No character, to our knowledge, has impaled anyone with a pencil here. “It definitely harkens back to simpler times.”Īll this makes The Brave and the Bold more kid friendly than some of Batman’s other recent appearances. “I’m calling in a big, Saturday morning bowl of cereal,” producer James Tucker told CBR News. It’s part Powerpuff Girls, part Superfriends and part 1960s-era Batman. The result is a show that feels lighter, brighter and sometimes sillier than Cartoon Network’s first Batman incarnation, the brooding and much-lauded Batman: The Animated Series. With so many fellow superheroes to talk with and so little time to take down the barrage of bad guys, Batman has precious little time to do dour. (I don’t think the folks at DC Comics are rushing to make a film based on Blue Beetle anytime soon.) But just as often they’re pretty anonymous. Sometimes they’re wildly popular protagonists, such as Wonder Woman or Green Lantern. In each stand-alone episode, Batman must battle baddies with the help of another superhero. But he has neither, thanks to Cartoon Network’s tight template. Oh, perhaps he’d be prone to give his glower a go if he had enough time and space to do it. This is the lighter side of Batman, a not-so-Dark Knight, if you will. In Batman: The Brave and the Bold, it sometimes can be hard to tell what hurts Batman’s nemeses more: the superhero’s right hook or his dry wordplay. But on Cartoon Network, there’s a more colorful caped crusader at work, as prone to uttering lame puns as trading fisticuffs with the nearest supervillain. At least, that’s the way he’s seen in the movies. These days, Batman is more likely to be seen as a brooding, troubled vigilante who struggles with dark evildoers and his own inner demons in equal measure.

Batman brave and the bold cast