Every Batman Animated Series Ranked

[Applause] captain [Applause] midnight [Applause] this video is brought to you by brilliant so it's been a pretty long time since i've done any sort of ranking video but the truth is i really like writing them they give me a great excuse to talk about a bunch of movies or tv shows at once and re-examine some things that have meant a lot to me so with the batman hitting theaters not to mention the new animated show that's supposed to be on hbo max soon but batman has a pretty incredible animated legacy so i should probably define what i'm covering here because the cape crusader has a tendency to pop up everywhere i really had to narrow down what i wanted to cover so in this video i just want to cover animated series focused on batman first and foremost the series part means you won't see dc animated movies here like the killing joke or shows where batman is just a member of the ensemble or a supporting character like super friends justice league harley quinn and young justice nothing against those shows but they don't meet my criteria for being a batman show whereas something like batman beyond definitely does even if it features a new batman so what i'm ranking here is just the animated shows that star batman and there's really been no shortage of those many of them are really solid too i think batman has had a far more consistent cartoon history compared to many of his superhero peers even spider-man so i'm gonna dig into these shows and feel free to tell me which one is your favorite you can rank them in the comments below and if you liked the video while you're down there it would really help push it to more people i think that's more than enough introduction though so let's get into it the dark knight [Music] the boy wonder the ultimate video collection number seven the adventures of batman slash batman with robin the boy wonder 1968. this series is a weird one because it was kind of cobbled together from the batman segments of the batman superman hour and then retitled midway through its run it's mostly competent but not much more it's clear that the actors are really trying to pull directly from adam west and burt ward but without the clever funny scripts of the live-action show it's fairly watchable but really stiff by today's standards and there's just nothing all that notable about it there's some charm here but nothing that later shows on this list didn't do a lot better leaving this one to really be in the domain of completionists only if you've seen one episode of this i'm gonna go ahead and say that you really got the gist there's just not that much more here number six beware the batman 2013 okay putting this show this low on the list may not go over well with some people and i get it it's 10 years old next year meaning that for some of you this is probably the batman show you grew up with but for me i was just never very impressed running a single season beware the batman is a cg animated show that seemed to really struggle to find its own identity i'm fine with the animation style but the show itself never really took off i will give it some credit for trying to use some more recent villains like professor pig and mr toad or rarely seen ones like anarchy but i think they just failed to hit those same highs as some of the other shows here unlike so many batman cartoons which are able to blend being family friendly with telling compelling stories that can hold up to some adult scrutiny beware the batman always felt really held back by being for kids characters like professor pig always have a real horror angle in the comics but that has to be severely toned down here it's a show that always feels uncomfortable in its own skin held back by the wish to tell darker and more graphic batman stories that just weren't feasible for a show that needed to be accessible to 10 year olds i don't think bruce himself is very compelling here either he kind of feels like a pale imitation of the other takes on the character that we'll get to later number 5 the new adventures of batman 1977. to some older fans this show has a terrible reputation a lot of them hate that it features batmite as a main character but going back to it this month i was kind of surprised by how much i enjoyed it even if stylistically it has a lot of the same flaws as the 1968 cartoon adam west and burt ward actually reprised their roles here as batman the live live-action show was still a huge hit in syndication in the 70s i'm a big fan of that original show so much that i snapped up the blu-rays because it's just rare to see it preserve very well on streaming so having weston ward back is a nice bonus and thankfully the scripts do a better job than i was expecting capturing their campy absurdist tone like i loved robin getting upset at the joker for pointing so much because it's rude to points brr ward robin was just really big on manners yes the batmite stuff is very saturday morning cartoon but he matches the tone of the show well and watching him and adam west's batman interact is great since batman just cannot stand the guy and it's really rare to see adam west batman be like mean to someone i think there's always a place for a light-hearted campy take on the caped crusader and this filled that void better than i expected even if it's not quite up to the standards of the live-action show or the next cartoon on this list number four batman the brave and the bold 2008. from here on out i think we're really hitting the cream of the crop it may only be number four but batman the brave and the bolt is a very easy recommend to anyone who appreciates batman at his most fun you won't find much brooding here just a great deadpan performance from diedrich bader who you may know from comedies like office space and napoleon dynamite but one great performance isn't all this show has to offer as basically every episode brought in different heroes from around the dc universe with special attention being paid to the most lighthearted golden and silver age stuff while the show may not be as consistent as the best batman cartoons when it works it really works giving us some of the most fun and unique spins on these