The Best of All Possible Batmen

You don't need to be The World's Greatest Detective to figure out I'm major Batman fan, but in case my extensive review of The Dark Knight didn't tip you off, I have words to share about Arkham Asylum.


The title of this post might be slightly exaggerated but it gives you a pretty good idea of my opinion about the game. Activision has finally done Bats justice vis-à-vis videogames, halting a dreary, drown-out parade of fail. Their outing (which I experienced via the 360) presents players with the brilliant voice acting of the 90's animated series (which, in my opinion, captures Batman and Joker at their best), the brutal brooding aesthetics of Frank Miller (the only aspect of Miller meriting imitation in my opinion), and the encyclopedic depth of Batman's comic legacy, realized through references, homages, and an impressive character dossier.

Of course, the most important aspect of the game is that it plays like Batman should. The "Freeform Combat" system presents players with the frenetic pacing of the rhythm-action genre in the form of fisticuffs. Conceptually, fights entail frenzied matches of Rock, Paper, Scissors (or Strike, Stun, Dodge) with an emphasis on stringing together long combos to unlock more powerful techniques. It's a much smarter and much more satisfying approach to brawling than typical licensed fair, and even though I happen to be no damn good at it (my combo counter usually peters out at about 8), it's thoroughly enjoyable.

In addition to Zonking and Biffing, (invoked here as old school sound effects; not sexual euphemisms) you also have a utility belt chock full of wonderful toys at your disposal. Batman's signature grapnel gun breaths new life into the hackneyed sneaking trope by allowing you to zip from perch to perch (for some strange reason, the asylum is lousy with indoor gargoyles) to get the drop on fools, as opposed to hiding in boxes or crawling around for five minutes to find the right hiding spot. This is the preferred method for taking out punks with guns, and the only way to navigate situations where thugs have been instructed to kill hostages at the first of Batman. These strategic sequences of cat and mouse, or bat and rats, play more like a strategy or puzzle game than a stealth-action affair, and they truly capture the spirit of Gotham's avenging angel.

My only gameplay gripe, because I've gotta have one, is that the experience feels a little over-engineered at times. You occasionally run into convenient excuses as to why you can't use a gadget, or find yourself forced to clear a room in a very specific way, but I can't stay mad at the game. The very fact that it bothers to explain itself is essentially a good quality, and it's engineering almost always works in the service of variety as opposed to tedium. All the same, I can't help but long for a freer game based on the same model, like an open-ended affair in Gotham.

Lesser oversights include the omission of Shirley Walker's spine-chillingly excellent Batman theme, and the complete absence of Robin. Oracle and Jim Gordan make for good company, but it would have been nice to see at least one of Bruce Wayne's many wards put in an appearence. This is not Christopher Nolan's realistic universe, and therefore there is no excuse to exclude a boy wonder. At the same time, I'm happy to see that the game pays no attention to Batman RIP or Battle for The Cowl. Don't get me wrong, Bruce Wayne has had a hell of a long run, and I can see how killing him off could breathe new life into the Batman mythos, but I'm happy that we got a game that captures him in his prime.


To close on a related tangent, those who are disappointed, or hopelessly confused by the way DC handled the Death of Batman may find some solace in Neil Gaiman's Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader?. Then again, you might just be more confused. The story (which is, in typical Gaiman fashion, a collection of stories) stands in 'the gutter' between Batman RIP, Final Crisis, and Battle for Cowl, and offers a brief, metafictional look at Bruce Wayne as Batman that is moving and appropriate, if a little sentimental for modern tastes. It is simultaneously an epitaph for his Era, and an indication of what is to come in terms of comic story-telling.

Dingos Frisky and Chicken Robotic

It's been quite a stretch since I've talked about animation, what with the abrupt, inexplicable suspension of my Japan's Finest! segment (don't worry, it will be back when you are least prepared for it) and it occurred to me that I never discussed any western animation, which is quite criminal really. Disney and The Simpsons are the obvious points of departure and for that reason, they will be ignored outright. Instead, I would like to discuss [adult swim], a network whose quirky line-up has found particular favor with the internet generations.


I was initially drawn to the network for it's anime, "dubbed down" though it was (quit scoffing you little weaboo brats! we didn't have torrents or crunchyroll.com back then) and I was only dimly aware of the network's original shows. It seems like most people felt the same, because the network really started to gain popularity when it became a refugee camp for prime time toons that more conservative networks had cancelled. Over the years, [as] has continued to develop it's own bizzaire brand of programming, and while most of it is incoherent, mind-scarring, crap, it has produced several gems. Among these, you are probably most familiar with Seth Green and Matthew Senreich's Emmy-winning stop-motion cavalcade...


