the second era of the dc universe original movies was introduced by flashpoint paradox, an adaptation of the flashpoint arc. this led to a continuity known as the dc animated movie universe, which was basically a series of fairly faithful adaptations of the new 52 line of comics.
i actually like most of these, but it was admittedly a little disappointing to see these direct-to-video animated features go from kind of all over the board to frequently being very predictable.
there were a few movies that didn’t follow the dcamu continuity here and there, but the bulk of the team’s resources was clearly devoted to this new continuity.
it’s not difficult to understand why. from a business standpoint, it’s probably easier to get people to come back over and over when they more or less know what they’re getting, and also harder for them to skip individual entries that might not otherwise capture their interest if it’s all part of an interconnected series. i mean, that’s basically the mcu’s entire business model, right? that’s just how franchises work these days. this is just that on a much smaller scale.
what was pretty frustrating for me as a fan, and probably a big part of why i got disenchanted back when i was watching these as they came out, is that this was also when they decided that almost every movie needed to be either a batman or justice league movie. there was even a non-batman movie that had “batman” cynically slapped on the title just because he appeared in that movie for like… probably a grand total of five minutes if you add all his scenes up.
still, this series got so dang reliably good at this point, pretty much every new entry is a must-watch when it comes out. i don’t think many other direct-to-video series can truthfully claim that.
also due to the sheer number of entries in this era of the series, i’ve decided to divide my reviews of it into two parts.
flashpoint (comic 2011)
writer: geoff johns
artists: andy kubert & sandra hope & jesse delperdang
justice league: the flashpoint paradox (movie 2013)
“there’s only one thing i know about life. i know some things happen by chance, and some things happen because we make them happen.”
you probably got used to hearing me say this in my review of the first batch of dc universe original movies, so it’s only fitting that i start my first review by offering for context that i saw the movie long before i read the comic it’s based on. i’m pretty impressed, as i often am by these, by how closely this actually follows the comic it’s based on.
the story in both versions goes to some pretty grimdark places i’m not wild about but am a lot more forgiving about given that it’s an alternate future a la x-men’s days of future past. and the action was pretty great and it was a very satisfyingly pulpy storyline.
the movie followed the basic storyline of the comic, but it streamlined a few things, eliminated some minor characters, and expanded on the core scenes it kept. in the end i think the movie is, for the most part, actually noticeably better than the comic.
also it… well, there’s no way around this: there’s a lot of stuff in the movie i was extremely horny for.
like yo-yo almost murdering batman with her thighs and choking him with one of her eponymous yo-yos. or wonder woman choking and/or lassoing so many bitches with her lasso. and stepping on people. and so many people getting stepped on in general. and i think at one point wonder woman literally demanded, “submit!” like that was the actual word she used and just… heccccccc. comic: b-rank, movie: a-rank
justice league, vol. 1: origin (comic 2011-12)
writer: geoff johns
artists: jim lee & scott williams & various
justice league: war (movie 2014)
“my name is bruce wayne. when i was 10, i watched my parents get shot dead by a mugger, just like that. i’ve spent my life training to fight the same sort of criminals that took them from me. but this, this is different. [...] because this right here? it’s not about me, and it’s not about you. get out of your own way, jordan. focus on what’s important: everyone else.”
another one where i saw the movie before i read the comic, though i was more or less generally aware of what was going on with the new 52 since that was when i was following the nerd press. the comic is again virtually identical to the movie, with the exception that the movie switches in captain marvel for aquaman. i don’t mind captain marvel, but i like aquaman a lot better in general, and his part in the comic was pretty important.
the fight with darkseid is definitely trying to take itself way too seriously and this is around when i started feeling like the movies were getting too monotone back when i was watching them as they came out. i think my feelings are a bit more forgiving now, but yeah, i see where past-me was coming from.
