Hello and welcome to Project Nitsuj. In 2012 Warner Bros. released a video series called Batman of Shanghai. It was 3 short videos which featured Batman, Catwoman, and Bane fighting each other in a 1930’s setting of Shanghai. The concept was cool, unique, the animation spectacular, and it offered a unique and interesting take on the Batman universe that we’ve never seen before. Everyone was amazed by these videos and wanted to see more of Batman and the others in this Asian-like setting. Well we finally got our wish with Batman Ninja. Coming out in April of 2018, the hype for this movie was out of this world. When they first saw the trailer, some were amazed others were confused but everyone was interested in this movie as it was being done entirely by some of the top creators in Japan. They got character designs from Takashi Okazaki from Afro Samurai, the screenplay was written by Kazuki Nakashima who did Kill la Kill and Gurren Lagann, music from Yugo Kanna who did Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure and Psycho-Pass, Jumpei Mizusaki was the director, and the production for the movie was being done by Kamikaze Douga a studio that’s been around since 2003 but mostly did the CGI production of animes over the years until they made a name for themselves this year with Pop Team Epic. With so many talented people coming together to create a Japanese Batman movie the hype for this movie was off the scale. Let’s journey to the past and see if this movie lives up to the hype. This is Batman Ninja.
The movie opens up in Arkham Asylum (the most insane place on Earth) where Batman voiced by Roger Craig Smith and Koichi Yamadera (Zenigata from Lupin the Third Part IV) along with Catwoman voiced by Grey Griffin (Mandy from the Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy) and Ai Kakuma (Julis from Asterisk War) are fighting Grodd who has built a time machine (he’s wants to go back and rewrite Planet of the Apes). Things go haywire and the machine sends Batman back in time to feudal Japan where he’s a wanted criminal. Samurais show up wearing Joker masks and try to kill him but he escapes (scene here: https://youtu.be/yu9gZjRjcAc, *chuckles* no skyscrapers this time Batoman-san). At night, he sneaks into the castle garden and discovers that Joker voiced by Tony Hale and Wataru Takagi (Bellamy from One Piece) is the lord of the castle with Harley Quinn voiced by Tara Strong (Twilight from MLP: FiM) and Rie Kugimiya (Aria from Hidan no Aria) at his side. He gets the jump on Batman and they have a short fight in the garden where Batman manages to dodge Joker’s attacks and escapes to fight another day (scene here: https://youtu.be/sqQ24BI1-YI). He manages to escape safely where he meets up with Catwoman who arrived 2 years before him (that’s time travel for you. Despite getting sucked in at exactly the same time they arrived at different times). She explains to Batman that Joker along with the other criminals of Gotham have deceived the Sengoku daimyo and become feudal lords of the state (they can take over a country but can’t take over one city?) who are now all battling each other for dominance in Japan (well they got that part of history right). Batman and Catwoman agree to work together to stop the criminals and their first goal is get control of Grodd’s machine located in Joker’s castle. They find Alfred who along with Nightwing, Red Robin, Red Hood, and Robin got sent to the past as well however the locations of the boy wonder club are unknown. Alfred and Catwoman have created a Batcave outside of Edo where the Batmobile has been waiting all this time (goddamn it, this thing is like Tails from Sonic the Hedgehog. It keeps popping up). The Batcave gets attacked by the Joker army but Batman uses the Batmobile to race through the streets and reach the castle (scene here: https://youtu.be/WaXPx91quD8, this is sure to mess up the timeline). As he races to the castle, Joker activates the castle’s secret function mecha arms (yeah, not gonna lie. This is both silly, cool, and stupid at the same time). The Batmobile gets caught but it transforms into the Batwing and then when that gets caught it transforms into the Batcycle (and then when that fails it transforms into the unicycle. Then it transforms into a pogo stick followed by Batman just walking) where he finally reaches Joker’s throne room and confronts Joker (scene here: https://youtu.be/8qael3ndMUw) only to leave him to save a woman and her child. He has a short fight with Bane (the quickest Bane fight I’ve ever seen) and manages to save the woman and child but loses his armor in the fight and finds out the woman was just Harley Quinn in disguise (shades of Return of the Joker). He gets attacked from behind and surrounded by the Joker and his men only to get saved by ninjas (scene here: https://youtu.be/C-lATPJDMAE). He gets taken to a boat where he meets Nightwing voiced by Adam Croasdell and Daisuke Ono (Midorima from Kuroko’s Basketball) and Red Robin voiced by Will Freidle (Terry from Batman Beyond. He finally became a Robin) and Kengo Kawanishi who along with the other boy wonders were in the care of Eian, leader of the ninjas known as the Bat clan who want to help Batman restore order to the land as told to them by a prophecy.
