Retrospective Review - Batman: Year One
Batman: Year One is arguably one of the most iconic Batman stories in the character's history. For me personally, alongside The Long Halloween, Year One is one of my favorite Batman stories. So I was very interested in this movie when it came out because it is very much the definitive Batman origin story, even though stuff like Zero Year has retconned it out of canon. So I was looking forward to this adaptation. Its without doubt the most faithful adaptation of a story that I have seen in an animated film. From character design to dialogue, it is almost a complete copy. And that's a good thing because of the quality of the story.
In essence, this is a parallel origin story. This isn't a story of how Bruce trained himself to become a vigilante, but more on how the idea of Batman came to be when he arrived in Gotham and what his first year as a vigilante was like, while in parallel, Gordon joins the GCPD as a lieutenant and navigates the corruption within the GCPD. We basically follow the both of them as their paths intertwine and how they become allies by the end of the movie. Its a compelling narrative and Frank Miller deserves a lot of credit for it. The film navigates the connections between the seedy underbelly of Gotham to the mob to the police. The film portrays Gotham as a city that is rotten from the inside and there seem to be only two men who are doing anything to fight the corruption. I think what helps the film considerably is that the source material is naturally cinematic, so nothing major additional needs to be done to make the movie compelling to watch.
In terms of tone and content, this is probably among the darker Batman animated movies. Miller's stories played a huge part to push Batman away from the campier content of Adam Wes, towards the modern interpretations of Batman. For an animated film, this film shows violence like gun shots and blood spatter, seedy aspects of the life like prostitutes and pimps. So this is definitely not a movie aimed at kids. Whereas the DCAU and The Batman movies were spinoffs of animated shows that were aimed at children, the shackles are off here. The story does a great job characterizing and endearing us to Gordon especially. I will say that the Gordon side of the narrative is slightly stronger and has a bit more of the focus whereas the narrative in the original story was more balanced. But that works in the movie because we are naturally more aware of the Batman story while the Gordon story is more relatable and is new to us. He's shown to be a moral guy but he's also prone to mistakes, such as his affair with Sarah Essen. He is not above beating the crap out of a bully cop and leaving him stripped naked in the snow. The animation is strong. I mean, obviously this isn't theatrical movie level animation, but the film is able to have some great visuals. There are some terrifying visual shots of Batman, like when he confronts a witness and when he confronts Falcone and Loeb at dinner. Also, the Bat breaking into the Manor to give Bruce the inspiration to become Batman is another superb visual. Rewatching the film also reminded me of how much this film influenced Batman Begins, from the device in his show that calls the Bats to evade the cops, to the final shot of Batman and Gordon meeting on a rooftop to discuss Joker.
There aren't too many complaints I have with the film. The film is extremely faithful and briskly paced. It manages to encapsulate all the major story points without being rushed. I am not overly fond of the Catwoman prostitute origin from the source material. And like I mentioned, Batman himself seems like the second lead to Gordon in the movie. But these are fairly minor complaints overall. Its a compelling movie and a real solid adaptation.
Definitely the voice acting coup of the movie is to get Bryan Cranston as Gordon. He is pretty fantastic. Delivering the weariness, the determination, the conflict, the anger etc... all of it throughout the movie. He's honestly a fantastic potential casting choice for live action even though no complaints at all with JK Simmons and Jeffrey Wright. Ben McKenzie, who ironically went on to play Gordon in Gotham on Fox, plays Bruce/Batman. He plays the role fairly monotone. It works brilliantly for Batman because he has that cold, emotionless tenor which is terrifying when he's threatening the villains. But it feels a little flat when he's playing Bruce or doing his inner monologue. The rest of the voice cast is strong as well but the focus is really on Bryan and Ben because there is a lot of inner monologue for these characters. Eliza Dushku as Selina, Katee Sackhoff as Sarah Essen, and Fred Tatasciore as Detective Flass are other standouts.
Overall, Year One is a stellar adaptation and captures what made the source material so good. Bruce Timm, Alan Burnett, Lauren Montgomery, and Sam Liu know their stuff as Producers and Directors of this movie. Huge credit obviously to Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli for the source material. An 8/10.