this is kind of way better if you just don’t take darkseid seriously at all and don’t buy into the narrative’s attempt to tell you This Is Really Serious And Intense, Guys. but yeah. it’s kinda fine if that’s how you approach it.
a lot of my favorite parts of this story actually happen towards the beginning, when they’re setting everything up, moreso than in the actual main action. the bit with wonder woman trying ice cream for the first time is precious, and we get lots of flirting between the boys--bats & gl, bats & supes, gl & flash. and all of it culminates in bats getting captured on purpose to save his future boyfriend! and he’s so extra about it, throwing on his disguise in the middle of explaining his plan, and then holding out his arms and whistling for one of darkseid’s minions to scoop him up.
big-picture wise when it comes to the movies, i do still kind of wish the looser, more lighthearted continuity from before flashpoint paradox had continued, but this thoroughly doesn’t suck. and when it comes to the comics, i really have enjoyed what i’ve read of the new 52 so far. b-rank
son of batman (movie 2014)
“the only thing [the robin costume]’s missing is lace trim and a sun hat.”
this is another one where i watched the movie first, which is a familiar refrain for these reviews. but what is much less familiar is that the comic and movie are actually drastically different. so different that i actually don’t think a combined review makes much sense in this case! we’ll arbitrarily start with the movie since it’s what i saw first!
so, i’m gonna say upfront that this one is actually extremely good, like maybe one of my favorites of the series. it also badly mishandles one of the two extremely sensitive issues it depicts. that might be disqualifying for you, and it’s totally fair if that’s the case.
so. first off, the “son of batman” in the film’s title is not in any way metaphorical. he’s damian wayne, bruce’s biological son with his on-again/off-again enemy/lover talia al ghul. bruce is surprised to learn of his existence, so talia fills him in:
“if i remember correctly, i put a little something in your drink.”
“same way i remember it.”
“it made you romantic.”
“it made me do what you wanted.”
so. we have a word for that kind of thing. it’s rape. that’s a rape they’re talking about there. but then it actually gets worse, because talia asks, “was it all bad, beloved?” and bruce responds, “no. it wasn’t all bad.”
put me down for a YIKES.
like, look. i’m not innocent of any number of fantasies including rape fantasies, but this is a mainstream superhero movie. the standards for what you want your characters to communicate to large audiences are much, much different than the standards for what’s okay between consenting adults in private. especially given the fact that male survivors of sexual assault are still not taken seriously by a lot of people, the least you should do in a mainstream story like this to be any kind of responsible is have bruce at least say “it doesn’t matter if i enjoyed it, it wasn’t okay.”
then there’s the child abuse.
this one actually sees bruce pretty firmly on the right side. when damian says his grandfather and mother “taught him how to fight,” he snaps back, “and i take it not much else.” and later, relating their childhood experiences to each other, he tells him, “i had my traumas, but i also had people around me to help. alfred, dick, others. i had friends. as far as i can tell, all you’ve had are trainers. there’s a difference, damian.” i actually really like how this was handled!
as for why i love this movie so much, well. part of it is just that it’s really tight and clean, and the action is very character-driven. and i love all the stuff damian shakes loose just by going around being a snotty little brat. he brings out alfred’s maximum amount of sass, he has a wonderfully antagonistic relationship with dick that i think borrows heavily from dick’s relationship with jason todd, and for all he’s fighting to rein him in, bruce is just so damn proud of him and it’s so adorable.
and, y’know, there’s also some superficial reasons. i’m a notorious nightwing simp, so seeing him so involved is always nice. and there’s a ton of bondage in this!! and i love all damian’s cracks about how effeminate the robin costume is (it is, that’s why i like it damn it).
and above all… i just love robin-centric stories! batman has never been my favorite thing about batman. it’s always been robin. and even though robins like dick grayson or tim drake are more my speed, i still love anything that builds more robin lore. so, yeah. this is really well-done, and it’s just completely up my alley. a-rank
batman and son (comic 2006)
writer: grant morrison
artist: andy kubert
“father. i imagined you taller.”
