Movie Review: Batman - Bad Blood

Batman: Bad Blood

Well, I actually enjoyed this a fair bit. Batman: Bad Blood is set in the same universe as the two relatively newer DCAOM (DC Animated Original Movie, which is a freaking mouthful) Batman movies, namely Son of Batman and Batman vs. Robin, both of them which may or may not be in the same continuity as the other New 52 projects from DCAOM with a similar animation style (Flashpoint, War, Throne of Atlantis... ), which means that figuring out DC movie continuity is just about as troublesome as figuring out its comic continuity.

Bad Blood adapts a strain of Batman lore that I am not overtly familiar with, namely the origin of the Batman Incorporated storyline... except adapted to only include the established DCAOM cast, meaning Bruce, Dick, Damian, and Alfred, as well as to introduce the modern Batwoman and Batwing in their very first portrayals outside of comic books. I know just about the smallest details about Batwoman, and almost nothing about Batwing other than his identity, so this was definitely all new.

The premise of the movie is that Batman is missing, and Dick Grayson, Nightwing, needs to take over the mantle of the Bat, something that was a fairly big event since Dick is honestly the only person that the fandom agrees is cool enough to wear the cowl without seriously pissing people off. Sorry, Jean-Paul Valley. Of course no one remotely sane would believe the movie would kill off Batman, so the kidnapping of Bruce Wayne and frankly a blatant disregard about them figuring out Batman's secret identity, is part of the villains' master plan.

The setup is nice, though. The movie introduces us straight to Batwoman attacking the villains, before Batman swoops in and helps out. Batman is apparently killed in an explosion, and Batwoman, working independently, tries to figure out what happened. The lack of Batman causes both Nightwing and Robin to return to Gotham City to answer the call. There's still a bit of brattiness in Damian, but the barbs are definitely friendlier between the two of them, and Damian is nothing short of cooperative with Nightwing, though he (rather rightfully) distrusts the newcomer Batwoman.

Batwoman felt like a nicely compelling character, even if they added some Huntress into her film character development with her being content to use guns and being more aggressive compared to Batman and Nightwing... an aspect I'm told that Batwoman doesn't have in the comics. I'm not overtly familiar with the newer incarnation of her, and the only Batwoman I have ever read about is the one from the Silver/Bronze Age, but Kathy Kane is a fun character. Her lesbianism is given a couple of token scenes (cameoing Renee Montoya, Batman's resident lesbian cop) but nothing really major is made out of it. We get her backstory of being traumatized after her mother and sister were killed during a kidnapping attack, and her resolve to become Batwoman was more out of a desire to prove that she doesn't need anyone's help again. Batman is still involved in her backstory somewhat, though, and her old friendship with Dick gives us a somewhat believable reason that Dick would want to recruit her so quickly.

Batwing, likewise, felt organic. Lucius Fox's introduction into the movie was smooth as he went to cover up Bruce Wayne's absence on Wayne Enterprises, and Luke Fox just shows up. Luke's backstory as a soldier and the amicable-if-slightly-strained relationship that Luke and Lucius has is a nice, refreshing break from the "you don't give me any attention dad!" backstory that several superhero origin stories employ. Of course, Luke gets held hostage when the villain squad attack, figures out the identity of Batman (well, the current mantle-bearer) and wants in. Dick understandably declines, though Luke just hops into the new Batwing armour, shows up in a Big Damn Heroes moment and just continues kicking ass throughout the movie. Neither Batwoman nor Batwing felt like side characters, but neither did they dominate the movie and outshine Dick and Damian's plight.

Dick and Damian are done well. Dick is clearly chafing under the weight of simply bearing Batman's cowl, as shown when he explodes a bit to Damian and talks a bit with Kathy. He also does things differently than Bruce, as observed by Dick politely, apologetically but firmly declining Luke Fox's offer to help, as compared to Bruce just brushing off Batwoman and Batwing and telling his two children to keep it in the family. We don't get too much before Dick dons the Nightwing garb again, but Dick is just cool. Damian doesn't get as much to do, and he's still a bit of an ass, but his status as Bruce and Talia's son make him rather unique as he has a far more personal stake in all this. He also gets a nice little character development as he tries to save the thug Tusk from being sliced up by the motor turbine, reprising Bruce's credo from Batman Vs Robin, and while he ultimately fails to save Tusk, Damian is certainly growing to a more likable character.

Alfred also gets time to shine in a combat capacity, which is awesome! When everything breaks loose at that Wayne presentation thing and the Bats are all occupied, he takes a handgun, and heads off to get rid of the whole mind-control thing all by himself, taking out a supervillain (admittedly Calculator's hardly a combatant) and ends up with a total body count of two, and easily throws the biggest wrench into Talia's big evil plans.

Bruce gets the least to do, considering he's being 'reprogrammed' for half of the movie, and mind-controlled for another quarter, but he does display both jerkass and inspirer qualities equally in this movie whenever he gets the chance. Of course, the whole point of the movie is to show what Dick, Damian and the two newcomers to the Bat-family can do outside the shadow of Batman, so it's only appropriate that Batman is reduced to a nothing but his shadow. He does get some nice moments like that horrifying personal-hell dream, and when he eventually breaks free from Mad Hatter's control and points the gun away from Dick. Highly predictable, of course, but still an emotional moment nonetheless.

