BATMAN: CAPED CRUSADER: SEASON TWO
Starring: Hamish Linklater, Jason Watkins, Krystal Joy Brown, Eric Morgan Stuart, Gary Anthony Williams, John DiMaggio, Matthew Needham, Michelle C. Bonilla, and Cedric Yarbrough
Creators: Bob Kane and Bruce Timm
AMARÚ
When you say something has upped its game, it usually means the predecessor wasn’t great. But with Batman: Caped Crusader, this second season elevates a great show to an exceptional one. Hamish Linklater now deserves mention in the annals of recognized Dark Knights, homaging Kevin Conroy while still stamping his own voice. The noir setting is gritty, humorous at the exact right moments, and brings a fresh take to the best rogues gallery in comics. More than anything, though, I’ve never seen such an unedited representation of the brutality Batman brings to Gotham. It’s surprisingly violent and damn near flawless.
QUENTIN
You know, it’s funny. I recently reviewed X-Men ’97, theorizing the two-year break between seasons might have killed my interest in that series. But here comes Caped Crusader, which also had a two-year break, and my thoughts couldn’t be more different. The surprisingly brutal action, noirish animation, and art deco design remain top-notch (X-Men’s technicals also remained strong, to be fair), but the story is far more engrossing and cohesive, merging crime-of-the-week tales featuring both favorites and deep cuts from Batman’s (Hamish Linklater) rogues gallery with the slow-burn introduction of Joker (Matthew Needham). If nothing else, Caped Crusader’s excellence has solidified my apathy towards X-Men.