the one thing this comic has in common with the movie is talia being very blasé about her sexual assault of bruce wayne. several lines of the movie’s version of that conversation are just lifted directly from the comic. there are things that are worse in the movie, and things that are worse in the comic, but in both cases just, y’know, ew.
damian isn’t nearly as likable in the comic as he was in the movie, which i imagine is largely attributable to subsequent comics figuring out how to make him work, and the movie having the benefit of those experiments. it could also be because this story was originally in the pre-new 52 continuity and it’s being adapted into a continuity that is based on new 52, i honestly haven’t read enough of damian in non-new 52 stories to know if there’s a significant difference in characterization. though i guess that would arguably amount to the same thing?
whereas the movie has a fight between nightwing and damian that’s somewhat reminiscent of one that nightwing had with jason todd in the nightwing: year one comic, the comic has damian feel threatened by tim drake (who doesn’t even appear in the movie) and beat the everloving shit out of him because he thinks he needs to beat up batman’s surrogate son to claim his rightful place as his real son or whatever. and while damian pretends he doesn’t want to be robin in the movie, he tries to claim the role by force in the comic and bruce never makes it official.
i liked the overall story in the movie better than the comic, clearly, but that isn’t to say there weren’t things about the comic that i liked. for one thing i, as usual, really enjoyed morrison’s dialogue and narration. the stuff where bruce is trying and failing to take a vacation before talia shows up with damian was also pretty cute. the stuff at the beginning with the joker was super weird, though? not really sure what was going on there. b-rank
batman: assault on arkham (movie 2014)
“anyone who throws boomerangs has some real issues letting go.”
you know what? i liked this one a lot better this time around than the first time i saw it! it’s not amazing or anything, but it’s fine!
yeah, it’s still annoying that they made a suicide squad movie but slapped “batman” on it even though he’s in like three scenes to make it more marketable. yeah, i have no idea why this has to be set in the arkham games’ universe, or why you wouldn’t just do a more straightforward adaptation if you really wanted to do a movie in that universe, but whatever!
honestly, the only point where i got truly annoyed with this is when all the suicide squad members just started betraying each other to get to the helicopter like it was some kind of race only one of them could win. y’all coulda just gone together, folks! plenty of room on those things, generally.
i also didn’t really love king shark’s design or the fact that he died, but i realize that’s a me problem. and i did admittedly love the part where killer frost rode him like a horse. that is a crackship i can get behind!! what’d you go and kill them both off for???
but yeah. what i was mostly struck by upon revisiting this was that i was just thoroughly wrong about it being monotone and personalityless. it’s actually got all kinds of personality! it still isn’t my favorite version of any of these characters by any stretch of the imagination, but it’s fine! it’s fun. it’s fine. c-rank
justice league, vol. 3: throne of atlantis (comic 2012-13)
writer: geoff johns
artists: ivan reis & paul pelletier
justice league: throne of atlantis (movie 2015)
“i was born of two worlds. atlantean by birth. human by instinct. join me and we will bridge those worlds in peace.”
much like batman and son, the dcamu’s adaptation of throne of atlantis actually diverts quite a bit from the comic it’s based on, despite this one actually being a new 52 title. it does follow the broad strokes of the narrative, but the way it gets there is a lot different.
both versions are certainly not my favorite version of aquaman or his world, but given how little love he gets i’m pretty much always onboard for aquaman-centric stuff even when it isn’t exactly my speed. and i did enjoy both versions moment-to- moment regardless of them not quite fitting my preferred aquaman flavor. speaking of not liking broad strokes, i hate clark and diana together but it’s done a bit better in the movie imo. they’re actually kinda adorable there.
the movie also has a lot of neat little stuff like a sloppily drunk arthur saving a lobster from a tank and ending up in a barfight over it, and a john henry irons cameo!
