Note: This post also contains spoilers for all of the Batman: Arkham video games. If you've not played and intend to do so, please skip over this post as the spoilers are fairly large.
The announcements of more Direct to DVD features have come thick and fast since 2007. One that excited me more than most was news that the next Batman DVD would be based upon the incredible Arkham video games which at the time consisted of the awesome Arkham Asylum, the even better Arkham City and it’s not so special prequel Arkham Origins.
Before the release of Arkham Asylum, Batman video games were plagued by mediocrity, or where downright terrible. While there was good fun to be had on Batman, Batman Returns and The Adventures of Batman and Robin on the Mega Drive in my youth, anyone who has had to try and plan Batman Forever for the same console, or Batman and Robin or Batman: Gotham City Racer for the original PlayStation will know what true suffering Batman games can bring to fans. Seriously, that Batman Forever game is probably still the textbook example of how utterly horrific controls can ruin a game. The rest of the Batman games tended to be cheaply produced adventure for the kiddies, which made it all the more infuriating when trying to get through the Gasworks level on Batman: Vengeance, which to be fair was a solid effort which needed a bit more polish, but it was nowhere near as good as any of the Spider-Man games of the same era.
This was until Batman: Arkham Asylum was released. A fairly small studio based here in England, Rocksteady, acquired the license to develop a Batman game following the mediocre response to the Batman Begins and the none release of The Dark Knight video game, rumoured to have cost Warner Bros. a small fortune.
Hoping to utilise both the stealth and fighting aspects of Batman’s character, alongside his famed skills as a detective, the game was the first in what felt like decades that allowed one to feel like Batman. There was none of the infuriating nonsense of the Batman Begins and Batman Vengeance where one was easily overpowered by a single thug, when Batman entered a room, it was to kick someone ass, with style. The simply yet nuanced controls made fights actually fun and the Predator combat system offered the chance to routinely outsmart ones foes via a plethora of options, rather than 'this is the way' approach most stealth games offer.
The story sees Batman in his crime fighting prime returning a captured Joker to Arkham Asylum, only to realise he’s been duped and The Joker sought his return to Arkham, to follow through with his plan of using an army of Titan thugs to control Gotham and finally break Batman into a psychotic mess. The game has a wonderfully moody tone and comes gross as an elegant mix of the Nolan and Burton movies and the animated show of the 90s. It’s grounded enough to not feel fairytale like, but a 9ft tall Crocodile man does not feel out of place. It also is an unashamedly adult Batman, this was not a title aimed at a young audience. There is nothing particularly excessive in it's violence etc, but it's clear that this was not something that was intended for parents to buy for their children.
The game sold like gang busters when it was released and was one of the critical darlings of its day, Batman fans, ganers and reviewers praised its gameplay and the story and characterisation. Rocksteady sought Batman writer extraordinaire Paul Dini to pen the game, and with his hiring came the return of stalwarts DCAU actors Kevin Conroy, Mark Hamill and the overlooked Arleen Sorkin (still the undisputed greatest voice for Harley Quinn for me, I will die on this hill.)
While I normally do check out most DC/Marvel games, I admit the casting alone made me pick this up on day one. I throughly enjoyed Arkham Asylum, and was utterly thrilled when Rocksteady announced they would be returning to Arkham for a sequel, Batman: Arkham City.
Following an utterly awesome teaser trailer in which it was shown that Professor Hugo Strange would be the main antagonist of the game and that the game would take place outside Arkham Island, the trailer also showed that the game would feature a far larger cast of villains and supporting characters and even better for longtime Batman fans like me, a selection of new skins (70s grey and blue Batman for the win!) Arkham City proved to be even better than Asylum and wiped up various game of the year awards. 9 years later it is still up there on any Greatest of All Time lists. From it's clever imagination of the villains (Nolan North as a cockney Penguin works exceptionally well), to it's increadble boss fights (the Mr Freeze one is one of the all time greats) to it's genuinely shocking conclusion, Batman: Arkham City is a game for the ages.
With the success of Arkham City came numerous action figures and even a comic book series set in the Arkham verse, post Arkham City. Rocksteady eventually announced their final Batman game, Batman: Arkham Knight would released, but before this we got a WB Games Montreal prequel to Asylum in Batman Arkham Origins to be released later that same year. This news caught me by surprise, butWB Games announced they felt a 4 year wait was too long between Batman games, hence this ‘stopgap’ game.
