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Five Thoughts on Batman: The Animated Series‘ “POV”

By | June 26th, 2017
Posted in Television | % Comments

This episode seven of the series and it is one of the best ones yet. The episode follows three cops as they’re investigated for a botched sting and a conflict arises when the officers begin to tell incongruent stories.

1. The Supporting Cast

One of the things that helps this episode shine is the fact that it focuses almost entirely on characters other than Batman. It explores the conflicting stories that three police officers give about a busted sting. This set-up allows for great characterization for all three of the cops, as well as Commissioner Gordon. Harvey Bullock comes off as smarmy and questionable for most of the episode, but at the end we get a hint that he’s got a heart of gold. Officer Montoya is portrayed as a tough as nails cop who takes down criminals, not because it’s her job, but because it’s the right thing to do. The rookie cop is shown to be a bit of a green horn that can be amazed by little things and is still naïve to other little things. Gordon shines through all of this as a righteous protector for his men who isn’t willing to let them standby to be investigated when he knows they all did the right thing.

2. Fleischer Inspiration

You can really feel the influence of Max Fleischer’s classic Superman cartoons in this episode. Because everything is told from the perspective of other people seeing Batman, we see what they would see when they see him. His movements are exaggerated and super human. He lands more liked Superman did in those old cartoons. The lighting is also a throwback, as Fleischer’s Superman always was visually effected by the light in each individual scene. This wasn’t a feature present in later cartoons such as Super Friends, however, it returns here and gives the cartoon dramatic weight. There are also little details that are animated differently now than then and the show seems to use what would be animated then. Such as when a boat pulls away from the dock and is still tied down a modern cartoon would have docks post snap in half, but Fleischer’s old cartoons would always snap the rope and that’s what happens here.

3. Conflicting Stories

This story enters a moral grey area with the character of Harvey Bullock. We see him deliberately lie about things happening in the story, as well as accuse his other officers of being late when they seemingly weren’t. It’s interesting choice to portray a character who is someone of a hero in the show as the type of person that would lie to look better, especially in a time when most cartoons were like the Super Friends and steered clear of anything morally grey.

4. POV

A real gem in this episode is getting to see Batman from other people’s point of view. They view him as completely super human and its something that really justifies other characters reactions to him in other episode. When the rookie officer is describing his experience he says things about Batman such as “the Batman threw out his hand and sparks flew from his fingertips,” “then he pointed his fingers and some kind of ray shot out of the van,” and “the Batman just pointed at him. Wham! He drops.” Interestingly enough this point of view is really countered at the end of the episode when Batman only defeats the episodes unnamed bad guy with the help of Officer Montoya.

5. The Voice Actors

This episode serves to illustrate that the show’s great voice acting doesn’t stop with Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill. Ingrid Oliu’s Renee Montoya is equally tough as nails and deliberately vulnerable. She shows a ray of emotion from disdain to surprise to earnestness. Robert Costanzo also shines has Harvey Bullock though this isn’t the first episode where that’s happened. He’s just swarmy enough to be questionable but he makes you believe that he at least believes he’s doing the right thing. Finally Robert Hastings Commissioner Gordon does good work as the righteous protector of his men. He always comes off as is he has the high ground and whoever he’s arguing with is completely out of order.


//TAGS | 2017 Summer TV Binge | Batman: The Animated Series

Ryan Perry

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