I didn't get much out of The Lego Movie, and the surprisingly prominent Batman therein was not the highlight to my mind. This spinoff didn't promise as much focus on the Lego aspect, so I figured it wouldn't even be comparably creative. Nevertheless, a critic made it sound pretty heartwarming, so I didn't write it off altogether. Besides, after all the dark Batman flicks I've seen, I thought I'd try a popular example of the other extreme.
In a moment of distraction, Bruce Wayne (Will Arnett) agrees to adopt ambiguous-aged Dick Grayson (Michael Cera). Wayne butler Alfred Pennyworth (Ralph Fiennes) refuses to send Dick away and even lets him into the Batcave, without letting him know that Batman is Bruce. Batman reluctantly acknowledges that he'll need a little assistance to thwart the latest threat to Gotham City, yet he underestimates how much he could use not just a sidekick but family, especially when the curiously fangy Joker (Zach Galifianakis), with help from henchwoman Harley Quinn (Jenny Slate), assembles an army straight out of the Phantom Zone, an interdimensional prison for extra dangerous supervillains.
If TLBM shares a continuity with TLM, it would explain why the filmmakers appear to have asked themselves, "What if a sugar-addled preteen wrote Batman's script?" In the first half especially, he's egotistical, rude, overcompensatingly macho, and incautious about protecting his secret identity. No wonder Alfred still sees him as a child. Not to say that many other characters act like adults. Alfred and new Police Commissioner Barbara Gordon (Rosario Dawson), who deems Batman inadequate for reducing crime rates, are the only ones played anywhere near straight. Officers even go "pew, pew" when firing weapons.
Yeah, the kiddie humor is pretty embarrassing to adults and probably older kids, but at least the lampooning has a lot of legitimacy. There are also a lot of cultural references that would go over kids' heads. I did pick up on most of the callbacks to older elements of the franchise (which suggest that it was never quite this absurd), but I'm glad to have poked around a trivia page for what I didn't notice. And while we get the most complete traditional if facetious Batman rogues gallery I've ever seen, the Phantom Zone is full of villains from various non-DC Universe movies and shows, even ones I haven't associated with Warner Bros. Young viewers may recognize Voldemort (Eddie Izzard, not Ralph Fiennes), but how many know the Daleks?
Just finding out who voiced whom is good for a tickle to adults. In addition to the above, we have Billy Dee Williams reprising his Harvey Dent role after 28 years, only now after becoming Two-Face. I would not have nominated Conan O'Brien for the Riddler or Mariah Carey for Mayor McCaskill, but they work. And Zoë Kravitz must have done a great job with her few lines as Catwoman, because she went on to a live-action depiction five years later.
As I suspected, the pseudo-brick medium is mainly just a visual style. Its value is in signaling more wackiness than a typical animation. Only a couple scenes have characters rapidly building stuff or making use of their own blocky features.
Heartwarming? Eh, in a pinch. I never respected Robin's existence until I realized that he tended to bring out a less antiheroic side of his mentor, All-Star Batman and Robin notwithstanding. Within 24 hours (or less than 104 minutes, depending how you look at it), Batman treats him gradually yet significantly better. He also gets kinder to Alfred, Barbara, and even a bunch of the villains, not least the Joker, who has a sort of reverse romantic interest in him. Hey, when does the Joker do anything not warped? Still not the funniest guy around, but at least the only apparent (NPI) permanent losses this time are in the past.
Speaking as someone who never watched a complete episode of the 1966 TV series, I found TLBM adequate for mindless entertainment. I just wish DC would follow Marvel's lead and master a balance between light and serious within the same picture.
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