I was very much interested in another Batman game, and thought the idea of the games main storyline featuring Batman’s first meeting with The Joker and The Black Mask putting a hit on Batman on Christmas Eve giving us a legion of would be assassins to fight against would be a winner.
My mood quickly soured when they announced that Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill would be recast by Roger Craig Smith and Troy Baker, respectively. The decision was made apparently, in an attempt to make the actors sound younger, despite the fact that the characters are grown ass men in all of the games and this is rumoured to take place only 5 years or so before Arkham Asylum. Pleased, I was certainly not. It seemed like recasting for the sake of recasting, which I do not approve of in most circumstances.
When the game was eventually released, I admit that Smith and Baker did not impress me in their roles. Smith’s attempts to sound gruff unfortunately came across as if he couldn’t be arsed to be there, and Baker does his hardest Hamill impression.... which again makes me wonder why they didn’t just bring Hamill back in the first place? There were rumours that Hamill had retired from the role following Joker’s death in Arkham City which seems somewhat comical now, but Bakers sounded like a soundalike, rather than his own performance. The games reception was quite quiet when it was released, the general consensus was that it was pretty good, but couldn’t hold a candle to the previous Arkham games. I agree with this. It isn’t helped by poor character designs and far too many bugs they never bothered fixing. Credit where credit is due however, the game features some excellent boss fights.
Which brings us Batman: Assault on Arkham. Set after Origins, but before Asylum, in truth this is far more of a Suicide Squad Movie than either a Batman or Joker piece but it fits in with the Arkham timeline well. There are no massive continuity screw ups, and it was quite clear that great care was taken with designing this piece to make sure it matched the Arkham Asylum found in the game. Fans of the games will immediately recognise key locations and backgrounds, and the models are beautifully recreated (I admit to marking out, to use a pro wrestling term when Bane and Scarecrow cameo’d in their Arkham outfits!) As a big fan of the Arkhamverse, I was very pleased with the attempts to make this feel like it fit in with that universe. This could’ve very easily been something they slapped the name Arkham on and did as they pleased but thankfully, this was not the case, care was taken and it is immediately noticeable. Phil Bourassa, the character designer, did a hell of a job making the designs look like the game, but still animate well enough to avoid an ugly looking movie.
There are a more than a few recasting choices here. I do not know if this is because of availability or the actors not wishing to reprise their roles or not but some of the main characters are recast for this film and frankly, the film is better for it. Chris Cox was an excellent Deadshot in City/Origins, but Neil McDonough inches it for me and helps carry the piece. I didn’t even realise it was him playing Floyd until the end credits, despite being more than familiar with his voice over the years (shout out to the awesome first season of The Incredible Hulk from the 1990s in which McDonough portrayed Bruce Banner).
Hayden Walch becomes the third actress to voice Harley Quinn in the Arkhamverse, reprising her role from The Batman cartoon. She is just sensational in the role and was thankfully used over Tara Strong, who goes far too over the top trying to make Harley sound like an irritating child. Strong’s Harley grates, and seems to get worse the more I hear it, sadly. Walch for the win here, she plays Harley's dangerous flirtation perfectly.
Thankfully, Andrea Beaumont saw sense and brought Kevin Conroy back as Batman for the film. While I do have an incredible fondness for others who have taken over the role, such as Bruce Greenwood, Diedrich Bader and Peter Weller, Conroy will always be Batman to me. I will never not be happy to hear Kevin Conroy play Batman. Simple as that.
Which brings us to The Joker. Whether or not Hamill did consider himself retired from the role at the time I do not know, but Troy Baker is back as Joker this time around. It is especially jarring to see his Arkham Asylum model speak with Baker’s voice. It just feels... off. This is the unfortunate sting of recasting, the new actor is always going to be subject to comparisons and well... Mark Hamill’s casting as The Joker is still God tier 28 years later. There’s nothing especially wrong with Baker’s performance, it’s just not Mark Hamill. I realise I’ve said this ad nauseam now, so will stop there. As an aside, I can’t tell you what a great surprise it was when I hears that famous “Miss me?” in Batman: Arkham Knight. It was a combination of shock, joyous excitement and terror all at the time time. I still remember that moment vividly, despite it happening over 5 years ago. Arkham Knight also has a great scare jump when Man Bat appears that gets me every single bloody time I play it!
Getting back to the film, it is thoroughly entertaining and juggles a large cast of characters well. Joker is the main antagonist here but given that the central characters are also villains, it adds a very cool twist. The plot sees Amanda Waller send her Suicide Squad into Arkham Asylum to retrieve a thumb drive from The Riddler’s cane. Following a cool Penguin cameo (Arkham Penguin is easily my favourite of every Penguin we’ve had, Nolan North for the win!) Batman apprehends Harley, who interrogated her over the presence of a dirty bomb in the city.
