BEWARE THE BATMAN “Doppleganger” Review

Toonami has aired the final seven episodes of Beware the Batman in one grand marathon! I will be reviewing all the episodes, and releasing them every other day. Let’s begin. SPOILERS!

In this episode, Bruce Wayne (Anthony Ruivivar) has an encounter with, ironically, a man-sized bat creature. After the brief tussle, he decides to investigate as Batman. Meanwhile, Professor Pyg (Brian George) and Mister Toad (Udo Kier) continue to terrorize Gotham, this time with the threat of turning various citizens into animals!

It’s always nice seeing the show dig into Batman’s rogue gallery, and while Man-Bat was not my first choice, I do like what they do with him here. In pretty much every Batman cartoon before now, Man-Bat has been a villain. But in the comics, he has been a hero before, and Beware goes down that route.

The revelation that Man-Bat was being controlled by the two animal-lover villains isn’t that surprising, but Toad makes up for it with his sinister, yet humorous plan to marry one of the females he has taken hostage. I know I wouldn’t want to be in any of the women’s shoes!

I also really liked a scene featuring Katana (Sumalee Montano) training with Barbara Gordon (Tara Strong). Barbara is really coming into her own, and I can’t wait to see her full potential!

Harvey Dent gets some scenes to himself, and while they’re funny, it’s at the expense of making him an idiot. Yay. And as far as closure goes, I think it would have been nice seeing Man-Bat beat up on Pyg or Toad, but oh well.

Another solid episode of Beware the Batman. We have a new ally, foreshadowing for another, and a horrible wedding was stopped. All in a day’s work.