Under The Hood

The holiday season is not doing the comic shop any favors. The delivery guy didn't show up until noon, so there were about a half-dozen customers lounging about, discussing whatever. Jack was going to put The Expendables in the DVD player, but he'd taken it home because his son wanted to watch it. Too bad, that would have fulfilled my desire to see it without spending money to do so.

So he popped in Under the Hood, the animated Batman flick instead, which I also hadn't seen. It was good, considering I had no real interest in the story when it was happening in comics. The fights and the chases were animated very well. The voice work was fine, beyond that part of me that is used to the characters sounding a certain way, and them not sounding like that, since they were voiced by different people. It is strange to hear hints of Bender Bending Rodriguez in the Joker, though.

The whole bit with Jason/the Joker/Batman was sort of interesting. It seemed to start with Jason killing crooks because he feels that's the right way to carry out Batman's mission. Then it shifted to him really wanting proof Batman cared about him, because Batman didn't kill the Joker for killing Jason. Killing criminals takes on more of a cry for attention than any desire to stop crime.

What surprised me was Batman admitting he doesn't kill the Joker because if he does it once, he'll never be able to stop. I'm used to Batman having a superhuman level of control, and admitting that if he gave in to the temptation once, he'd never be able to rein it back in, was unexpected. Then again, he can't seem to stop fighting crime, even when he needs rest. That's how Bane broke him, keep throwing problems out there, and let Batman exhaust himself by refusing to take nights off. So he can be ruled just as much by obsessions as anyone else.

The end caught me off guard. The flashback to Jason's first night on the job, as he runs to the Batmobile, then roll credits. I wasn't expecting some decisive confrontation between Red Hood and Bats, where Jason loses and is thrown in jail or whatever, but that wasn't what I expected.