When the Squad makes it into the Asylum, pretty much all hell breaks lose as Joker, Riddler and Batman are thrown into the mix. While I doubt few fell for the Black Spider facade, it was an interesting twist to see Batman infiltrate the Squad to learn their intentions and even allow them to undergo the electric shock procedure to negate the bombs in their necks.
The Joker naturally escapes and has an amusing confrontation with Deadshot in which he realises crossing the assassin will result in an ass whooping he’d sooner avoid, until we get to the final of Batman Vs Deadshot Vs Joker in a helicopter. The fight scenes in the movie are very well done and the ending ties in perfectly to Arkham Asylum, even with Batman not finding Joker’s body (if you remember, Asylum begins with Batman capturing Joker and Harley already institutionalised.)
It even sees Batman admonish Waller that her careless plan allowed The Riddler to stay on the loose, who is course captured off screen in the first fame, when one finds each and every last riddle, to ones incredibly satisfaction. Not using the internet to cheat and find every last one of those damn trophies was an achievement, I will tell you. I distinctly remember finally smashing that one last pair of chattering teeth in the library to abundant joy!
The film received favourable reviews at the time of its released. It is much, much better than the live action Suicide Squad movie (which isn’t at all difficult, but still worth mentioning.) We would see further Suicide Squad DTVs but sadly, no further Arkham films were commissioned. I imagine it would have been difficult to decide where to go following Arkham Knights shocking ending, and it’s utterly stupid epilogue, which was supposed to be ambiguous, but simply left a rotten taste in most gamers mouths. (I note again - the main thing missing from Arkham Knight was writer Paul Dini.)
Having rewatched the film for this piece, I have to say I throughly enjoyed it. It had enough Batman in it to gather my interest, but developed most of the Squad enough to make me care about their outcome. Captain Boomerang in particular became a favourite, you can imagine how disappointed I was to see him butchered on the big screen. We will be seeing The Suicide Squad again in another live action movie shortly. written and directed by James Gunn and this one actually looks good! Until then? Assault on Arkham is well worth your time.
Next: DCEU.
The announcements of more Direct to DVD features have come thick and fast since 2007. One that excited me more than most was news that the next Batman DVD would be based upon the incredible Arkham video games which at the time consisted of the awesome Arkham Asylum, the even better Arkham City and it’s not so special prequel Arkham Origins.
Before the release of Arkham Asylum, Batman video games were plagued by mediocrity, or where downright terrible. While there was good fun to be had on Batman, Batman Returns and The Adventures of Batman and Robin on the Mega Drive in my youth, anyone who has had to try and plan Batman Forever for the same console, or Batman and Robin or Batman: Gotham City Racer for the original PlayStation will know what true suffering Batman games can bring to fans. Seriously, that Batman Forever game is probably still the textbook example of how utterly horrific controls can ruin a game. The rest of the Batman games tended to be cheaply produced adventure for the kiddies, which made it all the more infuriating when trying to get through the Gasworks level on Batman: Vengeance, which to be fair was a solid effort which needed a bit more polish, but it was nowhere near as good as any of the Spider-Man games of the same era.
This was until Batman: Arkham Asylum was released. A fairly small studio based here in England, Rocksteady, acquired the license to develop a Batman game following the mediocre response to the Batman Begins and the none release of The Dark Knight video game, rumoured to have cost Warner Bros. a small fortune.
Hoping to utilise both the stealth and fighting aspects of Batman’s character, alongside his famed skills as a detective, the game was the first in what felt like decades that allowed one to feel like Batman. There was none of the infuriating nonsense of the Batman Begins and Batman Vengeance where one was easily overpowered by a single thug, when Batman entered a room, it was to kick someone ass, with style. The simply yet nuanced controls made fights actually fun and the Predator combat system offered the chance to routinely outsmart ones foes via a plethora of options, rather than 'this is the way' approach most stealth games offer.
The story sees Batman in his crime fighting prime returning a captured Joker to Arkham Asylum, only to realise he’s been duped and The Joker sought his return to Arkham, to follow through with his plan of using an army of Titan thugs to control Gotham and finally break Batman into a psychotic mess. The game has a wonderfully moody tone and comes gross as an elegant mix of the Nolan and Burton movies and the animated show of the 90s. It’s grounded enough to not feel fairytale like, but a 9ft tall Crocodile man does not feel out of place. It also is an unashamedly adult Batman, this was not a title aimed at a young audience. There is nothing particularly excessive in it's violence etc, but it's clear that this was not something that was intended for parents to buy for their children.
