Brave and the Bold - "Knights ot Tomorrow", featuring Dick and Damian!
I was going to add this to the last Brave and the Bold post, but... nah, let's lavish a bit of attention on this story, which "Brave and the Bolds" Earth-1 Batman and Grant Morrison's output.... (eg mixes and matchs for as close to maximum awesomeness as possible).
The story opens with THIS image...
First we get given a run down on Batman's initial crime fighting career..
and how he came to realise a need for a crimefighting partner, a squire (Given that I don't think that Batman ever thought about taking on a partner until after Dick's parents died, I'm not sure I like the stalkerish implications there, but I'm probably reading too much into it, and being contaminated by ASBAR's "I've had my eye on that young man for quite some time, which will never stop being icky)
Anyway, the squire hardly needs and introduction, but they give him one anyway, including the famous "jump through the hoop" moment from his initial introductory story... Why Batman taught Robin to jump through hoops is anyone's guess, but it might have had to with conditioning him....
Cue homage to the 60's TV opening, with a healthy dose of homage to the Golden Age
Time trots along, Dick grows up, becomes Nightwing and leaves the cave... and Batman fights alone... or does he?
(Also in this little sequence we see the Joker meet his end, falling from such a great height into the sea that he couldn't possibly survive)
Through the healing power of love, Batman convinces Catwoman to join the side of justice...
And look, they even take out Hugo Strange...
And shortly afterwards... our serial flirterers become newlyweds...
Now who can we recognise in this crowd? That MIGHT be Jaime on the left, and that's Commissioner Gordon just behind the enormously large man with the glasses who I'm sure is nobody the show hasn't featured properly yet... That looks like Babs on his arm, which seems unllikely, but what the heck.
And a little after that... the Waynes are pleased to announce the arrival of a son.... Damian (Have to say, I LOVE that Bruce grows a moustache like his Dad's... it's the sort of thing Bruce WOULD do one feels)
(Now this is a little like Earth-2, where Bruce and Selina married and had a daughter, Helena, who grew up to be the pre-Crisis Huntress.)
So Bruce retires as Batman, to spend more time with his new family, and Dick becomes, at Bruce's invitation, the new Batman.
Damian grows up, and with Bruce as his father, learns more things than how to throw a football.
So the Wayne's decide to have a night out (That always ends well). They attend the opening of the new Batman Museum, where Bruce makes one too many comments about how "Some day all this could be yours" to Damian, who is feeling a little bit too much paternal pressure to join the family business, he's not even finished Junior High yet.
Selina intervenes and suggests Damian go and visit the "Hall of Holyisms" which is.. well, you can see...
Selina suggests that Bruce let Damian make up his own mind about his future, figure things out for himself.
Sadly, the event is broken up by a new Joker, who proceeds to blast the museum to pieces, and despite a frankly magnificent civilian performance against him from Bruce and Selina, they are caught in the destruction are Bruce and Selina, neither of whom survive.
Again, we can play spot the cameo here... Aquaman, Diana, two I'm not sure about, Babs (or Mera), Alfred, Damian, Dick, Clark, Lois, Ollie and Dinah.
Dick tried to console his little brother who is blaming himself for not being able to save Bruce (This is perhaps my biggest grumble with the episode, but more on that later). Dick notes that loss has made Bruce the man he was, has shaped his own life, and that Damian can use it to shape his own life, rather than consume it.
And then an announcement comes in about the new Joker defacing a new statue of Batman...
Dick goes to investigate, noting to Damian that "There's more to the legacy of being Batman, than being Batman... I should know"...
There's a rather brutal fight between new Batman and new Joker, but evil will out, and Dick awakens to find himself chained to the statue... la plus ca shange, eh Dick? :)
Oh, and the statue is rigged to pump enough Joker gas to cover all of Gotham...
And then the real mastermind appears.
Seems he DID survive the fall (as he points out, he's been dropped down smokestacks, eaten by sharks and the like so often it's just a given.. he SURVIVES), but the jokes on him, because the chemicals he's been exposed to over the years mean that he IS dying ("The doctor gave me six months to live, I gave him six seconds" has to be one of the best sick Joker lines in a long time). So he trained up an apprentice ("Batman's not the only one with fans" and "I tried training a lot of apprentices, but it's hard finding someone who can survive being COMPLETELY INSANE!" are a couple more gems)
Oh, and what's the point of having a tied up former Robin if you don't gag him a little.
All seems lost for the new Batman when... a new voice is heard, telling the Joker that it's not just Batman who's new. Yup, Damian has decided to embrace his destiny.
And I like the fact his Robin costume includes flight wings like his fathers.
