10 Times We Saw Behind Batman's Mask In The DCAU
Occasions when the 'Man' in Batman became more important than the 'Bat'.
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00:00 When you think of Batman, it is very unlikely that you think about words like compassion,
00:04 empathy, or mercy.
00:06 Usually you think cape, gadgets, and throat punch.
00:09 Despite being a vigilante who embraces the dark back alleys of Gotham as his second home,
00:14 occasionally we see behind the mask to the man, not the bat, and occasionally even glimpses
00:19 of the scared little boy who lost his parents in one of those filthy alleys.
00:23 So with that in mind then, I'm Ellie with What Culture and here are 10 times we saw
00:27 behind Batman's mask in the DCAU.
00:31 10.
00:32 Double Talk
00:33 Unlike most of Batman's rogues gallery, Arnold Wesker, aka the Ventriloquist, isn't truly
00:38 evil.
00:39 He's a simple man who has been afflicted with mental illness, albeit one that gives
00:43 him the unfortunate split personality of an old-time gangster named Scarface, a ventriloquist
00:48 dummy dressed like a 1930s hood.
00:51 Upon earning his release from Arkham, Arnold finds out that not only does he have a home
00:55 at the Wayne Gardens halfway house, he also has a job waiting at Wayne Enterprises.
01:00 Unfortunately, circumstances soon draw him back to the world of crime as he believes
01:05 that Scarface has returned to haunt him.
01:07 The rest of the episode follows Batman and Batgirl as they try to figure out what's
01:11 happening to Wesker, eventually realising that Scarface's old gang needed their boss
01:15 back and manipulated Wesker.
01:17 At the episode's end, Bruce reasons with Arnold, telling him that Scarface is the puppet,
01:22 not him.
01:23 Bruce then kills the dummy that so destroyed his life and is pleasantly surprised to find
01:27 that despite his lapse, he still has both home and job.
01:30 Although not as dramatic as some of the other examples in the list, Double Talk is a story
01:34 of redemption and shows that despite his jaded outlook on life, Bruce understands that mistakes
01:39 can be forgiven and that people can be saved.
01:42 Sometimes Batman's best weapon is a gentle nudge in the right direction, not a batarang
01:46 to the head.
01:47 9.
01:48 Flash and Substance
01:50 It would be difficult to find two heroes more opposite than Batman and Flash.
01:54 Okay, Batman and Superman, but that would be too obvious.
01:57 Wally West's depiction of the JL and JLU shows was that of a light-hearted and slightly
02:02 egotistical but incredibly generous hero who sees protecting Central City as an honour,
02:07 not a duty.
02:08 In the JLU episode Flash and Substance, a Flash Museum is being opened in Central City,
02:13 meant to recognise Wally's crime-fighting accomplishments.
02:17 The museum is also packed with easter eggs alluding to the Flash's comic history all
02:20 the way back to the Golden Age.
02:23 After transporting to the Watchtower and finding the rest of the original Justice League's
02:27 engaged in missions, Wally not-so-subtly hints that he would love for Bruce to attend his
02:31 Flash Appreciation Day.
02:33 Despite showing complete disinterest, Bruce ultimately sighs before simply asking "What
02:38 time?"
02:39 Bruce recognises how important it is for a heavy hitter of the League to be at Central
02:43 City's Flash Appreciation Day, and that Wally really is a sincere hero who views something
02:48 that Bruce would never want for himself as a huge deal.
02:51 Not only does Bruce agree to attend, he persuades the equally pessimistic and hard-edged new
02:55 god Orion to accompany him with nothing more than a look, in a truly inspired bit of banter
03:01 between voice actors Kevin Conroy and Ron Perlman.
03:04 8.
03:05 Baby Doll
03:06 First appearing in the same-named episode Baby Doll, aka Mary Doll, is an actress living
03:11 with a condition that prevents her body from growing to adulthood.
03:14 After finding tremendous success on a Brady Bunch-like sitcom, Mary struggled to find
03:18 serious parts, forever being thought of only as the catchphrase-spouting Baby Doll.
03:23 The lack of recognition for her talents finally causes her to snap, and she kidnaps her former
03:27 TV family, intending to recreate a birthday party episode that was ruined by the addition
03:32 of another obnoxious child star.
03:35 Baby Doll eludes Bruce for the entire episode, which ends at a carnival.
03:38 He chases the gun-toting Mary into a house of mirrors, causing her to stop in her tracks
03:43 as she sees her reflection in a mirror that makes her look like a regular adult woman.
03:47 As Mary breaks down, Bruce recognises that she is in fact traumatised and broken from
03:51 her life and exploitation as a child star.
03:54 After emptying her gun of bullets in a daze, Bruce gently takes it from her, letting Mary
03:58 hug his legs as she says her catchphrase "I didn't mean to".
04:02 Knowing what it's like to have a lost childhood, he lays an understanding hand on her head,
04:07 comforting her as she ponders both her unhappy life as a child and her present as a criminal.
04:12 7.