They arrive at the Bat clan village where Robin voiced by Yuri Lowenthal (Sasuke from Naruto. He also pulls double duty and voices Red Hood) and Yuki Kaji (Issei from Highschool DxD) deliver a message from Grodd asking to meet Batman in the hotsprings. Batman goes to the hotsprings where Grodd wants to team up with Batman to get his time machine back and out of Joker’s hands (Baron: Alright that’s all cool. Now, can we get the females in the springs as well. I mean, it’d be a great injustice not to have that). The next day comes and they lure Joker out at sea where they fight him and manage to catch him along with Harley (scene here: https://youtu.be/B-1Y_4uDUwQ). But Grodd betrays them and reveals he’s working with Two-Face (really, Two-Face? No offence to Harvey but I think Grodd would have been better off working with Deathstroke). He abandons ship as does Catwoman who changes sides in order to get back home. Two-Face begins destroying their ships and Joker decides that if he’s going to go down he’s going to take Batman with him. He sets off a bomb which destroys them both (they’ve survived worse. They’ll live). Grodd prepares for war in order to get the other power cells from the other criminals and Batman recovers after 2 days of rest where he realizes how foolish he’s been by relying solely on his technology. He and the rest of the Bat family decide to start learning the ways of the ninja to prepare for the big battle ahead and Red Hood finds the Joker and Harley who survived the blast as well but wound up with amnesia and became farmers. Red Hood voiced by Yuri and Akira Ishida (Gaara from Naruto) thinks they’re faking and proceeds to beat them up (still mad about the whole crowbar incident Jason?). Just when he’s about to kill them (https://youtu.be/qFYO43UCMYE), Batman comes in to stop him where he says they’re not faking. He doesn’t see the madness in their eyes anymore, and can see that the two are finally at peace with the world (this scene is also where we see they ran out of budget). Batman decides to leave them alone for the time being and come back for them when they have the time machine (but little does he know, that beating Red Hood gave them reawakened the madness that slept within them).
A month passes and the criminals in their mecha castles (one was silly enough so why not stop now. I shouldn’t be surprised on account of who the people behind this are) set out to do battle as does Batman and his clan (scene here: https://youtu.be/p0Su73Lmj5o). We go to the battlefield where everyone is fighting in their mechs (oh my God it’s so cool yet so goddamn stupid at the same time *begins to cry a little*) and seems like Grodd has the upper hand. He manages to bring everyone under his control and reveals that he’s the one who manipulated everyone into building mechs (you thought of this? You know for a supposedly intelligent being you sure have a lot of dumbass plans. Where’s Luthor when you need him?). He also reveals that he has no intention of returning to the future and instead plans to become the ruler of Japan but his plans may go array as guess who’s back (scene here: https://youtu.be/iZgyl2n5Bq8, he’s baaaaaccccccckkkkkk~). Joker and Harley return where they use gas which paralyzes Grodd and Catwoman to kick them out and take over the mech to combine it with the others to create a super mech (scenes here: https://youtu.be/X9ra-9TJ6B8 and https://youtu.be/v_ndKl-c0MQ, it’s Power Rangers. I am watching an episode of Power Rangers). Oh but it gets sillier. Just when you think it couldn’t get anymore ridiculous, Grodd gives them control over his monkey army and Robin uses them to create a monkey mech made entirely out of monkeys to fight Joker’s mech (https://youtu.be/cRl-dmeLTT8). But that isn’t enough to take Joker down so the bats from the Bat Clan come in, combine with the monkeys (https://youtu.be/BNsrK6P9QvI) and create golden age Batman (or Bat God as they like to call it. Either one is correct). The Bat God fights the Joker mech and manages to bring it down (scene here: https://youtu.be/QGkstrrQ9Ts). Thankfully, after that bit of Shizuku level insanity we return to the badass action as everyone takes out a criminal (Shizuku: The monkeys are destroying Joker’s mech from within) and we get our final fight between Batman and Joker where they deliver on one of the best fights I’ve even seen between the two. Batman wins by going full ninja on Joker (Bat clone jutsu. Scene here: https://youtu.be/MCBxcnB4pl4). With all the criminals captured they use Grodd’s machine to return to their time and hand the villains over to Gordon (hey that reminds me, where was Batgirl in all of this?). In the mid-credits we get a scene of Catwoman trading in a vase she bought back for money and Batman going to the mayor’s party in his horse-driven Batmobile (scene here: https://youtu.be/ut780L_EP1g, the legend of Japan lives on).
Final Thoughts
So that was Batman Ninja and. . .it doesn’t live up to the hype. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed it. The animation is brilliant, the fight scenes are good, and the characters are handled well for the most part but it’s just not as great as we were all hoping it to be. The first two-acts are good but it’s the third act where everything goes from cool and good to silly, stupid, and cool. The mecha fight was completely unnecessary, made no sense, and was so over the top that nobody could take this seriously. I don’t mind insane things in a Batman movie, but the third act was just too insane for me to enjoy.
The voice acting in both the sub and dub is good but I think the sub is better. While the voice acting in the dub is good as they got some good VAs the dialog and lip-syncing is just all over the place. Like I said before the animation is brilliant here and the concept of Batman in feudal Japan is cool as well. I really wanted to see the villains have more of a role in the movie besides showing up and facing each other at the last minute. I really do think this concept would have benefitted more as an actual anime or a video game for that matter.
Final Score
Batman Ninja earns a 5.5/10. Despite the movie’s fault I still find this an enjoyable movie and would encourage fans of Batman and anime to check it out at least once as the concept is just too cool and unique to overlook. It’s one of the first times we’ve ever seen Japan’s interpretation of the Dark Knight and I hope to see more interpretations in the future. Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time on Project Nitsuj.
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