i do wish these movies had eventually gotten back to the new legion of doom the post-credits scene seemed to be hinting at, but oh well. b-rank
batman vs. robin (movie 2015)
“beware the court of owls, that watches all the time. gazing in the shadows, behind cement and lime. they see you at the hearth, they see you in your bed. take care, beware, or they will send a talon for your head.”
once again this movie has only a little in common with the storyline it was based on, and once again i will be reviewing the movie first because i saw it long before i read the comic. what the movie basically does is takes some of the broad strokes of the fan-favorite night of the owls storyline and uses them as a vehicle to continue the storyline with damian that started in son of batman. it’s honestly not a bad direction to go!
if you find yourself siding with bruce over damian in this one, which a lot of people i’ve seen comment on this movie have, i genuinely do not think you should ever be left unsupervised with a child. you’re scary. damian is an annoying little brat, but he’s doing his best, and bruce is the worst father in this until he isn’t.
so, let’s get the bad shit out of the way first. the dollmaker stuff at the beginning was just so unnecessarily grimdark. i’ve seen extremely creepy versions of this character where he’s victimizing adults instead of children, and this depiction added nothing to the movie other than “oooh look how edgy we are!” and giving him a line of throwaway dialogue indicating he himself had been victimized as a child did nothing. you weren’t trying to make this character three dimensional, it’s not like you were keeping him around long enough for that. so why the fuck even go there? this whole intro is just gross. and, for what it’s worth, is not featured in the comic in any way, shape or form.
i mostly like the rest of the movie? i’ve mentioned before that i’m always an easy mark for stuff involving batman, robin, and nightwing. it’s understandable that they didn’t do a straight-up adaptation of the court of owls storyline, but i do like this simplified version and i’m really glad they brought it onto the screen in some fashion.
one thing that the movie adapted pretty straightforwardly was the flashbacks where bruce was searching for the court of owls as a child. i was initially making fun of them for how heavy-handed they were but i actually ended up really liking where they went? they showed him actually learning how to be a detective, failing, and more importantly it set the court of owls up as a massively ominous big, bad threat when they turned out to be real. all of this ruled, honestly.
and i even liked bruce and damian’s story! ... to a point. i appreciated that the point of it was that bruce was in the wrong. i enjoyed damian’s continued antagonism with nightwing, and banter with alfred. and i especially appreciated alfred and nightwing trying (and failing) several times to be the voice of reason. this entire conflict could’ve been avoided if bruce had listened.
i hated how bruce was interacting with damian for 90% of the story, and when damian and him came to blows i was rooting for damian to beat the shit out of him, but that ended up being the point. and bruce realized he was wrong. i would’ve appreciated a heartfelt onscreen apology between them instead of bruce realizing he was wrong and apologizing to a hallucinatory avatar of damian and never actually apologizing to the real him onscreen, but it’s reasonable to assume that that might have happened offscreen. i’m nitpicking here.
but what really saves this for me is that damian had to save bruce, not the other way around. because for all its missteps, this movie is smart enough to realize that damian is the hero of this story, not bruce. bruce fucked up. bruce majorly fucked up. and he doesn’t get to be the hero. not this time.
but at least he admitted he was wrong. a lot of fathers like him never do. b-rank
batman: the court of owls (comic 2012)
batman: the city of owls (comic 2012)
batman: the night of the owls (comic 2012)
writer: scott snyder
artist: greg capullo
“sometimes all it takes is a few words to change your life. sometimes they’re words spoken by someone else. but sometimes, like now, they’re words you tell yourself, in the dark. words that you see in your head, lit up, like the grid on a good day.”
i’ve heard that this storyline was incredible since all the way back when it was first coming out, so i was pretty excited to finally read it! and it honestly didn’t disappoint.
regardless of whether lincoln march was really thomas wayne jr or not, his claim gave his confrontation with bruce so much extra sizzle. and the battle for gotham was already plenty epic even before that.