04:13 Hereafter
04:14 Depending on the canon, Batman and Superman have been longtime friends, rivals, or outright
04:18 enemies.
04:19 Their dynamic is fascinating.
04:22 Batman hates the fact that he has to occasionally be Bruce Wayne, and Superman wishes he could
04:26 always be Clark Kent.
04:28 Despite their differing outlooks, the DCAU generally depicted Bruce and Clark as friends
04:32 who had an occasional disagreement due to how they viewed the role of the Justice League.
04:37 In Hereafter, the world sees Superman die during a battle with assorted foes.
04:41 In reality, he was transported to a future where Vandal Savage had outlived literally
04:46 everyone else on Earth.
04:47 Much of the two-part episode shows how the world deals with the death of Superman.
04:51 Bruce simply refuses to believe Clark is truly dead, applying scientific theory and logic
04:56 in place of the grief he clearly feels.
04:58 Even though he doesn't attend Superman's funeral, he watches from a distance, later
05:02 deciding to pay his respects to the dead hero at his memorial.
05:05 In a short but moving soliloquy, Bruce admits that he had nothing but respect for Clark,
05:10 and that Superman showed him that justice doesn't always have to come from the darkness.
05:14 It's a telling moment for Bruce, revealing that even though logic says otherwise, he
05:18 knows his friend may indeed be gone, and that he will miss the man who showed him that it
05:22 was alright to occasionally step from the shadows.
05:25 6.
05:26 The Grey Ghost
05:27 Beware the Grey Ghost gives DCAU fans perhaps the best look ever into what Bruce was like
05:32 as a kid, completely normal, loving junk food and plunking down in front of the TV.
05:37 His favourite show was an old pulp-style program about a hero called the Grey Ghost, who is
05:42 strikingly similar to the very heroes who inspired Batman's own origin.
05:47 During the course of the episode, Bruce becomes involved in a series of bombings across Gotham
05:51 that he quickly realises are identical to incidents from episodes of the Grey Ghost.
05:56 While investigating, he encounters Simon Trent, who portrayed the Grey Ghost.
05:59 At first, Bruce is thrilled at meeting his childhood idol, who partly inspired him to
06:03 become a hero, but grows disillusioned when he discovers that Trent resents his time as
06:08 the Ghost as it typecast him and ruined his career.
06:10 Ultimately, Bruce and Simon, both in costume, team up to take down the mad bomber.
06:15 In the process, Bruce helps his hero rediscover who he is and revitalise his career.
06:20 Seeing Bruce as a fanboy, idolising a man who helped send him down the road to his own
06:24 heroics is a welcome look at the Bruce that may have been.
06:27 To add another layer, Simon Trent is voiced by Adam West, a great touch that makes the
06:31 episode one of the most meta of the DCAU.
06:35 5.
06:36 Harley's Holiday
06:37 Harley Quinn was absolutely one of the best things to come from BTAS.
06:41 Introduced as a foil for the Joker, she soon took on a life and identity of her own, and
06:45 this episode is a perfect example of why she did so.
06:49 We begin with Harley being granted her release from Arkham.
06:52 Needing to update her wardrobe, she hits the stores, accidentally walking out with a dress
06:56 she actually paid for and setting off the security alarm.
06:59 One misunderstanding after another results in Harley completely reverting to her old
07:03 ways, kidnapping rich girl Veronica Vreeland before leading Batman and Robin, the police,
07:08 the mob, and the army on a wild day-long pursuit.
07:11 After returning her to Arkham, again, she asks Bruce why he didn't give up on her when
07:15 all she had ever done is make his life miserable.
07:18 Reaching into his cape, he pulls out the dress that started the whole fiasco, telling Harley
07:22 he knew about rebuilding her life and that he had a bad day too once.
07:26 It's a glimpse into a Bruce who can never really escape what happened the night his
07:29 parents died and who is driven to right wrongs because of it.
07:32 Harley caps off her thank you with a kiss, much to the surprise of Bruce, Dick, and Poison
07:36 Ivy.
07:37 This episode is a fantastic showcase for Harley's original and many say best voice, Arlene Sorkin.
07:43 4.
07:44 This Little Piggy
07:45 Not many DCAU episodes were written to be purely humorous, but they hit it out of the
07:49 park with This Little Piggy.
07:51 Set on a stakeout where Wonder Woman openly pines for a date with Bruce, who rejects the
07:56 Amazonian princess outright, Diana is turned into a pig by an ancient enemy of her mother's
08:00 Circe.
08:02 What follows is a glorious half hour of Batman and Zatanna parading around the world and
08:06 even into hell to find the means to return Diana to normal, featuring some of the best
08:11 laugh out loud jokes of any animated superhero show.
08:14 The depths of Bruce's affection for Diana become apparent as he admits to Zatanna that
08:19 there may have been something between them.
08:21 After tracking Circe to Mykonos and engaging in what seems to be a hopeless battle, Batman
08:26 stops the fight.
08:27 He tells Circe he's learned that magic always comes at a price.
08:30 What is the price to restore Diana?
08:32 Circe's price is for Bruce to reveal a deep secret.