I think you can guess how this ends, right? Watch the episode if you're not sure..
And then we get a montage of the new Dynamic Duo living up to their father/parent's memory
Note that these are also the International Club of Villains that Morrison created
Pierrot Lunaire...
Scorpiana and El Sombrero
Mr Toad (okay, not in the gang, but the first villain we saw Dick and Damian defeat in the comics as Batman and Robin
and Charlie Caligula
And so the mantle is passed, and when the time comes, Dick passes on the cowl in turn to Damian (and then fades away) and soon there's a new NEW Dark Knight in town.. as a gang of Mutants (as in DKR) rob a bank...
And of course, every Dark Knight needs a squire... and we get a brief glimpse of Damian's son (I suppose it might be a pre-adolescent daughter, but probably not, which seems a pity) who is excited to be joining his father's mission.. "Holy Hammers of Justice!" as he puts it, punching his fist into his other hand a la Burt Ward...
To mirror the Joker "Isn't he PRECIOUS!"
And so the legacy continues, because Batman is an ideal, and an ideal can never die...
We then pull back to see... Alfred Pennyworth, finishing the speculative fiction story he's been writing!
Bruce comes in to tell Alfred that he's discovered that Catwoman is on the prowl again.. Alfred notes drily that that would explain why Bruces Batuite looks so nicely pressed, and that she might make quite the Mrs Wayne... Bruce doesn't agree, but as he disappears off, Alfred just smiles...
End...
Of course, that final scene is actually another nod to the Golden Age, when we found that Alfred sometimes amused himself by writing stories of the future, where Bruce had married Kathy "Batwoman" Kane, retired as Batman and they had a son, Bruce Jr., who became Robin to a now adult Dick's Batman (They even had big roman numeral II's on their chests in case anyone in Gotham was confused) and fought the likes of "The Joker's son".
Oh, and just because it never gets old, whilst we see Bruce marry, we don't see Dick marry, so here's a speculative suggestion of what that ceremony might have been like.
I LOVE the white tie Robin tuxedo! Alfred must have spent WEEKS making that!
Oh, and the gripe about the episode I mentioned; whilst a lot is made of Damian being Bruce's son and heir, it never really seems like it acknowledges that Dick was his son too, just not by blood! Dick was his heir as Batman yes, but... it just didn't feel like he was given the same level of attention. Damian had lost his parents, but Dick has lost his second father too... I dunno, a minor gripe to be sure, but maybe that's just me...
The story opens with THIS image...
First we get given a run down on Batman's initial crime fighting career..
and how he came to realise a need for a crimefighting partner, a squire (Given that I don't think that Batman ever thought about taking on a partner until after Dick's parents died, I'm not sure I like the stalkerish implications there, but I'm probably reading too much into it, and being contaminated by ASBAR's "I've had my eye on that young man for quite some time, which will never stop being icky)
Anyway, the squire hardly needs and introduction, but they give him one anyway, including the famous "jump through the hoop" moment from his initial introductory story... Why Batman taught Robin to jump through hoops is anyone's guess, but it might have had to with conditioning him....
Cue homage to the 60's TV opening, with a healthy dose of homage to the Golden Age
Time trots along, Dick grows up, becomes Nightwing and leaves the cave... and Batman fights alone... or does he?
(Also in this little sequence we see the Joker meet his end, falling from such a great height into the sea that he couldn't possibly survive)
Through the healing power of love, Batman convinces Catwoman to join the side of justice...
And look, they even take out Hugo Strange...
And shortly afterwards... our serial flirterers become newlyweds...
Now who can we recognise in this crowd? That MIGHT be Jaime on the left, and that's Commissioner Gordon just behind the enormously large man with the glasses who I'm sure is nobody the show hasn't featured properly yet... That looks like Babs on his arm, which seems unllikely, but what the heck.
And a little after that... the Waynes are pleased to announce the arrival of a son.... Damian (Have to say, I LOVE that Bruce grows a moustache like his Dad's... it's the sort of thing Bruce WOULD do one feels)
(Now this is a little like Earth-2, where Bruce and Selina married and had a daughter, Helena, who grew up to be the pre-Crisis Huntress.)
So Bruce retires as Batman, to spend more time with his new family, and Dick becomes, at Bruce's invitation, the new Batman.
Damian grows up, and with Bruce as his father, learns more things than how to throw a football.
So the Wayne's decide to have a night out (That always ends well). They attend the opening of the new Batman Museum, where Bruce makes one too many comments about how "Some day all this could be yours" to Damian, who is feeling a little bit too much paternal pressure to join the family business, he's not even finished Junior High yet.
