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Occasions when the 'Man' in Batman became more important than the 'Bat'.
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00:00When you think of Batman, it is very unlikely that you think about words like compassion, empathy or mercy.
00:06Usually you think cape, gadget and throat punch.
00:09Despite being a vigilante who embraces the dark back alleys of Gotham as his second home,
00:14occasionally we see behind the mask to the man, not the bat,
00:17and occasionally even glimpses of the scared little boy who lost his parents in one of those filthy alleys.
00:23So with that in mind then, I'm Ellie with WhatCulture,
00:26and here are 10 times we saw behind Batman's mask in the DCAU.
00:31Number 10. Double Talk
00:32Unlike most of Batman's rogues gallery, Arnold Wesker, aka the Ventriloquist, isn't truly evil.
00:39He's a simple man who has been afflicted with mental illness,
00:42albeit one that gives him the unfortunate split personality of an old-time gangster named Scarface,
00:48a Ventriloquist dummy dressed like a 1930s hood.
00:51Upon earning his release from Arkham, Arnold finds out that not only does he have a home
00:55at the Wayne Gardens halfway house, he also has a job waiting at Wayne Enterprises.
01:01Unfortunately, circumstances soon draw him back to the world of crime,
01:04as he believes that Scarface has returned to haunt him.
01:07The rest of the episode follows Batman and Batgirl as they try to figure out what's happening to Wesker,
01:12eventually realizing that Scarface's old gang needed their boss back and manipulated Wesker.
01:17At the episode's end, Bruce reasons with Arnold, telling him that Scarface is the puppet, not him.
01:22Wesker then kills the dummy that so destroyed his life and is pleasantly surprised to find that despite his lapse,
01:28he still has both home and job.
01:30Although not as dramatic as some of the other examples in the list,
01:33Double Talk is a story of redemption and shows that despite his jaded outlook on life,
01:38Bruce understands that mistakes can be forgiven and that people can be saved.
01:42Sometimes Batman's best weapon is a gentle nudge in the right direction, not a batarang to the head.
01:47Number 9. Flash and Substance
01:50It would be difficult to find two heroes more opposite than Batman and Flash.
01:54Okay, Batman and Superman, but that would be too obvious.
01:57Wally West's depiction of the JL and JLU shows was that of a light-hearted and slightly egotistical,
02:03but incredibly generous hero who sees protecting Central City as an honour, not a duty.
02:08In the JLU episode Flash and Substance, a Flash museum is being opened in Central City,
02:13meant to recognise Wally's crime-fighting accomplishments.
02:17The museum is also packed with Easter eggs alluding to the Flash's comic history all the way back to the Golden Age.
02:23After transporting to the Watchtower and finding the rest of the original Justice Leaguers engaged in missions,
02:28Wally not-so-subtly hints that he would love for Bruce to attend his Flash Appreciation Day.
02:33Despite showing complete disinterest, Bruce ultimately sighs before simply asking, what time?
02:38Bruce recognises how important it is for a heavy hitter of the league to be at Central City's Flash Appreciation Day,
02:45and that Wally really is a sincere hero who views something that Bruce would never want for himself as a huge deal.
02:51Not only does Bruce agree to attend, he persuades the equally pessimistic and hard-edged new god Orion
02:57to accompany him with nothing more than a look in a truly inspired bit of banter between voice actors Kevin Conroy and Ron Perlman.
03:04Number 8. Baby Doll
03:06First appearing in the same-named episode Baby Doll, aka Mary Dahl,
03:10is an actress living with a condition that prevents her body from growing to adulthood.
03:14After finding tremendous success on a Brady Bunch-like sitcom, Mary struggled to find serious parts,
03:20forever being thought of only as the catchphrase spouting Baby Doll.
03:23The lack of recognition for her talents finally causes her to snap, and she kidnaps her former TV family,
03:29intending to recreate a birthday party episode that was ruined by the addition of another obnoxious child star.
03:35Baby Doll eludes Bruce for the entire episode, which ends at a carnival.
03:38He chases the gun-toting Mary into a house of mirrors, causing her to stop in her tracks
03:43as she sees her reflection in a mirror that makes her look like a regular adult woman.
03:47As Mary breaks down, Bruce recognises that she is in fact traumatised and broken from her life
03:53as a child star. After emptying her gun of bullets in a daze, Bruce gently takes it from her,
03:58letting Mary hug his legs as she says her catchphrase,
04:01I didn't mean to.
04:02Knowing what it's like to have a lost childhood, he lays an understanding hand on her head,
04:07comforting her as she ponders both her unhappy life as a child and her present as a criminal.
04:12Number 7. Hereafter
04:13Depending on the canon, Batman and Superman have been long-time friends, rivals, or outright enemies.