08:35 What seems a sure setup for Bruce revealing his identity turns into the incredible realisation
08:40 that Batman is a hell of a singer as he belts out the old standard "Am I blue?"
08:44 He wins Diana's freedom, leading to a great closing scene where Diana hums the song back
08:49 at him, revealing she knows what he did, and garnering one of the few smiles we ever see
08:54 cross Bruce's face when he's in costume.
08:56 One of JLU's best.
08:59 Number 3.
09:00 Star-Crossed
09:01 Bruce Wayne has been shown as willing to sacrifice everything in his pursuit of justice.
09:06 In at least one episode of Justice League, this was almost quite literal.
09:09 The finale of the original Justice League series was a multi-part epic called Star-Crossed,
09:14 in which it was revealed that Hawkgirl had been for several years an agent of the Thanagarian
09:19 military.
09:20 Her role was simple; scout Earth and its heroes in preparation for the invasion of Earth by
09:25 Thanagar.
09:26 With the Justice League scattered, in a last ditch plan, Batman decides to send the Watch
09:30 Tower to Earth like a giant missile, destroying a massive Thanagarian teleporter.
09:35 As the Last Leaguers leave the Watch Tower, Batman locks Green Lantern and Flash into
09:39 an escape pod, telling them that his plan necessitates that someone pilot the station.
09:43 He tells his teammates that it was an honour to fight alongside them before ejecting the
09:47 pod.
09:48 The next few minutes are an exercise in tension as Batman, growing increasingly weak from
09:52 the heat of re-entry, approaches Earth, being saved shortly before impact by Superman.
09:57 Beside being yet another example of Batman's tremendous skill set, it is an incredible
10:02 depiction of the lengths Bruce is willing to go to in order to protect the innocent.
10:06 His life is of no consequence as long as he can go out saving those who can't save themselves.
10:12 2.
10:13 Heart of Ice
10:14 Heart of Ice is considered by many fans to be one of the best, if not the best, episode
10:18 of BTAS.
10:19 It completely revitalised the character of Mr Freeze, it set a high bar after only a
10:25 few episodes of the series, and it won the show its first Daytime Emmy for Animated Show.
10:30 The episode involves Bruce investigating a series of crime scenes left coated in ice,
10:35 eventually leading him to Mr Freeze, formerly known as Victor Fries.
10:39 Fries was a brilliant scientist specialising in cryogenics, who made it his life's work
10:43 to perfect a way to return his beloved wife Nora to health.
10:47 While working for Gothcore, Fries' work was sabotaged by the company's corrupt CEO
10:51 Ferris Boyle, causing the accident that turned the compassionate Victor into the cold, heartless
10:56 Freeze.
10:57 Once he finds out the truth, Bruce goes out of his way to help Victor, to reason with
11:01 him, only to be rejected.
11:02 At the end of the episode, Bruce, who has publicly exposed Boyle's misdeeds to the
11:06 Gotham media, resignedly defeats Freeze, returning him to a special temperature-controlled cell
11:11 at Arkham.
11:12 This is another fine example of Bruce acknowledging that some of his foes are in the position
11:16 they are through no fault of their own, but bad luck.
11:19 Bruce watches Freeze as he sits in his cell, mourning his wife, clearly sympathetic.
11:23 This mutual understanding would continue through further DCAU encounters between the two.
11:28 1.
11:29 Epilogue
11:30 Epilogue was written to be, if necessary, the finale of the DCAU.
11:34 Set in the future, an aged Amanda Waller recounts to Terry McGinnis the tale of how she was
11:39 responsible for carrying on the legacy of Batman.
11:41 Terry, who is having difficulty seeing any good in Bruce, has gone to Waller for answers.
11:46 He gets him through one of the best examples of what it's like for Bruce to be a normal
11:50 human among the gods of the Justice League.
11:53 During a battle with the Royal Flush Gang, Waller advises the Justice League that Ace,
11:57 a powerful psychic, is in the throes of dying, threatening the city with mental backlash.
12:01 Bruce takes a device that will kill Ace, the only way to stop her, and enters a fantasy
12:05 land she has physically constructed.
12:08 He approached Ace, who has already read his mind and knows he won't be using the device.
12:12 Ace, who has been experimented on and trained as a weapon since her birth, connects with
12:16 Bruce when he sincerely tells her he knows what it's like to have your childhood taken
12:20 from you.
12:21 After admitting she is scared of dying, Bruce sits on the swing next to her and reaches
12:24 out his hand in silent comfort.
12:26 Bruce sits with her until she dies, having persuaded her to voluntarily return the world
12:30 around them to normal, in one of the most emotional, animated moments ever put to film.
12:36 And that concludes our list.
12:37 If you can think of any other examples, then do let us know in the comments below.
12:40 And while you're there, don't forget to like and subscribe and tap that notification bell.
12:45 Also head over to Twitter and follow us there, and I can be found across various social medias
12:48 just by searching Ellie Littlechild.
12:50 I've been Ellie with WhatCulture, I hope you have a magical day, and I'll see you real