Why can’t DC do Live Action as well as they do Animation? (A Batman: Bad Blood review)

Batman: Bad Blood is the newest animated feature from DC Universe. If you aren’t familiar with it, check out the trailer:

Movies like this excite me and piss me off at the same time. This movie is in the same chronology as Son of the Batman and Batman v Robin. I love the way they are developing Damian’s character, and fleshing out this world more with each movie. If you haven’t seen it yet, you really should.

What is wrong with DC?

I know I take a lot of heat for not liking the Dark Knight trilogy with the exception of the first 2/3rds of The Dark Knight, but it suffers from the same problem that Man of Steel and the Watchmen did. DC wants to do something different from Marvel, so they chose to prostitute their characters out to writers and directors who don’t care about them.

Batman is the World’s Greatest Detective. That is what makes him unique. He is a kickass Sherlock Holmes. No matter what story you tell about him, it will be different from a Marvel movie, because they don’t have a dark, detective movie series.

I don’t what to rehash everything wrong with Man of Steel, but the movie was a waste of a character that could have been used in so many ways, and instead we got an inferior remake of Richard Donner’s Superman II (which is probably the best Superman movie too many people haven’t seen).

I am not against originality. I am against moves that use DC characters for their name and nothing else. This is where their animated movies succeed. They are not doing book adaptations in the latest stories (though their adaptations were really good). They are taking the themes and ideas from the comics and crafting new stories that honor the characters while taking them in directions we haven’t seen before.

Why can’t they do they same thing in the live action movies?

The new Suicide Squad trailer gives me hope they are starting to change their ways.

But the Batman v Superman trailers don’t… I want a good DC movie so bad. Wait! I got one!

What makes Bad Blood awesome?

It is about the characters, not the plot.

I almost feel like I don’t need to say anything other than that. What more could anyone want?

Possible Spoilers follow. You have been warned.

The story follows Nightwing and Damian as they deal with the disappearance and possible death of Batman. The movie also includes the origins of Batwoman and Batwing.

At its heart, the movie is about family. Damian is caught between Bruce and Talia, his parents. Dick is trying to be his own man, even though he is forced into donning the Bat cowl. Katie Kane, Batwoman, and Luke Fox, Batwing, are trying to find their place in the Bat family.

The story works because it is born out of the characters, their desires and fears.

There is one scene in the movie that sticks with me. Talia’s goons are rooting around in Bruce’s psyche in an attempt to reprogram him, and he relives the death of his parents, followed by the body of his dead father pulling him through a puddle into a bottomless see where he is confronted by Dick and Damian, who pull him down to his death.

This glimpse into his mind shows his fears and pain, and how it keeps him from letting anyone really get close to him.

The visual storytelling coupled with the end that involves Batman with a gun that pushed me to edge of my seat. I don’t want to spoil it, but suffice it to say, it gave me the feels.

I highly recommend this movie, and the other two in the series.

Fingers crossed that they will keep making great animated features, and eventually that may spill over to the live action.

What did you think of Batman: Bad Blood? I would love to know.