Selina intervenes and suggests Damian go and visit the "Hall of Holyisms" which is.. well, you can see...
Selina suggests that Bruce let Damian make up his own mind about his future, figure things out for himself.
Sadly, the event is broken up by a new Joker, who proceeds to blast the museum to pieces, and despite a frankly magnificent civilian performance against him from Bruce and Selina, they are caught in the destruction are Bruce and Selina, neither of whom survive.
Again, we can play spot the cameo here... Aquaman, Diana, two I'm not sure about, Babs (or Mera), Alfred, Damian, Dick, Clark, Lois, Ollie and Dinah.
Dick tried to console his little brother who is blaming himself for not being able to save Bruce (This is perhaps my biggest grumble with the episode, but more on that later). Dick notes that loss has made Bruce the man he was, has shaped his own life, and that Damian can use it to shape his own life, rather than consume it.
And then an announcement comes in about the new Joker defacing a new statue of Batman...
Dick goes to investigate, noting to Damian that "There's more to the legacy of being Batman, than being Batman... I should know"...
There's a rather brutal fight between new Batman and new Joker, but evil will out, and Dick awakens to find himself chained to the statue... la plus ca shange, eh Dick? :)
Oh, and the statue is rigged to pump enough Joker gas to cover all of Gotham...
And then the real mastermind appears.
Seems he DID survive the fall (as he points out, he's been dropped down smokestacks, eaten by sharks and the like so often it's just a given.. he SURVIVES), but the jokes on him, because the chemicals he's been exposed to over the years mean that he IS dying ("The doctor gave me six months to live, I gave him six seconds" has to be one of the best sick Joker lines in a long time). So he trained up an apprentice ("Batman's not the only one with fans" and "I tried training a lot of apprentices, but it's hard finding someone who can survive being COMPLETELY INSANE!" are a couple more gems)
Oh, and what's the point of having a tied up former Robin if you don't gag him a little.
All seems lost for the new Batman when... a new voice is heard, telling the Joker that it's not just Batman who's new. Yup, Damian has decided to embrace his destiny.
And I like the fact his Robin costume includes flight wings like his fathers.
I think you can guess how this ends, right? Watch the episode if you're not sure..
And then we get a montage of the new Dynamic Duo living up to their father/parent's memory
Note that these are also the International Club of Villains that Morrison created
Pierrot Lunaire...
Scorpiana and El Sombrero
Mr Toad (okay, not in the gang, but the first villain we saw Dick and Damian defeat in the comics as Batman and Robin
and Charlie Caligula
And so the mantle is passed, and when the time comes, Dick passes on the cowl in turn to Damian (and then fades away) and soon there's a new NEW Dark Knight in town.. as a gang of Mutants (as in DKR) rob a bank...
And of course, every Dark Knight needs a squire... and we get a brief glimpse of Damian's son (I suppose it might be a pre-adolescent daughter, but probably not, which seems a pity) who is excited to be joining his father's mission.. "Holy Hammers of Justice!" as he puts it, punching his fist into his other hand a la Burt Ward...
To mirror the Joker "Isn't he PRECIOUS!"
And so the legacy continues, because Batman is an ideal, and an ideal can never die...
We then pull back to see... Alfred Pennyworth, finishing the speculative fiction story he's been writing!
Bruce comes in to tell Alfred that he's discovered that Catwoman is on the prowl again.. Alfred notes drily that that would explain why Bruces Batuite looks so nicely pressed, and that she might make quite the Mrs Wayne... Bruce doesn't agree, but as he disappears off, Alfred just smiles...
End...
Of course, that final scene is actually another nod to the Golden Age, when we found that Alfred sometimes amused himself by writing stories of the future, where Bruce had married Kathy "Batwoman" Kane, retired as Batman and they had a son, Bruce Jr., who became Robin to a now adult Dick's Batman (They even had big roman numeral II's on their chests in case anyone in Gotham was confused) and fought the likes of "The Joker's son".
Oh, and just because it never gets old, whilst we see Bruce marry, we don't see Dick marry, so here's a speculative suggestion of what that ceremony might have been like.
I LOVE the white tie Robin tuxedo! Alfred must have spent WEEKS making that!
Oh, and the gripe about the episode I mentioned; whilst a lot is made of Damian being Bruce's son and heir, it never really seems like it acknowledges that Dick was his son too, just not by blood! Dick was his heir as Batman yes, but... it just didn't feel like he was given the same level of attention. Damian had lost his parents, but Dick has lost his second father too... I dunno, a minor gripe to be sure, but maybe that's just me...