Batman: The Animated Newsletter
Weeks of January 15 - January 28, 2001
Volume 4,
Rated: PG for some "low-key coarse language and occasional griping"
THIS ISSUE'S SUBLIMINAL MESSAGE: "WE WANT MORE BTAS
EPISODES! WE WANT THEM ALL RELEASED ON DVD!
WE WANT LOTS OF EXTRAS! WE WANT TO LEARN HOW TO BE MORE SUBTLE WITH OUR DEMANDS!"
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ANNOUNCEMENTS
-BE SURE TO CHECK OUT OUR 'RETURN OF THE JOKER' GIVEAWAY!
SCROLL DOWN TO JUST BELOW OUR EPISODE REVIEW FOR DETAILS!
-WE HAVE ALSO INCLUDED OUR FORM FOR THE "GOLDEN OVAL
AWARDS", OUR VERSION OF THE "BEST/WORST OF
2000" POLLS THAT ARE RUNNING RAMPANT ACROSS THE NET RIGHT ABOUT NOW. BE SURE TO
SCROLL DOWN AND
VOTE - THERE JUST MIGHT BE A CERTAIN UNEDITED VIDEO IN IT FOR YA!
Tim "TWO-FACE" Leighton
-still hung over
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EAGERLY ANTICIPATING...
New episodes are on the horizon! Here's what we can expect in the near future...
UNMASKED
Batman Beyond #??
Air date: ???
Synopsis: A little kid gets a glimpse of the face under the Batman mask.
COUNTDOWN
Batman Beyond #??
Air date: ???
Synopsis: Zeta and Mad Stan return.
THE CURSE OF KOBRA (Pt. 1, 2)
Batman Beyond #??, ??
Air date: ???
Synopsis: This two-part episode features a villainous gang named Kobra.
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KIDS WB ANIMATION SCHEDULES:
(courtesy of Brian Cruz and/or the official BTAS/STAS site)
Kids'WB! currently airs BATMAN BEYOND five or six times a
week. Batman airs on weekday
afternoons Monday-Friday, as well occasionally Friday morning before Pokemon. Remember,
Kids'WB! is notorious for switching schedules around at the very last minutes. Batman
Beyond
currently airs at 11am (ET) on Saturdays and 4:30pm (ET) on weekdays.
Check out these links if our schedule is not 100% updated:
THIS WEEK:
Mon 01-15-01: B-BEYOND #??
Tue 01-16-01: B-BEYOND #??
Wed 01-17-01: B-BEYOND #??
Thu 01-18-01: B-BEYOND #?? April Moon
Sat 01-20-01: B-BEYOND #28 Zeta
NEXT WEEK:
Mon 01-22-01: B-BEYOND #46 Inqueling
Tue 01-23-01: B-BEYOND #?? Speak No Evil
Wed 01-24-01: B-BEYOND #16 Splicers
Thu 01-25-01: B-BEYOND #23 Mind Games
Sat 01-27-01: B-BEYOND #?? Untouchable
All episodes #86 and onward of BATMAN are considered THE NEW
BATMAN ADVENTURES while the original 85 are considered BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES (BTAS)
episodes.
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CANADIAN EPISODE SCHEDULE
(BATMAN and BEYOND on YTV)
(courtesy of our friends at YTV)
YTV currently has the rights to air all 109 episodes of
Batman, as well as the current 52 episodes of Batman Beyond. YTV usually airs these
episodes in either chronological order, or in the original order they aired on Kids'WB!
and FOX. Batman now airs at 3:30am Monday - Friday. (Actually, more correctly, they
seem to be airing them at 3:40 am - go figure.)If our schedules are not updated or are
inaccurate, please use these links:
http://www.geocities.com/worldsfinestpage/epsched.htm
http://www.ytv.com/ytvguide
WANNA GET BTAS ON AT A BETTER TIMESLOT ON CANADIAN
TELEVISION?
(courtesy of subscriber "Carlos O")
"The current BTAS timeslot is too late for me and I'm
sure it is for many others. I tried e-maling them asking if that timeslot was going to
change and they said they can't change it for now. However, if they recieved enough demand
to move the show to an earlier timeslot, they would definitely consider it - that's what
they said. It's kind of hard for me to let this oportunity go by since this is the only
way many of us can catch this show (as most Canadians don't receive the CARTOON
NETWORK)."
That's a very good point, Carlos. If there are any Canadian
Bat-fans reading this that want BTAS to be back on at a more reasonable timeslot (it used
to be on at 7:30 am and then it was moved to Noon), go to http://www.ytv.com,
then to the HELP section, and then to the CONTACT US section. E-mail them (politely but in
a demanding manner) and hopefully something will be done!
Anyhow, the original BTAS series is still airing, and it will
be shown as follows:
THIS WEEK:
Mon 01-15-01: BTAS #36 The Strange Secret of Bruce Wayne
Tue 01-16-01: BTAS #41 Tyger, Tyger
Wed 01-17-01: BTAS #28 Dreams in Darkness
Thu 01-18-01: BTAS #18 Beware the Grey
Ghost
Fri 01-19-01: BTAS #35 Cat Scratch Fever
NEXT WEEK:
Mon 01-22-01: BTAS #45 Terror in the Sky
Tue 01-23-01: BTAS #49 I Am the Night
Wed 01-24-01: BTAS #46 Almost Got 'Im
Thu 01-25-01: BTAS #42 Moon of the Wolf
Fri 01-26-01: BTAS #02 Christmas with the
Joker
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THE CARTOON NETWORK
Cartoon Network has the right to air all 109 Batman episodes,
as well as all 54 Superman episiodes. Come September, Cartoon Network will begin airing
these. Shows. Batman currently airs during the weekday Toonami block at 6:30pm (ET).