04:19Their dynamic is fascinating. Batman hates the fact that he has to occasionally be Bruce Wayne,
04:25and Superman wishes he could always be Clark Kent. Despite their differing outlooks,
04:29the DCAU generally depicted Bruce and Clark as friends who had an occasional disagreement
04:34due to how they viewed the role of the Justice League.
04:37In Hereafter, the world sees Superman die during a battle with assorted foes.
04:41In reality, he was transported to a future where Vandal Savage had outlived literally everyone else on Earth.
04:47Much of the two-part episode shows how the world deals with the death of Superman.
04:51Bruce simply refuses to believe Clark is truly dead,
04:54applying scientific theory and logic in place of the grief he clearly feels.
04:58Even though he doesn't attend Superman's funeral, he watches from a distance,
05:02later deciding to pay his respects to the dead hero at his memorial.
05:06In a short but moving soliloquy, Bruce admits that he had nothing but respect for Clark,
05:10and that Superman showed him that justice doesn't always have to come from the darkness.
05:14It's a telling moment for Bruce, revealing that even though logic says otherwise,
05:18he knows his friend may indeed be gone,
05:20and that he will miss the man who showed him that it was alright to occasionally step from the shadows.
05:256. The Grey Ghost
05:27Beware the Grey Ghost gives DCAU fans perhaps the best look ever into what Bruce was like as a kid.
05:33Completely normal, loving junk food and plunking down in front of the TV.
05:37His favourite show was an old pulp-style programme about a hero called the Grey Ghost,
05:42who is strikingly similar to the very heroes who inspired Batman's own origin.
05:47During the course of the episode, Bruce becomes involved in a series of bombings across Gotham
05:51that he quickly realises are identical to incidents from episodes of the Grey Ghost.
05:56While investigating, he encounters Simon Trent, who portrayed the Grey Ghost.
05:59At first, Bruce is thrilled at meeting his childhood idol, who partly inspired him to become a hero,
06:04but grows disillusioned when he discovers that Trent resents his time as the Ghost,
06:08as it typecasts him and ruined his career.
06:11Ultimately, Bruce and Simon, both in costume, team up to take down the Mad Bomber.
06:15In the process, Bruce helps his hero rediscover who he is and revitalise his career.
06:20Seeing Bruce as a fanboy idolising a man who helps send him down the road to his own heroics
06:25is a welcome look at the Bruce that may have been.
06:27To add another layer, Simon Trent is voiced by Adam West,
06:30a great touch that makes the episode one of the most meta of the DCAU.
06:35Number 5. Harley's Holiday
06:37Harley Quinn was absolutely one of the best things to come from BTS.
06:41Introduced as a foil for the Joker, she soon took on a life and identity of her own,
06:46and this episode is a perfect example of why she did so.
06:49We begin with Harley being granted her release from Arkham.
06:52Needing to update her wardrobe, she hits the stores,
06:54accidentally walking out with a dress she actually paid for and setting off the security alarm.
06:59One misunderstanding after another results in Harley completely reverting to her old ways,
07:04kidnapping rich girl Veronica Vreeland before leading Batman and Robin,
07:07the police, the mob and the army on a wild day-long pursuit.
07:11After returning her to Arkham, again,
07:13she asks Bruce why he didn't give up on her when all she had ever done is make his life miserable.
07:18Reaching into his cape, he pulls out the dress that started the whole fiasco,
07:21telling Harley he knew about rebuilding her life and that he had a bad day too once.
07:25It's a glimpse into a Bruce who can never really escape what happened the night his parents died,
07:30and who is driven to right wrongs because of it.
07:32Harley caps off her thank you with a kiss, much to the surprise of Bruce, Dick and Poison Ivy.
07:37This episode is a fantastic showcase for Harley's original and many say best voice Arlene Sorkin.
07:43Number 4.
07:44This Little Piggy
07:45Not many DCAU episodes were written to be purely humorous,
07:49but they hit it out of the park with This Little Piggy.
07:51While on a stakeout where Wonder Woman openly pines for a date with Bruce,
07:55who rejects the Amazonian princess outright,
07:57Diana is turned into a pig by an ancient enemy of her mother's, Cersei.
08:02What follows is a glorious half-hour of Batman and Zatanna parading around the world
08:06and even into hell to find the means to return Diana to normal,
08:10featuring some of the best laugh-out-loud jokes of any animated superhero show.
08:14The depths of Bruce's affection for Diana become apparent as he admits to Zatanna
08:19that there may have been something between them.
08:21After tracking Cersei to Mykonos and engaging in what seems to be a hopeless battle,
08:26Batman stops the fight.
08:27He tells Cersei he's learned that magic always comes at a price.
08:30What is the price to restore Diana?
08:32Cersei's price is for Bruce to reveal a deep secret.
