Ungoliantschilde

original storyboards for the title sequence from ‘Batman: the Animated Series’, by Bruce Timm. this won Bruce Timm an Emmy Award.

this sequence has been called the BEST animated representation of the Dark Knight. ever. Not the TV Show (which was great) just this opening 60 seconds of animation. the best Batman story ever animated.

Sleep well, Kevin Conroy. You will be missed.

Marvin the Martian, by the late Seth Fisher.

The Max Fleischer Cartoons were absolutely amazing. It’s also the first cartoon to feature human figures, which was accomplished through rotoscoping. Essentially, an actor would shadow dance behind a blank screen, and each frame would be colored and drawn over as a tracing. Additionally, Superman was only depicted as being able to jump very long distances. The cartoon introduced the idea that he could fly, with him changing directions in mid-flight for the first time for the character.

“Faster than a speeding bullitt! More powerful than a locomotive! Able to leap tall buildings in a single bound!…” was the introduction used for these early serials. They are very, very worth your time.

In My Darkest Moments, I’m Taunted by the Suspicion that my Parents’ Murder was the Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me.

Cynically, I Tell Myself it has Given my Life a Destiny and the Means to Fulfill it.

The Affleck Batman’s outward appearance is inspired by The Dark Knight Returns. Underneath the costume is an Alex Ross-Paul Dini inspired one, who has lost his way after twenty years in Gotham. 

“In BvS, Bruce was a man obsessed with the past and the wrongs he perceived had been done by Superman’s hand. What he went through in that film gave him a totally different understanding of those events and who Superman really was. “

- Ben Affleck (source)

Batman: War on Crime Written by Alex Ross and Paul Dini Art by Alex Ross Lettering by Alex Ross

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice - Ultimate Edition Directed by Zack Snyder Written by Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer Cinematography by Larry Fong Edited by David Brenner

So much of the design and visual effects of the Zack Snyder universe was so incredibly spot on that it clouds a clear review of the movies.

Zack Snyder directed 3 shitty movies in a row. Each one was a little better than the one before, but they were all pretty much just bad.

And the facts that Henry Cavill was perfect as Superman, Ben Affleck was great as Batman, and holy fuck - Kevin Costner and Diane Lane as Ma and Pa Kent were overshadowed by a series of movies that cared more about making things look “cool” than they cared about actually making a good movie. They sucked. They were not “controversial”.

Basically, anyone with a brain and a basic understanding of the characters thought Snyder’s movies were stupid, over long drivel. But, they made a bunch of money overseas and in middle America. So, the defenders call them “controversial”. They were bad. The Big Bang Theory was ridiculously popular. It made sooo much money. And everyone on Tumblr routinely makes fun of how badly written that show was. Snyder’s movies sucked. They weren’t controversial. They sucked. And Batfleck being wasted on them was collateral damage.

The movie dawn of justice seemed to me to be rushing thru the story to play catchup with Marvel Movies. So the movie was like quick origin quick origin fight fight fight and done..

Yep.

Man of Steel had a lot of problems. Most of all? Too violent for Superman. It’s not about him killing Zod at the end. It’s about how the first 40 minutes was Russell Crowe as space Conan, then a nearly perfect 40 minutes of Kevin Costner teaching Superman to be... Superman. And then an hour and a half of stuff blowing up. Man of Steel was not a good movie, and it was NOT Superman. If anything, it was a movie about Rob Liefeld’s “Supreme” character.

Dawn of Justice was a montage of scenes from the comics. That warehouse fight where Batman saves Martha was staged and shot to have multiple direct references to the Dark Knight Returns. And the first time you see it, it’s like “hey, cool!”... and then you sit back and think about the whole movie and realize that there was really no plot to speak of, just a loosely connected series of “cool” things. It wasn’t a movie. It was Zack Snyder desperately trying to tell everyone that DC is darker and cooler than the Marvel movies. It’s entertaining, but it’s mindless.

And, lastly, Justice League. Wanna talk about competing with Marvel? I think DC wanted to have Darkseid as the big bad, because they don’t know how to market their movies. Then, Marvel beat them to the punch anyways and gave audiences the more interesting version of Darkseid: Thanos. So, DC said screw it, we’ll change the villain. And they could have dug out a classic JLA villain.

Despero would have been great. And different from Marvel. Eisenberg was terrible as Lex, but Dawn of Justice set him up as the villain, so we could have had the Injustice Gang. All of those were viable options.

But, nope.

Instead we got Steppenwolf. If any of Darkseid’s goons qualified as a twerp, it would be Steppenwolf. The guy is twerp. He shows up in the comics and gets smacked. That’s his role as a character. And his role in the movie was as a clear stand-in for Darkseid. And they switched him out because Marvel already did Darkseid first and better. That’s just fucking lame.

Oh, and another thing. Not having Grant Gustin as the Flash was a HUGE missed opportunity. That was an epic blunder. They could have made all of the DC platforms unified, just by saying “yeah, the CW shows are in the same universe”. Free marketing, better story, etc.

But, nope. We got some dude wearing a space suit and I kept wanting to see Grant Gustin being the better version of Barry Allen.

Zack Snyder’s DC movies were not controversial. They were bad.

 Arrow’s  the new lair

Ollie must really wishes he was Bruce.

The Writers really wish Ollie was Bruce. 

Yes, the writers DO wish that Ollie was Bruce, going all the way back to his first appearance, as an even more obvious copy of Batman. Kind of like how modern writers tend to want to write SHAZAM as if he is the same as Golden/Silver Age Superman. Except SHAZAM has more depth to him and a better supporting cast, making it easier for the characters to be differentiated.

Ollie might as well have a bat symbol on him for all the stuff he has copied. His main villain is Merlyn.

Merlyn is ONE of Ra’s Al Ghul’s assassins.

One underling of a Bat-Villain, and Ollie has his hands full.

I like Ollie better than Bruce, but I have to agree. Actually, in my opinion, the Flash is the only recent property out of WB television or movies, that doesn’t look like they want to be Batman.

Agreed.

Hellblazer should have been put on SyFy from the get-go. It was never gonna work as a prime-time show on Fox. Never. But, if it was on SyFy, it would have had room to grow into a great, ongoing gem of a comics show.

My gripe with superhero shows is that they inevitably become villain-of-the-week shows, or worse: they do the Smallville cut and paste origin story for every character getting their powers from meteors. On the Flash, everyone got their powers from the accident. The show thankfully moved beyond that crutch of a storyline and developed into more. But Smallville was torturous for a good long while.

Batman/Superman #26 Looney Tunes variant cover by Ryan Sook and Warner Bros. *

Layout drawings by Chuck Jones from “The Bugs Bunny Show” which  ran for 52 episodes 1960 - 1962. 

WATCH THE FULL ‘BATMAN VS. SUPERMAN’ PANEL FROM COMIC-CON 2015

Animaniacs: the Complete Good Idea/Bad Idea.

Animaniacs (gif)

the covers for the 'Superman Returns' tie-in prequel comics were illustrated by Adam Hughes.

this is from 'Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker'. the only animated movie from the DCAU that is better than this is 'Batman: Mask of the Phantasm'.

Batman: The Animated Series character designs by Kevin Nowlan