The game sold like gang busters when it was released and was one of the critical darlings of its day, Batman fans, ganers and reviewers praised its gameplay and the story and characterisation. Rocksteady sought Batman writer extraordinaire Paul Dini to pen the game, and with his hiring came the return of stalwarts DCAU actors Kevin Conroy, Mark Hamill and the overlooked Arleen Sorkin (still the undisputed greatest voice for Harley Quinn for me, I will die on this hill.)
While I normally do check out most DC/Marvel games, I admit the casting alone made me pick this up on day one. I throughly enjoyed Arkham Asylum, and was utterly thrilled when Rocksteady announced they would be returning to Arkham for a sequel, Batman: Arkham City.
Following an utterly awesome teaser trailer in which it was shown that Professor Hugo Strange would be the main antagonist of the game and that the game would take place outside Arkham Island, the trailer also showed that the game would feature a far larger cast of villains and supporting characters and even better for longtime Batman fans like me, a selection of new skins (70s grey and blue Batman for the win!) Arkham City proved to be even better than Asylum and wiped up various game of the year awards. 9 years later it is still up there on any Greatest of All Time lists. From it's clever imagination of the villains (Nolan North as a cockney Penguin works exceptionally well), to it's increadble boss fights (the Mr Freeze one is one of the all time greats) to it's genuinely shocking conclusion, Batman: Arkham City is a game for the ages.
With the success of Arkham City came numerous action figures and even a comic book series set in the Arkham verse, post Arkham City. Rocksteady eventually announced their final Batman game, Batman: Arkham Knight would released, but before this we got a WB Games Montreal prequel to Asylum in Batman Arkham Origins to be released later that same year. This news caught me by surprise, butWB Games announced they felt a 4 year wait was too long between Batman games, hence this ‘stopgap’ game.
I was very much interested in another Batman game, and thought the idea of the games main storyline featuring Batman’s first meeting with The Joker and The Black Mask putting a hit on Batman on Christmas Eve giving us a legion of would be assassins to fight against would be a winner.
My mood quickly soured when they announced that Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill would be recast by Roger Craig Smith and Troy Baker, respectively. The decision was made apparently, in an attempt to make the actors sound younger, despite the fact that the characters are grown ass men in all of the games and this is rumoured to take place only 5 years or so before Arkham Asylum. Pleased, I was certainly not. It seemed like recasting for the sake of recasting, which I do not approve of in most circumstances.
When the game was eventually released, I admit that Smith and Baker did not impress me in their roles. Smith’s attempts to sound gruff unfortunately came across as if he couldn’t be arsed to be there, and Baker does his hardest Hamill impression.... which again makes me wonder why they didn’t just bring Hamill back in the first place? There were rumours that Hamill had retired from the role following Joker’s death in Arkham City which seems somewhat comical now, but Bakers sounded like a soundalike, rather than his own performance. The games reception was quite quiet when it was released, the general consensus was that it was pretty good, but couldn’t hold a candle to the previous Arkham games. I agree with this. It isn’t helped by poor character designs and far too many bugs they never bothered fixing. Credit where credit is due however, the game features some excellent boss fights.
Which brings us Batman: Assault on Arkham. Set after Origins, but before Asylum, in truth this is far more of a Suicide Squad Movie than either a Batman or Joker piece but it fits in with the Arkham timeline well. There are no massive continuity screw ups, and it was quite clear that great care was taken with designing this piece to make sure it matched the Arkham Asylum found in the game. Fans of the games will immediately recognise key locations and backgrounds, and the models are beautifully recreated (I admit to marking out, to use a pro wrestling term when Bane and Scarecrow cameo’d in their Arkham outfits!) As a big fan of the Arkhamverse, I was very pleased with the attempts to make this feel like it fit in with that universe. This could’ve very easily been something they slapped the name Arkham on and did as they pleased but thankfully, this was not the case, care was taken and it is immediately noticeable. Phil Bourassa, the character designer, did a hell of a job making the designs look like the game, but still animate well enough to avoid an ugly looking movie.