the biggest difference between the movie and the comics is that damian’s role in the comics was super deemphasized. in fact, he mostly only appeared in a solo story in volume 3. the basic format of the volumes was that volume 1 set up the scenario as a whole, who the court of owls were and bruce’s investigations into them. volume 2 is the night the owls tried to take gotham, and some additional stuff which we’ll circle back to later. volume 3 is all the tie-in stuff like nightwing, batwing, batgirl, robin, etc.
what made volume 2 so special is not just that it was the epic confrontation between batman and the court (and possibly his long-lost brother). it also had two side stories, one that showed that the new 52 version of mr. freeze is kind of a unique twist on the character, but i’m actually way more interested in the last issue of the volume. this issue featured a pair of super gay siblings named harper and cullen row. harper will eventually become the hero bluebird, but for now we just see her civilian life and how she first comes into contact with batman. and honestly, just seeing these two low-income queer siblings existing and being extremely relatable was such a joy.
this whole storyline was aces, but the city of owls is pretty easily one of my favorite batman graphic novels ever now. it legitimately might be my favorite. court: a-rank; city: s-rank; night: b-rank
justice league: gods and monsters (movie 2015)
this coulda been much worse, but at the end of the day i’m just not that interested in the core concept so it just didn’t do much for me. c-rank
batman: bad blood (movie 2016)
“you brought us all together because you understood our pain, our loneliness, better than anyone else could. we needed family. we needed you. you’re not just a mask. you’re a man. the best man i’ve ever known.”
this ruled before it had nunjas, and then it had nunjas.
ok, but let’s get my big complaint out of the way first. talia is just uncomplicatedly, one-dimensionally evil in this one, so that’s... not great. it kinda ruins her entire dynamic with bruce and with damian. not that i was a fan of either in the first place, but it feels like there’s so much connective tissue missing from where they left things to where they are in this movie. even some kind of frank acknowledgement after the fact of like “look, she was a sexual predator and an abuser, it sucks but of course this is where she ended up” would’ve helped a lot.
like, you kind of fucked up by not framing it this way all along? i know these movies aren’t typically willing to go into that kind of depth on these kinds of serious issues, which is fine. you get to decide what the scope of your story is. but if you’re not willing to really deal with this kind of stuff you can’t just halfway go there in order to be edgier or grittier or whatever. you either have to be willing to deal with it or you need to leave it out. what we end up with instead rushes to the mostly correct conclusion but doesn’t show your work at all, so it just ends up falling completely flat and not really saying anything, and that’s just kind of depressing.
oh, petty complaints department: batman telling batwoman “using a gun makes you just like them” when she was trying to save a dude from being tortured demonstrably does not??? but that’s not even where i’m going with this. no, my issue is that in this continuity batman has repeatedly used vehicle-mounted (likely high-caliber) guns and fucking missile launchers, so he can get all the way off his fucking high horse thank you ever so much.
whew.
so, yeah. i actually liked this movie? but my review might end up a bit lopsided in favor of the one or two things i really, really didn’t like. and that’s largely because by the very nature of what the movie wanted to be and what i wanted out of it, the things i liked about it were pretty superficial.
the heretic was a pretty interesting villain and figuring out his whole deal over the course of the movie only to have him carelessly tossed aside was actually a pretty effective way of establishing where talia was at these days. and while i still have all my abovementioned issues with it in terms of what it’s saying thematically, it’s been a minute since we had a good “talia is controlling everything from the shadows” story, so for pure entertainment value it really didn’t suck.
i’m a sucker for bat family stuff, as i’ve thoroughly demonstrated in these reviews. i’m less a fan of bruce being as much of a dumbass as he often has to be in these serious, gritty ones, but at least he has to explicitly to outgrow it in this one! getting to that final shot of the drastically expanded bat family gathering under the bat-signal ruled.
