Best title cards of BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES
Chris Sims rates the 14 best title cards from BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES.
The title cards were one of my very favorite aspects of BTAS, and one of the big reasons why I thought the fourth and final season lost its way (an unpopular opinion, as luminaries such as my very own Henchgirl celebrate the final season as the show's greatest, but bah says I) is because they abandoned the title cards. Nothing gave a greater sense of each episode's atmosphere, mood, and style like their title cards.
That said, I raise an eyebrow at some of Chris Sims' favorites. "Mad as a Hatter"? It's just the Tenneil illustration, nothing imaginative about that other than some creepy coloring. "Harlequinade" and "Harley and Ivy" both pale to the wonderfully evocative Vargasness of "Harley's Holiday." The rest vary from good to excellent, but there were so many others more deserving of inclusion!
We'll start by getting this one out of the way first:
The pathos of Clayface, actor turned monster, is so perfectly haunting with this card.
I've always loved the Crime Alley title card. It looks like a paperback crime novel from the 50's or 60's, making the place where the Waynes were killed look like a claustrophobic urban death trap.
While I resented that they were even including Bane in the show at the time, this title went a long way to winning me over. The use of light and shadow is what makes most of these great anyway, but here the harshness of the lighting is practically SIN CITY by way of an early 80's horror/sci-fi film from James Cameron, all the way down to the letters themselves.
And yet, of all these, there's only one title card in the whole series that I cannot forgive Sims' for excluding. When I think about my favorites, about the ones that burned themselves into my memory as the greatest indication of this show's power, this is the one that most comes to mind:
The episode itself might is certainly in my top three (or so) episodes of all time. It might be the best, if not my actual personal favorite.
One of these days, Henchgirl and I need to do our duelin' lists of the best eps, since our opinions differ in surprisingly big ways when it comes to the best BTAS (I don't think we'll ever see eye to eye over how I dislike "Judgment Day" and she dislikes "Almost Got 'Im"), even though it's the show that, in many ways, defined our mutual loves of Batman.
The title cards were one of my very favorite aspects of BTAS, and one of the big reasons why I thought the fourth and final season lost its way (an unpopular opinion, as luminaries such as my very own Henchgirl celebrate the final season as the show's greatest, but bah says I) is because they abandoned the title cards. Nothing gave a greater sense of each episode's atmosphere, mood, and style like their title cards.
That said, I raise an eyebrow at some of Chris Sims' favorites. "Mad as a Hatter"? It's just the Tenneil illustration, nothing imaginative about that other than some creepy coloring. "Harlequinade" and "Harley and Ivy" both pale to the wonderfully evocative Vargasness of "Harley's Holiday." The rest vary from good to excellent, but there were so many others more deserving of inclusion!
We'll start by getting this one out of the way first:
The pathos of Clayface, actor turned monster, is so perfectly haunting with this card.
I've always loved the Crime Alley title card. It looks like a paperback crime novel from the 50's or 60's, making the place where the Waynes were killed look like a claustrophobic urban death trap.
While I resented that they were even including Bane in the show at the time, this title went a long way to winning me over. The use of light and shadow is what makes most of these great anyway, but here the harshness of the lighting is practically SIN CITY by way of an early 80's horror/sci-fi film from James Cameron, all the way down to the letters themselves.
And yet, of all these, there's only one title card in the whole series that I cannot forgive Sims' for excluding. When I think about my favorites, about the ones that burned themselves into my memory as the greatest indication of this show's power, this is the one that most comes to mind:
The episode itself might is certainly in my top three (or so) episodes of all time. It might be the best, if not my actual personal favorite.
One of these days, Henchgirl and I need to do our duelin' lists of the best eps, since our opinions differ in surprisingly big ways when it comes to the best BTAS (I don't think we'll ever see eye to eye over how I dislike "Judgment Day" and she dislikes "Almost Got 'Im"), even though it's the show that, in many ways, defined our mutual loves of Batman.