Batman: Caped Crusader (HBOMax Animated Series) (Abrams and Reeves)

[Warm Gun]

I watched the first episode. Don't think I will continue. The digital animation looks so cheap. The thick outlines of Batman's eyes don't work at all.

1940s setting, but colored people everywhere. Everywhere. Several in positions of authority. Women too. Why even use the setting then? Could have touched on the racism and sexism back then, but no, had to make up history completely for diversity. Was less forced in Batman the Animated Series, which was more stuck in time with brutalist architecture but many modern tech elements, whereas this leans more into the 1940s. Black Gordon and lawyer Barbara Gordon bothered me especially. They made her hair light despite her dark skin.

Mrs. Cobblepot (Penguin, another character destruction) kills one of her sons for informing on her, which is illogical. The child she carried in her womb, gave birth to, gave so much of herself to. Someone reminded me that I have a Tony Soprano avatar and what happens in The Sopranos, but it was much better justified there, through all the meetings Tony had with his therapist, Dr. Melfi, who explained to him that his mother was a narcissist, and a childhood memory he shared of the woman pointing a knife at him. Penguin killed him like any henchman. Really poor taste and judgement.

Depressing move for Bruce Timm. To go back to old material, Batman again. Animation quality is so bad in this age of cheap streaming platforms competing. Digital looked cheap anyway, but now it's worse. Music also is nothing compared to The Animated Series. Streaming budgets are useless for this medium the industry regards as second to live action, very far beneath live action in fact.