characters that we've ever seen in animation 2008 also gave us the dark knight which won heath ledger and oscar for his dark take on the joker and showed how well the gritty and grounded take on bruce wayne's world can work on the big screen but then there's this show which does a fantastic job of showing us just how malleable the character is which i think proves there's no right or wrong tone for batman it all comes down to how well the project is able to execute that tone and the brave and the bold really nailed the tone it was going for number three batman beyond 1999. okay the placement of this show and the one after it were easily the hardest part of making this list because either way i feel like i'm underrating one a bit batman beyond is fantastic there's been a lot of attempts to create alternate versions of batman through the years but i can't think of one that's been nearly as successful as terry mcginnis after an aging bruce wayne retires in the far-flung year of 2019 the show then jumps ahead to 2039 where an elderly bruce trains a new batman a character who at times has more in common with spider-man than batman the relationship between terry and bruce is definitely the high point of the series this bruce wayne is a stubborn haunted man who still wants to do the right thing but has lost a lot of the hope that he had early on terry just isn't as disciplined as bruce was as a younger man leading to some well-written conflict between the two terry wants to live up to the legacy of batman without becoming the isolated old man that bruce eventually became it's good stuff and the action scenes really benefit stylistically from that futuristic setting the only reason i'm not placing it higher on the list is that i think a lot of terry's villains just can't hold a candle to bruce's with there being kind of generic cyberpunk gangs and stuff like that some of the late 90s internet terminology also seems pretty quaint and unintentionally funny today but that hardly detracts from how good the series is overall number 2 the batman 2004 man i was really unfair to this show as a kid when it came out i was like 11 and i remember thinking it was all wrong batman being voiced by reno romano really threw me off as someone who played the spider-man ps1 game a lot where he voices peter parker i didn't like the new look of the joker i didn't like how young bruce seemed compared to kevin conroy's version i basically wrote the whole thing off without giving it a chance but time has been very kind to this 5 season show which does a great job of following bruce wayne from a young and fairly inexperienced crime fighter to the gruff older father figure of the bat family this is a show that really benefits from running as long as it did because the blend of season long story arcs with individual standalone episodes does a great job of building out batman's world in a way that always feels natural and really gradual sure the joker design still isn't my favorite but i think it's a good take on the character overall he's constantly shifting between this like early 2000s edginess and playful goofiness in a way that i think works really well i think the show is probably at its best before the larger dc universe comes into play in the later seasons but it never had like a big drop in quality if you want to show that traces batman's evolution very few pull it off as seamlessly and make it look as effortless as the batman i didn't give the show a chance for the longest time but i ended up being really glad i did number one batman the animated series slash the new batman adventures 1992 i'm counting these as one show since they basically have the same creative team and same cast plus when you buy the batman animated series box set it includes both so i basically feel comfortable declaring these the same show and a really strong show with that and look do i feel predictable putting this at number one yes but it also feels undeniable to me that this earns the spot batman the animated series takes decades of comics tv shows and movies and blends them together expertly creating what is debatably the definitive take on the character the lighthearted team player and the brooding loner it all gets balanced into one coherent take on batman creating a gotham that not only looks great but also makes these characters actually feel of a peace with each other eventually giving way to a whole universe of animated shows that are about as entertaining consistent and fun as these characters have ever been kevin conroy is far from the only batman actor i think did a really good job but to me he is still the voice of batman and mark hamill can say the same when it comes to the joker boasting a great soundtrack that's aged better than many of its counterparts and an art deco design aesthetic that still feels like it exists in both the distant past and the near future the show was at its best in those early years but i think the brighter more upbeat look of the later years is still pretty good and gave us faster and more complex action scenes it does feel really hard to say anything about this show that hasn't been said already so i'll just try to sum it up here batman the animated series is my favorite version of batman on the big screen small screen comics page it doesn't matter for a character that's been used as often and as well as batman has through the years i think that's really saying something you think you know batman go beyond to the future in a whole new gotham city i think it's safe to say that none of us will ever be the world's greatest detective but you know learning new things is always a net positive that's where brilliant comes in brilliant is an interactive learning platform that lets you tackle new math 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Channel: captainmidnight

Views: 370,979

Keywords: Batman, The Batman, Batman Beyond, Batman TAS, The Animated Series, Kevin Conroy, Mark Hamill, cartoon, The Brave and the bold, Beware the Batman, Adam West, Burt Ward, Cartoon Network, 1968, 1992, 1999, Joker, Robin, captain midnight, captainmidnight

Id: 1vuenn5UWbY

Length: 12min 29sec (749 seconds)

Published: Fri Mar 04 2022