I think the biggest weakness of this entire movie are the villains. Talia al Ghul returns, bringing the League of Assassins back from Son of Batman, and her plan involves her creating an army of supervillains. Though Talia does end up hiding behind a decoy antagonist first, namely Heretic, who is imposing in his own right, easily taking out Batwoman and giving Batman a decent fight in his first appearance, has a bat-mask and a huge build, and certainly mysterious enough when he saves Damian from being killed by the Electrocutioner. He has all the buildings of an interesting villain, and since it's someone completely new I was excited to learn about his backstory.

And boy, what a weird backstory that was! Heretic was a clone of Damian Wayne created by Talia (or Ra's, the movie isn't clear on who specifically) and aged up to adulthood, but Heretic has no memories and desires a soul, which is why he's hellbent on understanding Damian and transferring Dmaian's memories into his own. A very interesting character... who gets killed unceremoniously by Talia for no reason beyond "he's flawed". Talia's plans and characterizations throughout the whole movie is unclear. Yes, she wants to take over the world and do what her father couldn't, that bit is fine, but just how she stands in regards to Damian is just odd, sparing Damian during the halfway point, and ordering a mind-controlled Bruce to 'kill the bastard' in the climax. Talia's speech about being in love with Bruce and owning him and all that doesn't work well either, and honestly I would've preferred it if Talia and Heretic were working together for a good part of the movie.

Rather unused as well is Onyx, who apparently really, really likes Heretic, moving into his defense when Talia threatens him, and is always found by his side. Onyx, in the comics, is a bald, dark-skinned League of Assassins member... who switched sides and fights for the side of the Bats. Well, at least they got the first part of her character right. But Onyx honestly does nothing but lurk in the background, do some sword-swinging alongside the other C-lister villains, shows shock when Heretic dies, fights Batwoman for a bit, then randomly shows up in the end and maybe kills Talia? I dunno, she's just a bit too much in a movie that's already overloaded with characters, and she's definitely the least interesting of the newcomers.

Mad Hatter, on the other hand, gets a relatively big role. When was the last time Mad Hatter commanded any respect or threat beyond 'that weird hat guy with mind control tech'? Well, Mad Hatter not only is able to pick through freaking Bruce Wayne's memories, he's also instrumental to mind-controlling the world leaders in Talia's plans, actually shows some badassery in using his head all Oddball-like and killing a bunch of guards, gets a couple of awesome snarky lines when he talks to Talia and Heretic, and is a surprisingly enjoyable addition to the movie. He also has a rather gory and thankfully off-screen death, but since it's at the hands of Alfred there's honestly no shame in that, Tetch.

The movie does love killing off villains, though. Literally every single villain that works for Talia dies in one way or another. Tusk, Electrocutioner, Mad Hatter, Heretic, Firefly and that one random ninja guy who wasn't named nor could I identify most certainly die, Onyx and Talia's fates were ambiguous, whereas Blockbuster, Calculator and Killer Moth really looked like they either died or suffered seriously grievous wounds.

I really liked how they used a bunch of C-lister Batman villains, by the way. Firefly and Electrocutioner both show up most likely thanks to their roles in the well-received Arkham Origins, and their physical appearance are quite obviously based on their incarnations there. Killer Moth is another nice classic Batman villain who shows up to give Firefly a flying buddy. Calculator of all people is an unexpected addition to the team, even if he doesn't really do much and certainly didn't do his Evil Oracle deal, but look cool with those cybernetic implants. Tusk seems to be created solely for this movie. There's this one random ninja guy who shows up with the other villains, but doesn't do much nor is named before a rock flattens him when it looks like he's going to fight Dick.

Firefly and Killer Moth honestly don't do much other than to fight and provide some awesome aerial scenes. Firefly, the obviously bigger threat, is kind of Batwing's rival as soon as Batwing shows up, whereas Killer Moth gets dispatched by a rock rather hilariously as part of his chronic loser status. Electrocutioner as well, though the dude's portrayed as a legitimate threat, at least, nearly killing Damian before he gets an undignified knife to the neck courtesy of Heretic's knife throw. Surprisingly for such a large cast, I thought every single one of the villains (other than the decoy Heretic and the plot device Onyx) ended up getting a fair amount of screentime that's not just centralized on a certain showcase scene.

We get a couple of short cameos from other classic Batman characters as well throughout the movie. Black Mask shows up for Dick!Batman to take down, and it appears the ensuing fight was the one that burnt Black Mask's black mask to his face. Blockbuster shows up as the villain Nightwing takes down rather effortlessly, and while this is the 'rawr me smash stuff' version of Blockbuster it's a nice nod to how an intelligent version of Blockbuster was Nightwing's main villain during his solo series. Penguin shows up near the end as the villain for the good guys to chase in the final scene. Starfire gets a short cameo talking to Dick on a phone, and Barbara Gordon's Batgirl makes an utterly surprising appearance near the end. Yay Batgirl! She makes me happy.

Overall the plot itself honestly is just there to facilitate the characters, and I couldn't be more happier than that. Bad Blood is a surprisingly good movie, easily surpassing the angst-ridden Damian duology in both storytelling and character development. It's not really perfect and there are some problems, naturally, but as a mostly-original story introducing a couple of new characters I certainly enjoyed this movie .