Over the holiday weekend my son & I watched a couple of Batman animated movies we’d never seen. One of them, Batman: Gotham by Gaslight, wasn’t bad. In fact, I really enjoyed the Victorian and slightly steampunk take. The solution to the “mystery” was, well, odd and kind of out of left field. But the story was nice and the setting spectacular, especially for Batman.
However, the second one we watched is where the title of this post comes in. I mean, really, about half-way through I turned to my son and asked, “What am I watching?” That he didn’t have an answer was no comfort at all. Because Batman Ninja isn’t simply odd. Or strange. It’s downright bizarre. Like an acid trip level bizarre.
There was even a point – right about when Damian, aka Robin, started playing the flute with not one, but two monkeys – where we both sort of gave up on it making any sense and simply starting laughing uncontrollably. At that point it was either make fun of it or turn it off. Seriously.
Look, a Batman story done anime style sounds great. In fact, wasn’t the entire The Batman series done in anime style? Kind of? Sort of? Maybe? I guess in my head I always thought of it as being like anime but I could be wrong. Whatever. No, I think the main problem with Batman Ninja is that they put him and company in feudal Japan and it ended up looking ludicrous. Why it ended up looking so odd I have no idea. As far as I know that isn’t necessary for anime.
And we won’t even talk about the story.
Okay, it looked more than ludicrous. There isn’t enough brain bleach in the world for some of those images.
Don’t believe me? Look up Batman Ninja online and check out the images you find. ‘Cause I refuse to add any more here. Trying to forget.