Superman will soon have a set airdate as well. Since Cartoon Network is unpredictable with
their schedules, we are unable to keep up with them. Please, use these links to find out
the schedule information you need:
Here is where you can find an air date schedule:
All of Tim "TWO-FACE" Leighton's reviews of the
new-style BTAS episodes and BATMAN BEYOND can be found via these links, which link to
"Two-Face's Tower of Tranquility and Terror":
The creative team for this column alternates between Zanna
and Justin Chen, two loyal subscribers and great friends of ours here. Any other
reviews printed here are written by editor Tim "TWO-FACE" Leighton. Enjoy!
???
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EDITORIAL
(by Kelly Tindall)
Hey there, ho there, bat-dolts. Didja miss me?
With a profound sense of, "Well, it's about TIME,"
I sat down to watch Batman Beyond: ROTJ and see what I could see. I knew that the
version I was watching was the edited version (more on that in the coming weeks), but I
knew also that the cuts were probably not that big a deal and I knew the thing would still
be a classic. Oh yeah, if you haven't seen the movie (and you call yourself a
Bat-fan, pfah!), I'll be issuing a SPOILER WARNING right about here. You've been
warned, kiddo.
I really, really liked it. My favorite bits, obviously,
were those set in the 'past' with old Bats and Harley and the whole nine yards. The
Joker is easily the most iconic and identifiable villain in comic history, and I'm happy
to see that Bruce Timm listened to endless moaning and complaining and changed Mr. J back
to a reasonable facsimile of what he used to resemble. It's not that I didn't like
the new Joker look...far from it, the entire body was much, much better and the face
wasn't too bad. It's just that the EYES threw so many people. It was good to
get 'em back, and the red pupils certainly didn't hurt. The Joker was immeasurably
SCARIER in this incarnation than he was in the other versions, and it didn't hurt that we
got to see him do his classic 'whacking the lippy henchman' routine.
The whole 'family' angle, which Paul Dini mined to genius
effect for years, came to a horrifying head with the Joker's insistence on choosing an
'heir' in Robin. His line about Batman 'always having a few extra kids around' was
chilling to the bone, but nothing matched the horror of what he'd done to Robin.
Excellent interplay between Batgirl and Harley as Harley realizes what the Joker has done
but blindly ignores it to suit her own happiness. Savage, savage dialog from the
Joker himself as he brutally mocks Batman and Batman's tragic past, and a nasty death for
the big man himself. Less nasty than the one originally animated, but nasty all the
same.
The way Dini resurrected the Joker was extremely intelligent
and even fit in with the Joker's doings as far back as "The Batman and Robin
Adventures" in 1994. The Joker's modern look was interesting and certainly
mold-breaking as far as the look was concerned (although my roommate, a notorious moron,
said the Joker looked like 'Eurotrash'). I liked the brazen gloveless hands and the
slicked-back hair, although the moment you first see Jordan Price you simply have to say,
"Red herring, for God's sake!" Having Mark Hamill play the weaselly CEO
certainly didn't help.
My favorite line from the piece was one of Future Joker's
last; "You're not Batman!" It certainly echoes criticisms from a lot of
dedicated Bat-nerds who prefer the old stuff. I'm simply pleased that they put in a
final adventure set in the past, and let us have one last taste of what we had
before. The ruin of Arkham was a perfect metaphor for the realization, from Batman
and his greatest foe, that things can't last forever. You have to grow up sometime.
My rating for Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker: A-.
Good to see you, one last time.
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'RETURN OF THE JOKER' GIVEAWAY
We have a contest, just in time for Christmas! We're trying
to get people both more involved with the newsletter AND want to help them out at the same
time. That said, we're offering anyone that participates in our NO MAN'S ISLAND column a
chance to win unedited copies of RETURN OF THE JOKER.
The way it works is as follows: vote for the two characters
you'd like to vote off the island. Of the characters that are being cast off or even
nominated in that particular issue, we will randomly select one of these characters for
our contest. Anyone who voted for this character will be entered into a draw, according to
the e-mail address from which their ballot was recieved. Every issue, we will randomly
select one e-mail address (from a hat, to make it fair) and that participant, if willing,
wins a copy of the unedited movie!
It is only possible to win once; you may vote for NO MAN'S
ISLAND as often as you like, but you will only be entered into our RETURN OF THE JOKER
giveaway if you are a subscriber and have not already won a copy in a previous voting
session.
If the selected winner for whatever reason declines, the will
be another draw for that same week. Each e-mail address can only win once! The catch? The
winner, if agreeing, must provide a tape and enough money to cover postage ($5 American)
of the tape to and from their place of residence. There will be no extra profit for us at
BATMAN: THE ANIMATED NEWSLETTER (as that would be illegal) or anything. We just want to
get this movie out to more people as it's not going to be definately released on tape just
yet.
NOTE: I am not promoting the act of bootlegging videos and
making a profit from it, I am merely looking for the cost of the tape and postage, so fans
will be able to view the movie as it was supposed to be.
That said, let's get voting! (And make sure to read the
NO MAN'S ISLAND section below.)
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