Batman’s first real recurring villain for Beware The Batman. Another less than known Batman rogue that has once again been translated into something possibly interesting. I say possibly because Anarky is basically a campy version of The Joker as played by Heath Ledger. Wrap your head around that one. Imagine Joker’s anarchistic screed but from more dramatic angles. Whenever Anarky is on screen he is shot with some extreme angle or close up. Making Anarky’s terrorist and political orientation far more palatable. Wallace Langham’s high pitch also disarms his character, he doesn't sound funny but he doesn't sound scary. It’s misdirection if you look at what he does and says and not how he says it you get two different pictures of the character.
He wants to play a game of wits with Batman, who he thinks is finally a worthy opponent. Manipulating two pawns, Daedalus “Doodlebug” Boch and Trucker “Junkyard Dog Long, into being a nuisance for Batman. These two are an odd bunch. They start off being your run of the mill taggers but once they are under Anarky’s patronage they upgrade to destruction. Daedalus was all about his tagging skills, why give him a laser rifle thing. He does at least get a destructive way to tag with acid later on.
Beware The Batman is straddling a hard line between Saturday morning fun but keep in the tradition of Batman: The Animated Series and other darker interpretation of the character. These two concepts don’t mix as well as they did last week. Look at the finale, which is basically a riff on the end of The Dark Knight. Anarky has rigged two gondolas to blow as soon as they pass one another. Giving Batman the chance to save one and backing him into a corner with a dead man's switch. This should have been a tense sequence. It was not. Things go wrong when the finale just happens. The showrunners have talked about wanting to emphasise the detective side of the Dark Knight, which was in prior episodes. Here Batman just shows up after playing a game of misdirection. To the sequence itself. there was barely any cuts to the gondolas which didn’t allow for any tension or sense of danger for the passengers. Batman saves the day by using his brains, of course he was it was never in doubt. Saving the day just didn’t feel momentus at all. The imagery of the electricity being funneled to the top was dramatic but at that point I had lost interest.
The testing of Tatsu Yamashiro continues to be handled well. She gets so close to finding out Bruce Waynes secrete only to choose the wrong button. This is how you tease a character along. She discovered the secret elevator and is shown to be physically capable. Her only failing was she chose the wrong floor to get off on. Tatsu looks smart but still doesn't have the entire picture.
The Bits At The End
White doesn't symbolize anarchy. Black does.
YAY Katana appears to have the sword Soultaker!
Alfred with that claw technique when working the dual analog sticks.
Michael Mazzacane can be found many places on the internet mainly onTwitter @MaZZM and at mazzz.net
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