Batman Beyond: The best Batman spin-off series ever
Batman of the future.
In the wake of Frank Miller’s reimagining of the Caped Crusader (The Dark Knight Returns, Year One), Tim Burton’s 1989 blockbuster, Batman, and the Emmy award winning animated series (1992), the eighties & nineties were a pivotal period for Batman’s transformation into the brooding, dark avenger we all know and love today. However, with all the good the two decades bestowed upon the Dark Knight, it also gave us Batman & Robin. In a time when Batman was being reinvigorated, the Joel Schumacher sequels temped to revert the franchise back to the Adam West camp of the 60s. While it may seem sensible from a profitable standpoint, it only served as a detriment to the evolution of the character, and his legacy, but if we know anything about Batman, it’s that he always finds a way to rise up from tragedy.
Around the time Superman: The Animated Series and The New Batman Adventures were wrapping up, showrunner Bruce Timm set out to create an entirely new Batman series. As the format for The New Batman Adventures, following the original 1992 series was becoming stale, the continuation would be set in the future with a younger character taking up the mantle of Batman in Neo-Gotham, and Bruce Wayne acting as mentor.
I will be looking in-depth of the show from its characters, to its themes, and shed light onto the series’ transition into other mediums. Certain plot details will be mentioned, so a SPOILER Warning is now in effect.
New & oldcomers
In the beginning of the series (2019), Bruce is still active as Batman, though his age proves to be detrimental to his health, eventually hanging up the cape for good after one incident nearly caused him to break his one rule. So, as you can imagine, Bruce doesn’t go out like in The Dark Knight Returns, though it saves us from its dreaded sequel (The Dark Knight Strikes Again).
Twenty later, the story now shifts to one Terry McGinnis, a teenage high schooler with a tendency to getting into trouble. Terry comes into the presence of an older Bruce Wayne after fighting against a future gang called the Jokerz. It is then where he discovers the Batcave, and puts two and two together.
When his father is murdered, Terry steels the batsuit to take vengeance on the company his father worked for, Powers Technology (merged with Wayne Enterprises). After Terry foils Powers’ creation of a deadly bio weapon, Bruce takes him in as his apprentice, and the new Batman. In the process of destroying the bioweapon, Derek Powers is exposed to the toxic gas, and emerges as the central antagonist of the first season, Blight, a translucent being made entirely out of radiation due to the treatment he received for his infection. Powers had potential of becoming the archnemesis of Batman Beyond, being the man responsible for the murder of Terry’s father, using Bruce’s own company for evil, and presented himself as the personification of death had all the makings of a threat to Neo-Gotham that Terry is destined to fight, but the opportunity was squandered when Blight’s arc was wrapped up at the season one finale.
In the wake of a new Batman in Neo-Gotham, so too does a new ensemble of supervillains appear for the Batman to face: Inque, a shapeshifting femme fatale made of black fluid; Shriek, an engineer with a suit that controls and generates high frequency sound; Spellbinder, an illusionist; Curare, a deadly assassin; The Royal Flush Gang, a criminal family taking up the playing card themed persona; and Kobra (no relation to Cobra from GI Joe), a terrorist organisation hellbent on world domination (definitely nothing like Cobra).
Batman (Terry) is allied by the past and present. Barbara Gordon, daughter of Jim Gordon, and former batgirl, now following in the footsteps of her father as Neo-Gotham’s police commissioner. Although the relationship between her and Terry can be laborious due to her resentment of Bruce after she dispatched from the bat family, she’s still loyal and dedicated to the law as her father would. Max Gibson is Terry McGinnis’ friend from school and a tech genius who assists Batman in his crime fighting with her wits and ingenuity. You can’t have a future Batman without a future Superman. In episode “The Call” part one & two, Kal-El returns still active as Superman and leading a group of superheroes called the Justice League. This episode serves as a continuation to the finale of the Superman Animated Series with Bruce having counter measures (Kryptonite) in case Superman goes rogue again (Legacy part one & two), and setting up the future Justice League spin-off series.
