Saturday, February 3, 2018

A Tale Of The Batman - Gotham By Gaslight


Once again DC animation takes one of their greatest stories and translates it to animation. This time it's the groundbreaking Gotham By Gaslight. This was the first graphic novel from DC that proved that the concept of superheroes existing in other times was a solid concept. Here we take the legend of Jack the Ripper and toss in the Batman and his universe of characters. It's amazing how smooth the translation is. A true proof of concept. It all just works.


The three orpahns named Dickie, Jason and Tim are a nice touch. They are called the Cock Robins.


Johnny Gobs? Telling a story of the the Batman attacking him? Remember that line? It's a nice throwback to the Tim Burton Batman movie.

The movie may be animated but it is not for children. There are strong scenes of murder and other assorted acts of violence. There is swearing by kids. There is blood. Lots of blood. But you don't tell a story of Jack The Ripper without the blood.


I loved all the Victorian touches and steampunk technology as the tale is set against the backdrop of the Gothan City World's Fair. There is alot going on here and it's fun to see a story I know so well mixed with a character I know even better.


If I have one conplaint it would be the pedestrian animation. But how can you bring Mignola's dynamic art to screen without messing it up? It's serviceable but I hoped for more. The voice acting is very good especially Bruce Greenwood as Batman/Bruce Wayne.

You can see the trailer and read my preview of the movie here.

http://calvinscanadiancaveofcool.blogspot.ca/2018/01/preview-to-gotham-by-gaslight.html

 
The identity of the Ripper will shock you. It's different from the book but I think it works better than the Ripper from the book. But some will be annoyed but for me this is another winner from DC Animation.
 

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