Batman: Under the Red Hood

I bought several of these direct to DVD/Blu ray DC animation productions during Amazon's blow out sale for holiday viewing. This is by far the best of the bunch. The animation is good, not "wow look at that", but good. What makes it work is a combination of tight plot and excellent voice acting. Unlike the huge plot holes in some of the other comic book to dvd adaptions, this one does not suffer overmuch from translating the multiple books/issues into a movie. The plot hangs together and flows in a way that makes sense, has suspense, and makes you care about the characters.

The voice casting is excellent. Bruce Greenwood and Neil Patrick Harris are convincing in their roles as Batman and Dick Greyson respectively. John DiMaggio was a very pleasant surprise as the Joker. He is wickedly engaging. Even better was the casting of Jensen Ackles as the Red Hood. Known really only for his television work, he gave this antagonist a depth of emotion with just his voice that carries through the restrictions of this type of animation. This is a character that the audience needs to feel for and care about, and his acting made that possible. Without spoiling the plot, his character has legitimate reasons for both loving and hating Batman. He is a character who is morally grey in a DC comic world that is often too black and white.

We watched several of the DC dvds in a marathon, and this is the only one that I thought about after viewing and am likely to view again several times. It is well worth the discount price for the two disc set. The other disc is not really all that interesting with a few features on it that were not nearly as compelling as the main movie.

I'm a 7 on a scale of 1-10 as far as fanboys go. I don't collect comics or attend conventions, but love the super hero genre. All that said, this is one of- if not my favourite of the DC/Marvel mini-movies along with Planet Hulk. The voice acting is great. Bruce Greenwood and whoever did the Joker were fantastic.

There's blood and actual killing (which raises the stakes) and some cheesy but fun exagerated comic book action. Aside from some of Batmans long winded, repetetive, guilt ridden speeches that briefly took me out of the movie, this sucker had enough action, story and surprises to keep me quite happy and pleased with my purchase.

That said, I do agree with other reviewers who feel the 2nd disc wasn't necessary. The 2 episodes were interesting, but the small bit on the Dark Knight was terribly produced and seemed more like a vanity project designed to validate it's existence- even though it's nothing more than fluff.

Still, fantastic movie. Well worth the purchase in single disc form.

Batman Under the Red Hood is yet another in a long line of DC animated movies. It starts out strong with a lot of action and what looks like a very complicated storyline yet ultimately it really boils down to a very simplistic plotline. Which is that mistakes of the past can and will come back to haunt you. And that try as you might; you can't always set things right!

And that's where the movie tends to be a bit of a problem for me. As the first two-thirds of the movie is a non-stop action movie with a very strong ensemble cast which is then followed by the last twenty minutes being a more introspective storyline which boils down to only three individuals. Which I found after the frenetic pace through the rest of the movie; tends to be a little bit of a letdown. But otherwise; it's a pretty good action movie.

Done in a 1.85:1 widescreen format; the video is a true 1080P and the sound is superb. Especially on the English dub which is a full 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio. Trucks rumble, buildings crumble; it's a full theatrical sound range. The Dolby Digital 5.1 German, Spanish and Portuguese tracks aren't bad either though not up to the English DTS-HD. There is no French track. There's also included an authentication code for a downloadable digital copy, but since it's marked as expiring in 2011, well...... good luck with that!

Like all DC movies, there's also a slew of extra's. A 12 min. Jonah Hex animated short which was fun to watch but doesn't have much replay value. It's an English DD 5.1 only. Plus a 25 min. documentary on the original Dick Grayson Robin and another 20 min. documentary on the Jason Todd Robin and how his death came about. I found both of these quite interesting.

And three of DC's 10 min. mini-documentaries on the Superman/Batman Apocalypse movie (which is really about Supergirl & my personal favourite), Justice League Crisis on Two Worlds and Batman Gotham Knight. There's also four episodes from the old 90's Batman series; two on Robin and two on the Joker.

Overall, I'd classify Under the Red Hood as about average for the DC movie stable. Not as good as Apocalypse or Crisis on Two Earths, but a little better than G.L. First Flight or Public Enemies. I give it a 3 to 4 overall depending on your tastes.

J. A.