As incorruptible relics of Bruce’s past surface, several of Batman’s well-known foes would return one last time to test the new Batman, and close their chapters for good. Victor Freeze is given a new body by Derek Powers, only for it to deteriorate, and is forced to return to his power suit to lash out his hatred on the world. Ra’s al Ghul & Talia returned to close the tale on the lazarus pit, and who could forget the Clown Prince of Crime, The Joker emerges from the dead to haunt Bruce, his family and wreak havoc on Gotham once again.
Themes & maturity
The DCAU had dealt with serious issues before, but this series has a unique take, especially with its cyberpunk environment as technology in the future society continues to thrive, also comes with it the dilemma when used by the corrupt. With this series telling the tale of a teenage superhero, the subject matter hits hard for its younger demographic and comic fans.
One of the things this series does with it’s tampering with science and technology is the deconstruction of superheroes. In episode “Heroes”, a new superhero team, The Terrific Trio are carbon reflections to Marvel’s the Fantastic Four with super powers and are sanctioned by the government to fight crime. However, unlike their Marvel counterpart who use their powers for good, the trio grew increasingly resentful with their curse and sought to take out their frustration on Neo-Gotham by threatening to incinerate the city when they learn of their deteriorating condition, leaving Batman to end them and is once again on his own to continue the fight.
Batman of the future is no shortage of episodes that tackle drug abuse and genetic manipulation. In “The Winning Edge”, performance enhancing drugs in the form of slappers is plaguing Terry’s school. The source goes back to venom, a highly addictive substance that increases one’s strength and endurance used by another of Batman’s nemesis, Bane. Although Bane is incapacitated due to years of venom dependency, the poison that deteriorated him would become a gateway for opportunists and peddlers in the future of Gotham. “Splicers” explores the subculture craze called Splicing, a genetic modification process that merges humans with animal DNA.
The series has a wide, abundancy of character death. The Batman and Superman animated series have their fair share of deaths for shows aimed at children. Some deaths were unexpected, and there were impactful deaths than effected the heroes. The deaths in Batman Beyond are more prevalent, but not too graphic and serve to underline the dark reality and the effects of the cyberpunk future on its citizens.
With Terry in the role of a crime fighter, his fighting style tends to be more severe since he comes from a streetwise background. He’s not as experienced as the first Batman, which explains why he’s easily knocked around at times, but he excels when using the surroundings to his advantage, and when the going gets rough, his tactics sometimes end up leaving his foes incapacitated, or disabled for life making him more of a threat to the supervillains than the original Batman was. Terry may come off as brash and cocky, but he still has a moral compass, and his confidence is what keeps him calm under pressure, making him the most no-nonsense superhero of the DCAU, and comes into his own as the true successor of Batman.
Expanding the DCU, animated & Beyond
Despite the show’s cancelation in 2001, the season three finale was not the end of Terry’s story. Batman Beyond would make one off appearances in other DCAU spin-offs, Static Shock (Future Shock), and Justice Unlimited (The Once and Future Thing). The finale to Terry’s tale would finally come at the season two finale of Justice League Unlimited, Epilogue. Terry unravelled the truth of his birth that he was a clone of Bruce through a plot by Amanda Waller called Project Batman Beyond. This finale links the first Batman series, to its predecessor, and then everything comes together in the expanded Justice League series.
Batman Beyond proved to be popular with fans of Batman and the DCAU that it became canon what he made a brief cameo in the twenty-first issue of Countdown to Final Crisis, appeared in the seven-hundredth issue of Batman, then in 2011, the DCU was rebooted with the New 52 relaunch, and Terry McGinnis became the main player in the 2014 DC event, Future’s End.
In 2010, Batman Beyond was given a six issue limited series called Hush Beyond which was well received by fans & critics. Batman Beyond was also given another comic series in 2011 that only lasted eight issues. The series featured two storylines: The Heart of the Matter, and Industrial Revolution.
In 2015, another Batman Beyond series was released following the ending to Future’s End, and ended in 2016 with the DC Rebirth, with more of the series in continuation.
Batman Beyond is a masterful continuation to the classic series and the legacy of Batman as it adapts to the times and advance to the future… and Beyond.