In many ways, Robot Chicken is the natural evolution of Saturday Night Live. It's a sketch-based show, ripe with amusing nonsense and pop-cultural parodies, but faster paced, cheaper to produce, and funnier (by current comparison anyway) than it's predecessor. Fast and cheap may not necessarily sound like appealing adjectives, but if a sketch bombs in SNL, you get to wait five minutes for the damn thing to play out, while the average chicky robot sketch clocks in at around 30 seconds. You're on to the next joke before you can decide whether you liked the last one or not. I will concede that a certain degree of physical comedy is lost in the transition from actor to action figure, though (sadly) it's less than you might expect. Also, GI Joes typically have less trouble with the booze and drugs. Hey-oh!

It's also clear that Seth Green learned a thing or few from Seth McFarlan while working on Family Guy; specifically, how to play to your demographic with relevant pop-cultural references. Each episode of Robot Chicken balances it's satires of the now (300, Resident Evil, Mario Kart) with parodies of the late 80s and early 90s (Rainbow Bright, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Transformers). Even more importantly, Green and Senreich have a gift for locking on to the embarrassing or absurd aspect of those things you used to love and viciously ridiculing them. The internet generations live in a perpetual state of iteration; we constantly destroy who we are to become somebody new. Perpetually. Indefinitely.

This cynical "anti-nostalgia" was present from the founding of [adult swim] in programs like The Brak Show, Sealab 2021, and Harvey Birdman Attorney at Law, which revive and twist classic cartoons like so many sons wished back to life by a gnarled monkey paw (too obscure? ah what the hell, we'll go with it). These early efforts pale before The Venture Brothers, however.


The show is parody of Johnny Quest and the Hardy Boys. It's a simple premise, one that sounds like it could be very easily exhausted in a single sitting. Indeed, one of the episodes of Harvey Birdman Attorney at Law entails a custody battle between Race Bannon and Dr. Quest for Johnny and Hadji. It was a funny enough episode, but you knew every joke before it happened. Venture Brothers is admittedly starting to show some strain in its 4th season, but it had 3 seasons of solid gold and it's still mostly enjoyable because it simultaneously sustains the absurd dynamics of it's source material while mocking itself with modern cynicism.

The titular brothers, Hank and Dean Venture both behave as if they were still in cartoon's Hanna-Barbera era (lolrhyme). Hank is an impulsive idiot who idolizes batman and Dean is a neurotic simpering milquetoast. Their father, Rusty Venture, a former "boy adventurer" himself, is not only cirminally negligent but borderline evil, yet he is rendered oddly sympathetic through a severe inferiority complex and his general haplessness. Brock Samson, the family's former-secret agent bodyguard, strikes an endearing balance between housewife and homocidal maniac, and the cast is rounded out by a number of delightful supporting characters like Doctor Orpheus, Molotov Cocktease and Henry Killinger.

Two Big Dysfunctionals

Perhaps the most innovative twist of the venture universe is the institutional relationship between heroes and villains. The Guild of Calamitous Intent assigns each villain a hero or team to antagonize, or "arch", as an arch nemesis. Both hero and villain must adhere to a convoluted code of conduct in their mutual aggression that lampoons the hackneyed conventions of the good and evil dynamic. The absurdities of the code prevent either party from ever accomplishing anything, allowing the show to capture the mundane spirit of everyday frustrations while remaining true to the laughable formula of action-adventure cartoons. In fact, it's interesting to note that the aforementioned strain evident in the show's most recent season stems from the fact that static characters are finally starting to change. As much as the internet generation loves changing themselves, they tend to abhor change in the familiar.

The final show I'd like to talk about is a personal favorite.


How to describe Frisky Dingo? Well, to begin with, the title has nothing to do with the plot. Like Venture Bros, the absurdity of the good and evil dynamic is central to the show, and it is captured through the unusual relationship between Killface, a verbose hulking super villain trying to raise funds for his doomsday device (see below), and Xander Crews, a millionaire playboy/superhero/impossible douche bag.


To accommodate bankrupt attention-spans like mine, each episode is a bite-sized 15 minutes, but like bonbons, they are best enjoyed when many are consumed in a single sitting. For all it's apparent (and actual) nonsense, there are some impressive narrative circles and a lot of running gags to be enjoyed.