There are a more than a few recasting choices here. I do not know if this is because of availability or the actors not wishing to reprise their roles or not but some of the main characters are recast for this film and frankly, the film is better for it. Chris Cox was an excellent Deadshot in City/Origins, but Neil McDonough inches it for me and helps carry the piece. I didn’t even realise it was him playing Floyd until the end credits, despite being more than familiar with his voice over the years (shout out to the awesome first season of The Incredible Hulk from the 1990s in which McDonough portrayed Bruce Banner).
Hayden Walch becomes the third actress to voice Harley Quinn in the Arkhamverse, reprising her role from The Batman cartoon. She is just sensational in the role and was thankfully used over Tara Strong, who goes far too over the top trying to make Harley sound like an irritating child. Strong’s Harley grates, and seems to get worse the more I hear it, sadly. Walch for the win here, she plays Harley's dangerous flirtation perfectly.
Thankfully, Andrea Beaumont saw sense and brought Kevin Conroy back as Batman for the film. While I do have an incredible fondness for others who have taken over the role, such as Bruce Greenwood, Diedrich Bader and Peter Weller, Conroy will always be Batman to me. I will never not be happy to hear Kevin Conroy play Batman. Simple as that.
Which brings us to The Joker. Whether or not Hamill did consider himself retired from the role at the time I do not know, but Troy Baker is back as Joker this time around. It is especially jarring to see his Arkham Asylum model speak with Baker’s voice. It just feels... off. This is the unfortunate sting of recasting, the new actor is always going to be subject to comparisons and well... Mark Hamill’s casting as The Joker is still God tier 28 years later. There’s nothing especially wrong with Baker’s performance, it’s just not Mark Hamill. I realise I’ve said this ad nauseam now, so will stop there. As an aside, I can’t tell you what a great surprise it was when I hears that famous “Miss me?” in Batman: Arkham Knight. It was a combination of shock, joyous excitement and terror all at the time time. I still remember that moment vividly, despite it happening over 5 years ago. Arkham Knight also has a great scare jump when Man Bat appears that gets me every single bloody time I play it!
Getting back to the film, it is thoroughly entertaining and juggles a large cast of characters well. Joker is the main antagonist here but given that the central characters are also villains, it adds a very cool twist. The plot sees Amanda Waller send her Suicide Squad into Arkham Asylum to retrieve a thumb drive from The Riddler’s cane. Following a cool Penguin cameo (Arkham Penguin is easily my favourite of every Penguin we’ve had, Nolan North for the win!) Batman apprehends Harley, who interrogated her over the presence of a dirty bomb in the city.
When the Squad makes it into the Asylum, pretty much all hell breaks lose as Joker, Riddler and Batman are thrown into the mix. While I doubt few fell for the Black Spider facade, it was an interesting twist to see Batman infiltrate the Squad to learn their intentions and even allow them to undergo the electric shock procedure to negate the bombs in their necks.
The Joker naturally escapes and has an amusing confrontation with Deadshot in which he realises crossing the assassin will result in an ass whooping he’d sooner avoid, until we get to the final of Batman Vs Deadshot Vs Joker in a helicopter. The fight scenes in the movie are very well done and the ending ties in perfectly to Arkham Asylum, even with Batman not finding Joker’s body (if you remember, Asylum begins with Batman capturing Joker and Harley already institutionalised.)
It even sees Batman admonish Waller that her careless plan allowed The Riddler to stay on the loose, who is course captured off screen in the first fame, when one finds each and every last riddle, to ones incredibly satisfaction. Not using the internet to cheat and find every last one of those damn trophies was an achievement, I will tell you. I distinctly remember finally smashing that one last pair of chattering teeth in the library to abundant joy!
The film received favourable reviews at the time of its released. It is much, much better than the live action Suicide Squad movie (which isn’t at all difficult, but still worth mentioning.) We would see further Suicide Squad DTVs but sadly, no further Arkham films were commissioned. I imagine it would have been difficult to decide where to go following Arkham Knights shocking ending, and it’s utterly stupid epilogue, which was supposed to be ambiguous, but simply left a rotten taste in most gamers mouths. (I note again - the main thing missing from Arkham Knight was writer Paul Dini.)
Having rewatched the film for this piece, I have to say I throughly enjoyed it. It had enough Batman in it to gather my interest, but developed most of the Squad enough to make me care about their outcome. Captain Boomerang in particular became a favourite, you can imagine how disappointed I was to see him butchered on the big screen. We will be seeing The Suicide Squad again in another live action movie shortly. written and directed by James Gunn and this one actually looks good! Until then? Assault on Arkham is well worth your time.
Next: DCEU.
