The next Batman cartoon I will be exploring is actually my personal favorite — Batman: The Brave and the Bold, a decidedly lighter series than most of those that preceded it. This show was originally aimed at a younger audience in order to sell toys. This cartoon was inspired by the long-running comic book series The Brave and the Bold which mostly featured team-ups between Batman and other characters from DC’s history.
In the earlier seasons, the creators intentionally omitted major characters like Superman and Wonder Woman, as well as Batman’s most famous Rogues, choosing instead to focus on characters that did not have the same exposure. The main villain in Season 1 was a new creation, Equinox. Among the other villains in the first season were Clock King, The Gentleman Ghost, Felix Faust, Black Manta, Sportsmaster, Sinestro, The Top, and Gorilla Grodd, as well as another original creation, Babyface.
Initially, the animated Batman: The Brave and the Bold featured Batman teaming up with lesser-known heroes, like the newly introduced Jaime Reyes version of Blue Beetle, another new version of a classic character, Ryan Choi’s Atom, Green Arrow (depicted the way he was drawn in the Silver Age before he was redesigned by Neal Adams), Plastic Man, the Guy Gardner Green Lantern, B’Wana Beast, the futuristic Kamandi, a teenage version of The Outsiders, wild west cowboy Jonah Hex, Red Tornado, Black Canary, Bronze Tiger, and more.
The most “Outrageous” reinvention was that of Aquaman, drawn with a beard, and voiced by John DiMaggio, inspired by the boisterous Brian Blessed performance of Prince Vultan in the 1980 cult classic film Flash Gordon. This version of Aquaman was so popular that he headlined his own episodes in later seasons.
The Justice League used on B&B, is the “International” lineup with Guy Gardner, Booster Gold, Fire & Ice, and Blue Beetle, although this version is Jaime Reyes, the Blue Beetle that appeared in the comic books, not Ted Kord, although Kord’s Beetle did factor into B&B. Aquaman was also included in the JLI, even though he wasn’t really used in that version of the comic.
Check out the title hero and his frequent guest stars in this opening credits sequence:
One of the most questionable inclusions was the character The Huntress. On the show, she is depicted as having an aggressive crush on Batman, but she is drawn in the costume of the Bronze Age Huntress, the daughter of the Golden Age Batman, who was considered a surrogate niece to the Silver/Bronze Age Batman. So ew.
Nearly every episode opened with a short vignette featuring one Batman team-up that was unrelated to the main storyline, although sometimes he would team up with a character in the cold open that would also appear in the main story.
As the series continued, however, more big-name heroes and villains were integrated. Just as Equinox was the main villain of Season 1, Starro the Conqueror was the overall baddie of Season 2.
Some characters were redesigned over the course of the series. Throughout most of B&B, Catwoman was drawn in her famous purple dress with a green cape, which is possibly her longest-running costume from the comics. What’s interesting is that as famous as this outfit is, B&B was the first cartoon to show her wearing it.
But in “Night of the Batmen,” she was shown wearing her short-lived blue and red costume from the late ’60s, which is often referred to as her “buccaneer” costume because it features pirate-like boots with flaps.
Katana of the Outsiders was also redesigned. In promo artwork, she was shown wearing a purple costume, but initially on the actual series, she was depicted wearing a “schoolgirl uniform” reminiscent of the character Go-Go from Kill Bill. She later adopted her familiar red and yellow costume from the comics.
Her teammate, Black Lightning, also underwent a redesign. Perhaps because they were originally depicted as teens, he was given a hipper, more street-style outfit with a hoodie. But eventually, he adopted his famous costume from the comics, deep V-neck and all.
B&B was clearly inspired by old-school comics. Robin is shown wearing the Earth-2 adult Robin costume which included yellow tights.
He eventually adopted his Nightwing persona and wore the original version of that costume and like Black Lightning’s, it included the deep V-neck and all.
After voicing Shadow Thief and other characters on The Batman, Diedrich Bader took on the voice of Batman himself on Batman: The Brave and the Bold. He has also voiced Batman in subsequent projects and other DC characters in others. Bader voiced the various versions of Batman used on B&B as well as Kilowog, Ace, Owlman, Solomon Grundy, Punch, Gorilla Boss, and more.
B&B‘s principal cast also included Jeff Bennett as The Joker/Red Hood, Captain Marvel, Abra Kadabra, OMAC, Ultra-Humanite, and Starman; Corey Burton as Red Tornado, Doctor Mid-Nite, Mercury, False-Face, Killer Moth, Batman (Bat-Manga version), and Alan Scott/Green Lantern; John DiMaggio as Aquaman, Gorilla Grodd, Faceless Hunter, Black Mask, Tiger Soldier, Enemy Ace, Ubu, Black Adam, Toyman, Vigilante, Hellgrammite, Mr. Freeze, and Captain Boomerang; Will Friedle as Blue Beetle/Jaime Reyes, and Lazy Eye; Tom Kenny as Plastic Man, Baby Face, The Ray, Deadshot, Mirror Master, and ‘Mazing Man; James Arnold Taylor as Green Arrow, Guy Gardner/Green Lantern, Major Disaster, Wotan, Nabu, and G.I. Robot. Each of these actors also voiced other characters.
