Thoughts on DC Animation's Dark Knight Returns, Part 1

The name Frank Miller has popped up a lot on this blog in its relatively young lifespan, which I suppose shouldn’t be a surprise even if I didn’t really set out to focus on him much when I launched this humble little home for my writing about comics. The man is a venerable Titan of the art form, and his vision and work has influenced nearly every mainstream comic from the past twenty-five years in some form or another. Whether it’s his integration of manga sensibilities into western comics, his reinvention of Batman into the emotionally tortured, Dark Knight avenger who has since starred in ninety-five percent of the Batman stories to follow in the wake of Year One and Dark Knight Returns, his sense of design and storytelling or any of the other myriad innovations he brought to the form, Miller’s touch can be felt everywhere in today’s comics.


Which I guess is why I find myself writing about him and his early comics so often, and why to this day I’ll buy, read and/or watch any project with his name on it even if he has gone more than a bit nutty in his old age. Even recent works like his highly controversial anti-terrorism polemic, Holy Terror, the insanely bizarre All-Star Batman and Robin and, yes, even his film bastardization of Will Eisner’s Spirit are worth watching if only as reminders that there’s still some artistic genius living in the eccentricities that have so clearly ballooned to cartoonish proportions in his later years. He remains an Artist in every sense of the word – one of the most important to ever work in the medium. And I’ll be damned if he’s still not one of the most interesting.

My love for Miller and his work, coupled with my general appreciation of anything produced by DC Entertainment’s animation division, made me eager to watch the animated adaptation of the Dark Knight Returns – the project that first established Miller as a comics master – from the moment it was first announced as two feature-length movies. Part 1 hit stores, online retailers and video-on-demand last week, and I recently sat down to find out whether the filmmakers succeeded in effectively capturing the revolutionary spirit of the original comics miniseries. My thoughts after the jump:

Above all else, The Dark Knight Returns, Part 1 is a startling reminder of just how influential Miller’s original comic has been on subsequent film/televison adaptations of the Batman mythos, from Tim Burton’s film to Bruce Timm’s Animated Series right on down to Christopher Nolan’s recently completed trilogy. Not that it was any sort of secret that these filmmakers and projects were borrowing heavily from Miller’s opus, mind you, but there’s still something eye-opening about seeing a direct adaptation of the source material and recognizing its reverberations through all modern Batman stories.

Young Bruce Wayne falling into the abandoned well and first discovering his fear of bats. The spotlight hovering ominously above Crime Alley in the exact space where Thomas and Martha Wayne were shot in front of Bruce while coming home from The Mark of Zorro. Martha’s pearls falling to the ground in a pool of rainwater and blood. All of these now iconic, recurring visual and thematic motifs first popped up in the 1986 comic, and if nothing else the film adaptation recalls just how prevalent the book’s influence has been to all subsequent Batman stories. Even a visual as brief as Harvey Dent calling for a mirror following reconstructive surgery echoed through to works such as Burton’s first film (with Nicholson’s Joker sitting in for Dent) and The Animated Series’ awesome two-part Two-Face origin, and it’s a hell of a lot of fun to see it, and other equally memorable images like it, adapted directly here.

That’s not to say that there isn’t a lot lost along the way from Miller’s comics art to animation. While all the requisite classic images associated with the comic –Batman’s silhouette set against crashing lightning, the giant harbinger Bat bursting through the parlor window – certainly appear throughout the film with great effect, and although Miller’s designs are without question present in all the character models, there is still a disappointing sterilization of Miller’s unique visual style in the animated finished product. I suppose much of this can be chalked up to the requirements of animation in general, where the visuals must be streamlined and kept consistent in order to provide both the animators and the audience visual continuity. Still, I can’t help but feel like this direct film adaptation, with its actual moving pictures, is somehow less kinetic than the original static comic. Miller’s work is just THAT dynamic, to the point where no cartoon could ever capture the same sense of movement and flow Miller achieves on the page. I imagine a direct animated adaptation/homage to any of Jack Kirby’s work would be similarly disappointing.

As should be expected from any adaptation, there are a few noticeable departures from the original story along the way. I’m saddened to report the bare-chested Bridgette Neilson clone with swastika tattoos on her boobs didn’t make it into the PG-13 film, even if I’m not surprised. And unless my memory of the original comic is failing me (and again, it has been a while since I last read it), there are some slight differences in the specifics behind how Harvey Dent’s retransformation into Two-Face and subsequent crime spree play out. Ronald Reagan’s talking head is completely absent, but sadly the endless parade of news reporters and man-on-the-street reactions made it in. These talking heads were an invaluable narrative device and source of critical exposition in the original comic, but here they just manage to interrupt the story’s momentum. That’s the only real pacing problem, though, and overall I think the decision to cut the story into two separate animated films was a good one, as this first installment delivers a satisfying arc on its own while leaving viewers wanting more. Finally, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that the film wastes a critical opportunity to follow Jaws storytelling 101 – instead of keeping Batman off screen until the aforementioned triumphant moment where he bursts across the night sky in front of two shocked police officers, the film blows the suspense far too early in the sequence by showing Batman in full.

All in all, and despite my few problems with it, The Dark Knight Returns, Part 1 is a damn good adaptation of one of the greatest comics ever, and certainly the most influential Batman comic of them all. The filmmakers pay tribute to Miller’s original work while also effectively bringing it to life on the screen. Though its jarring anytime you hear any voice other than Kevin Conroy’s vocalizing Batman’s dialogue, there’s a nice symmetry to using Robocop’s Peter Weller (Miller wrote a screenplay for Robocop 2, most of which didn’t make it into the film) to voice Miller’s Dark Knight, and I eventually came around to his performance. One scene in particular sums up the effectiveness of the voice acting: the first meeting between Batman and his new, female Robin, Carrie Kelly (voiced by Modern Family’s Ariel Winters), manages to be heart-warming and disturbing at the same time – which is pretty damn close to the dramatic power of the original comics sequence. The soundtrack and score also contribute nicely, bringing the appropriate sense of gravitas to the epic story of Batman’s return.

So yes, I enjoyed the film quite a bit. Check it out for yourself on-demand or buy the DVD. Just have your trade-paperback ready, because if you’re anything like me, the movie’s shortcomings will make you want to reread the original comics masterpiece and experience its magic all over again.

That it's for now. As always, thanks for reading, and please pass word of the blog on to friends and likeminded fans.