What are your favorite and least favorite DC animated films?

[Pfeiffer-Pfan]

While this is a difficult list to compile, I'll keep it a little simple by sticking to a top three for each, with a few key mentions:

BEST

Batman: Mask of the Phantasm
This is sort of perfect for me. Batman on his own in a film noir drenched Gotham fighting against the odds, all the while revisiting painful memories from his past. It feels like a sweeping epic, gangster movie and action adventure extravaganza all rolled into one great package. The music, the voice actors and the art design all come together make this as definitive as you can get for a very malleable character like Batman.

Animation can be wonky at times, but those Timm designs manage to stand their ground anyway. Brilliantly paced as well - something today's DTV teams could learn from.

Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker
This feels like the Yin to Phantasm's Yang. A wonderful vehicle to showcase the best of the animated Batman in all its forms. Despite all the epic stuff regarding The Joker and Bruce Wayne, the creative team never lose focus of their protagonist and allow Terry to fully mature into the Bat-suit. It is a perfect and confident finale to what was (post season 1) an uneven show. This movie demonstrates why Terry is the perfect successor.

Plus, nothing wrong with the animation in this one. All hail TMS.

Batman: Under the Red Hood
To take a messy, convoluted and controversial storyline from the comics and condense it down into a beautiful and highly emotional 75 minute DTV is nothing short of a miracle. Bravo to all involved for trimming the fat and getting to the heart of the matter... Batman's pain at losing a child. Everything came together for this one and I feel it deserved a continuation from the same creative team (not that awful interactive clip art thing). This deserves its reputation and shows what the team can do when they put their mind to it.

Honorable Mentions: The Batman vs. Dracula (Criminally underrated), Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Wonder Woman (2009), Justice League: Gods and Monsters


WORST

Injustice
Where do I start with this one? It was simply ill conceived from the ground up. The Injustice franchise was only 8 years old at the time... who was crying out for a butchered adaptation of the first game, with shoe-horned elements from the comics? Recasting voices just... because?

They should have created an original story set within the world, featuring the voice actors from the game that would have expanded on the narrative and allowed fans something new to chew on. As it stands, everyone was miscast giving dry/stilted deliveries and the art design was even worse than the games, if that is possible. Also, note to Robert J. Kral - stop cramming your Superman theme into every project featuring the character when it simply doesn't fit.

Superman: Brainiac Attacks
While it was nice to hear Tim Daly and Dana Delany back together again after Shadow of Apokolips, that is pretty much where the compliments end with this movie. Well, I guess the animation is nice as well.

Bad story, bad characterizations... I could go on. They should never have used the Timm style for this one.

Green Lantern: Beware My Power
This was just boring. The Tomorrow-verse started so strong, but everything after Batman: The Long Halloween has felt so half-hearted and cliched. Everything that is wrong with the Lukic movies is on display here: Choppy animation, poor pacing, no emotional investment in any of the characters, unnecessary plot twists and the most forgettable music I have ever heard in ANY superhero project. When they actually include music that is.

Dishonorable Mentions: I can't say I ever truly fell in love with the Tucker DTV'S. They were simply decent to mediocre at best and time is not being kind to them.

Also Justice League: Warworld, Batman vs TMNT (I have liked it less on repeat viewings) and Green Lantern: Emerald Knights.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

The Good:

I just watched both Batman: Year One and The Dark Knight Returns for the first time this August, and I liked them both. They were good adaptations of their comics. I remember generally liking Justice League: Doom, but it's been so long since I've watched it that I'd have to see it again to refresh my memory.

Mask of the Phantasm is terrific, and only handicapped by some animation that's not as great as it should've been. I wish they'd gotten the green light for being a theatrical release sooner, so they could've gotten the high quality animation the script deserved. I love Return of the Joker, too. Sub-Zero and Mystery of the Batwoman are both solid but unspectacular, IMO.

The Killing Joke is a decent adaptation of the comic if you skip past the whole "Batgirl sleeps with Batman" prologue and start watching the DVD/BluRay at Chapter 4. The subplot cuts out of the movie so easily that it confirms it never belonged there in the first place. That's how I watched it last time I saw the movie, and now I don't think I'm ever going to watch the entire thing again.

Justice League: The New Frontier is a pretty great adaptation/distillation of the Darwyn Cooke comic. I miss the John Henry stuff, but the story still works without it. Crisis on Two Earths is good, but I would've enjoyed it more if they'd just set it in the DCAU as originally intended. I liked Justice League vs. The Fatal Five a lot.

Gods and Monsters was well done, but it just got too relentlessly dark for me. Everyone was so villainous that there was no one to root for in the film. James Tucker's pair of Batman '66 movies were fun.

The Bad:

Batman and Harley Quinn isn't my favorite, but I think it gets way more grief than it deserves. It's just a comedy episode, but most people were disappointed by it because it wasn't the grand return to the DCAU they were hoping for. If you look at it as a feature length "Harlequinade," it's fine. It's the same premise (Batman recruits Harley to help him track down an old criminal ally of hers, shenanigans ensue), and Harley even sings a musical number in both.

I barely remember it at this point, but I recall really hating Brainiac Attacks. Using the STAS designs and some of the voice cast while doing a story that wasn't connected to the show seemed like a real bait & switch. So I'll say that one is my worst. I think I might've even thrown out my DVD copy of it when I was moving earlier this year.

Most of the others I haven't seen. The character designs in the Flashpoint era certainly don't appeal to me, so I doubt I'll ever bother with those. I've got a bunch of others in my queue at HBO Max, but I won't be getting to them anytime soon. I'm sure there are some good ones I'm missing out on.