This show had so many outstanding episodes! Among them was the musical “Mayhem of the Music Meister” which featured Neil Patrick Harris as the newly created foe The Music Meister. It appears that Bader wasn’t a trained singer, so Bennett provided Batman’s singing voice. The soundtrack was released on iTunes and was a surprise hit! The Music Meister has since been used in live-action in the crossover between The CW’s The Flash and Supergirl and was portrayed by Darren Criss. (Incidentally, Criss starred along with Melissa “Supergirl” Benoist and Grant “The Flash” Gustin, on the musical series Glee on which Harris guest-starred.)
The S2 episode “Chill of the Night” explored Batman’s origin, with him discovering the man that killed his parents was Joe Chill. Adam West voiced Thomas Wayne, while his Catwoman, Julie Newmar, voiced Martha Wayne. Kevin Conroy, Batman in Batman: The Animated Series, played the Phantom Strange, while Mark Hamill, who had voiced The Joker, portrayed The Spectre, and Richard Moll, that show’s Two-Face, performed as gangster Lew Moxon.
John Wesley Shipp, who starred on the ’90s Flash TV series, voiced the villain Professor Zoom/Reverse-Flash on the episode “Requiem for a Scarlet Speedster.” In the episode “The Golden Age of Justice!,” Hawkman is voiced by William Katt, who starred in the early ’80s series The Greatest American Hero about a bumbling superhero that doesn’t know how to control the super suit that grants him powers.
“The Mask of Matches Malone” featured a team-up between Catwoman, The Huntress, and Black Canary, in which the ladies sing a racy song about their male counterparts (and *ahem* their parts). This was deemed too racy and the episode was removed from reruns and was left off of the DVD set of Season 2. It was later released as an extra on the Season 3 set and the episode was edited down for future broadcasts.
The creators of Batman: The Brave and the Bold became more experimental as time went on. Toward the end of the second season, came the episode “Bat-Mite Presents: Batman’s Strangest Cases!” which featured an animated version of the Mad magazine story “Bat Boy and Rubin,” an adaptation of the Japanese Batman Manga (below) and a team-up with Scooby-Doo and Mystery Inc. which also included comedian/musician “Weird Al” Yankovic. This was a throwback to one of Batman’s earliest animated projects, two guest appearances on The New Scooby-Doo Movies.
The episode “Bold Beginnings” featured an opening short that paired Batman with another character from the Warner Bros./Hanna-Barbera vault, Space Ghost.
The third season opener, “Joker: The Vile and the Villainous!” flipped the show’s format and focused on The Joker teamed up with another criminal, The Weeper, who, in the comics, was a foe of Bulletman and, as explained by The Joker, was the first supervillain to commit crimes based on a theme. This episode featured a “Joker-ized” opening theme with The Joker running through a city made up of the names of various other villains and featuring the images of some of them.
Check it out below:
You gotta love that instead of climbing up a rope on the side of a building, The Joker uses giant toilet plungers. I mean… you won’t be seeing that in The Batman movie franchise. Or probably any live-action interpretation.
Wonder Woman made her debut in the teaser for S2 episode “Scorn of the Star Sapphire” in a bit that included the theme song to the 1970s Lynda Carter TV series. She later had a larger role in “Triumverate of Terror,” which featured Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman battling The Joker, Lex Luthor, and The Cheetah but not in their usual configurations. This episode also opened with a baseball game between the Justice League and various supervillains, in homage to the 1976 comic book DC Superstars Giant #10.
Sounds a bit silly, no?
Now some who are bigger fans of either the Frank Miller Dark Knight Returns iteration, the Christopher Nolan films, or this upcoming Matt Reeves’ take may dismiss this show as being too campy and being aimed at people who like their Batman the way he was depicted in the Adam West show. Hell, B&B even included villains that had only ever appeared on that series.
What this series really is, however, is a tribute to ALL THINGS Batman. It wasn’t beholden to a single source. In fact, “Night of the Batman” featured the Batmen from Filmation’s series, Scooby-Doo, the Super Friends, Batman: The Animated Series, and The Batman.
Batman: The Brave and the Bold culled from every era of the comics, and like it or not, the Batman comics could be downright goofy at times. There isn’t one correct Batman. There might be one that you find preferable and in this day, I imagine most prefer the more grounded Nolan/Reeves interpretations. But there was a time when the Caped Crusader traveled through time and visited alien worlds on a regular basis. Those takes exist. They’re real. And I loved B&B for not shying away from that.
There were 26 episodes of Seasons 1 and 2 and 13 for Season 3. The show originally aired on Saturday mornings on Cartoon Network. Honestly, it seemed like toward the end, the producers and writers just dumped everything they could think of in… and it WORKED!
You can check it out on HBO Max. It’s also on DVD.
Reeves’ The Batman live-action film opens next weekend, but there is one last installment of this series that will discuss the… less than successful… next Batman cartoon, and the future. Check back!
