Childhood Memories....

It is always enjoyable to take a trip down memory lane. And I did such a thing this past weekend when I took in a couple of straight to VHS movies. I watched a couple of animated Batman features, one of them being Mask of the Phantasm from 1993. I remember this movie being awesome, yet at the time I was 8, so surely with time it would lose it's luster and just be childish. Not true sir, it is still awesome. I then took in Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker from 2000. It was fantastic as well, and truly should be watched by any fan of The Dark Knight. I just love hearing Kevin Conroy as Batman and Mark Hamill as The Joker

For anyone who grew up watching the animated series in the early and mid-90's, those are the depictions you remember. For anyone I know, the first guy they think about when they hear The Joker is not Jack Nicholson, or Heath Ledger (though he was fantastic), it is Mark Hamill. The way he brought life to an animated character is nothing short of magical and I would have to think in the world of voice work, his for this character is the gold standard.

And to sound like a nerd, I am and always have been more interested in the world of Batman/Bruce Wayne. I always loved that he is just an ordinary guy, who goes through a trauma, and his way to cope is whooping ass. And as great as that is, it is truly the villains that make any superhero. And Batman has some great ones. My personal favorite was always Two-Face, basically because he didn't give a damn and really had no moral compass. Except for flipping a coin and giving you a 50-50 chance. I am really saddened that he didn't make it through The Dark Knight, because I think he could hold a movie on his own, especially played by Aaron Eckhart. Not surprisingly, the decision to kill him off was the only issue I had with Nolan's epic work.

So I rambled a touch, but the world of Gotham City is truly my favorite fictional place. I owe most of that to Batman: The Animated Series, from my childhood. I urge you to check it out, though I'm sure anyone of my friends that reads this has already seen some or all of the episodes. There are over 100 episodes in total, and all of them fall in the range of great to fantastic.