Batman Unlimited: Animal Instincts: Movie

     After watching this, I am convinced that this is a movie that was made for a younger and less initiated audience. A lot of the reveals are super obvious and if you know anything about these characters you will notice the Silverback, Man-Bat and Penguin reveals before they’re even set up. This is a movie with an animal villain team up and they even borrow Wonder Woman’s Cheetah (who I’ve always considered to be inadequate) for the horrifically named “Animilitia.”

The setting is really interesting though. It’s like a combination between the modern/contemporary Batman and Batman Beyond. In fact, the first suit we see the caped crusader in is virtually indistinguishable from the Batman Beyond suit. He even glides his way through Gotham City and flies in a Batwing that looks identical to the flying Batmobile that Terry McGinnis drove. They even turn Ace the Bat-Hound into a repurposed wolf robot that turns into a motorcycle instead of a German Shepard or Great Dane mix.

I thought this would be a Batman solo movie for new audiences when I first saw adverts for it, but they establish really early on that he has a team of sorts here. Nightwing, Green Arrow, Red Robin and the Flash all join in the fun within the first ten minutes or so. It seems as though this film’s creators wanted to capitalize on the success of the CW televisions shows, while appealing to younger audiences with the sidekicks as well. The second hint to it being for audiences is the particularly cartoony versions of the costumes involved. The third is the toned down versions of the villains. Killer Croc in particular.

It’s not a bad movie and the plot is actually pretty decent, but you kind of have to disregard almost everything you know about the characters involved to properly enjoy it. There are almost no easter eggs for older, more familiar audiences here, which is a little let down. As a pretty hardcore Batman fan, it was kind of a strain to watch this, but like I said, it’s not all bad. I promise your children or the children in your family or class will enjoy it thoroughly. That’s what this one is clearly made for. I honestly think it would do better as a new series.

Jonathan Jones

Jonathan Thomas Jones is a speculative fiction author and founder of geekhavenreviews.com. He has been passionate about all things geek for his entire life. See more about him at jonathanthomasjones.com and follow him on twitter @jtgloryjones.