08:35What seems a sure setup for Bruce revealing his identity
08:38turns into the incredible realization that Batman is a hell of a singer,
08:42as he belts out the old standard,
08:43Am I Blue?
08:44He wins Diana's freedom,
08:46leading to a great closing scene where Diana hums the song back at him,
08:50revealing she knows what he did,
08:51and garnering one of the few smiles we ever see cross Bruce's face when he's in costume.
08:57One of J.L.U.'s best.
08:59Number 3. Star-Crossed
09:01Bruce Wayne has been shown as willing to sacrifice everything in his pursuit of justice.
09:06In at least one episode of Justice League, this was almost quite literal.
09:09The finale of the original Justice League series was a multi-part epic called Star-Crossed,
09:14in which it was revealed that Hawkgirl had been for several years an agent of the Thanagarian military.
09:20Her role was simple, scout Earth and its heroes in preparation for the invasion of Earth by Thanagar.
09:26With the Justice League scattered, in a last-ditch plan,
09:28Batman decides to send the Watchtower to Earth like a giant missile,
09:32destroying a massive Thanagarian teleporter.
09:35As the Last Leaguers leave the Watchtower,
09:37Batman locks Green Lantern and Flash into an escape pod,
09:40telling them that his plan necessitates that someone pilot the station.
09:43He tells his teammates that it was an honour to fight alongside them before ejecting the pod.
09:48The next few minutes are an exercise in tension as Batman,
09:51growing increasingly weak from the heat of re-entry,
09:54approaches Earth, being saved shortly before impact by Superman.
09:57Beside being yet another example of Batman's tremendous skill set,
10:01it is an incredible depiction of the lengths Bruce is willing to go to in order to protect the innocent.
10:06His life is of no consequence as long as he can go out saving those who can't save themselves.
10:11Number 2. Heart of Ice
10:13Heart of Ice is considered by many fans to be one of the best, if not the best, episode of BTAS.
10:20It completely revitalised the character of Mr Freeze,
10:23it set a high bar after only a few episodes of the series,
10:27and it won the show its first daytime Emmy for animated show.
10:30The episode involves Bruce investigating a series of crime scenes left coated in ice,
10:35eventually leading him to Mr Freeze, formerly known as Victor Fries.
10:39Fries was a brilliant scientist specialising in cryogenics,
10:42who made it his life's work to perfect a way to return his beloved wife Nora to health.
10:47While working for Gothcore, Fries' work was sabotaged by the company's corrupt CEO Ferris Boyle,
10:52causing the accident that turned the compassionate Victor into the cold, heartless Freeze.
10:57Once he finds out the truth, Bruce goes out of his way to help Victor,
11:00to reason with him, only to be rejected. At the end of the episode, Bruce, who has publicly
11:05exposed Boyle's misdeeds to the Gotham media, resignedly defeats Freeze, returning him to a
11:10special temperature-controlled cell at Arkham. This is another fine example of Bruce acknowledging
11:15that some of his foes are in the position they are through no fault of their own, but bad luck.
11:19Bruce watches Freeze as he sits in his cell, mourning his wife, clearly sympathetic.
11:23This mutual understanding would continue through further DCAU encounters between the two.
11:28Number 1. Epilogue
11:30Epilogue was written to be, if necessary, the finale of the DCAU. Set in the future,
11:35an aged Amanda Waller recounts to Terry McGuinness the tale of how she was responsible
11:40for carrying on the legacy of Batman. Terry, who is having difficulty seeing any good in Bruce,
11:45has gone to Waller for answers. He gets them through one of the best examples of what it's
11:49like for Bruce to be a normal human among the gods of the Justice League. During a battle with the
11:53Royal Flush Gang, Waller advises the Justice League that Ace, a powerful psychic, is in the throes of
11:59dying, threatening the city with mental backlash. Bruce takes a device that will kill Ace, the only
12:04way to stop her, and enters a fantasy land she has physically constructed. He approached Ace,
12:09who has already read his mind and knows he won't be using the device. Ace, who has been experimented on
12:14and trained as a weapon since her birth, connects with Bruce when he sincerely tells her he knows what
12:18it's like to have your childhood taken from you. After admitting she is scared of dying, Bruce sits
12:23on the swing next to her and reaches out his hand in silent comfort. Bruce sits with her until she
12:28dies, having persuaded her to voluntarily return the world around them to normal, in one of the most
12:33emotional animated moments ever put to film. And that concludes our list. If you can think of any
12:38other examples, then do let us know in the comments below, and while you're there, don't forget to like
12:42and subscribe and tap that notification bell. Also, head over to Twitter and follow us there,
12:46and I can be found across various social medias just by searching Ellie Littlechild. I've been
12:51Ellie with WhatCulture. I hope you have a magical day, and I'll see you real soon.
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