as for the members of said bat family, the guy calling the shots for a lot of this movie while bruce was missing was nightwing, and as the world’s foremost robin i/ nightwing simp, hell yes i loved this. it’s always interesting when dick has to temporarily take up the mantle of batman, whether it’s in a more traditional portrayal where he really respects bruce so filling his shoes weighs heavily on him for that reason, or in something like this where their relationship is more strained and dick wants out of his shadow but gets pulled back in. there’s just always a lot of great character work. add to that the fact that nightwing is way better at playing with others, and i honestly just love this portrayal. they crushed it. i cannot say enough about how much i like him in this one. it’s probably the single biggest thing that elevates this movie for me.
i don’t have as much to say about damian this time? he’s a nasty little brat, as usual. and it’s charming, as usual. and he’s doing his best, and he goes through a lot, and i’m so upset that a lot of people are so annoyed by him. protecc the goblin sidekick!
batwoman rules. i have no notes here. and her gayness is portrayed very frankly and just treated like as much a baked in part of her character as anyone else’s straightness. i fucking love her in this movie and we’d all be better off if her and dick were in charge instead of bruce.
batwing is… fine. i got a good laugh out of how blatantly he’s just… he’s just bat-iron man, guys. he has a suit-up scene that’s just straight out of iron man 1. he’s just… bat-iron man. it’s hilarious.
anyway, uh, yeah! a lot of this movie hinges on dick deciding to trust people and bruce being angy about it and dick being right, so, yeah. it rules. except the parts that don’t. but mostly it rules. a-rank
justice league vs. teen titans (movie 2016)
“you dare disobey me? have you forgotten your heritage? you are an al ghul.”
“no... i’m a titan!”
yeah they knocked this one out of the fucking park. just absolutely crushed it.
i was actually a little sad to discover that this one wasn’t based on a comic, because i was really looking forward to reading whatever it was.
damian gets some sense knocked into him and stops being such a selfish little twerp without stopping being damian, and it is such a joy to see because i am so protective of him and i am so over people just constantly hating on him. hate on, haters! and i love how earned his developing relationships with the team feel.
raven is the fucking best, and i need her civilian outfit omg. the choice to tie her story and trauma into the central villain/conflict of the movie is an inspired one and having that kind of character-driven conflict in a movie where you’re building a team dynamic from scratch is just such a huge asset, like usually this is the movie where you kind of throw an uninteresting villain in there because you need all the narrative space for the team but this movie is smart enough to understand that having the villain be actually meaningful to the characters helps create that space and i just wish storytellers would realize this rather obvious thing more often. and then tying damian’s relationship with his grandfather and personal growth back into it too to make it a double-whammy is just so inspired.
i love how lived-in the relationships between the already-established titans feel. jaime and garfield channeling their gayness for each other into constantly trying to one-up each other obviously highlights, but the whole team really does feel like a family. i love how earned the relationships damian forms with them feel. i love that he can actually play well with others now. i love, love, love cyborg being unwilling to leave the justice league but also just boom tubing in because it’s pizza night.
dick checking in on starfire because he’s the daddy of the titans and she’s the mommy is the best thing and i’m kind of willing to concede at this point that my dick/barbara shipping has probably been too inflexible in the past, because these two are really good together.
honestly, i kind of just want more of these movies forever. i know they rebooted the whole damn universe AGAIN after i stopped watching these, but please can you just give me like twelve of THESE? BEAST BOY KICKS A BAD GUY AS A KANGAROO AND LANDS ON HIM AS AN ELEPHANT, ARE YOU SURE YOU DON’T WANT TO MAKE MORE OF THESE?
THIS MOVIE HAS A DDR FIGHT BETWEEN ROBIN AND BEAST BOY THAT IS PLAYED COMPLETELY STRAIGHT, I NEED THIS TO HAVE HAD MORE THAN THE ONE SEQUEL IT GOT. PLEASE, I ASK FOR SO LITTLE. a-rank
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