Nerding Day: Batman Ninja

What if Batman was a ninja?

Apologies. Some of you threw a fastball, and repair prices on a cracked screen sting. But great stories ask questions. Why are we here? Can a guilty soul be redeemed? What if Batman was a ninja?

Nice wind-up. It’s your phone, do what you want. But watch the yelling. Screaming “BATMAN IS ALREADY A NINJA” summons local cops. Like the NYPD’s Officer Steve, who’s a great sport. I asked “What if Batman was a Ninja?” and he only fired twice.

That question drives Batman Ninja.

A movie where Batman becomes a ninja. Not an origin story. Not a Year One retread. An active and experienced Batman learns the ways of stealth and martial arts. With the help of his sidekicks, who he trained in sneaking and punching. Skip the throw, a sweatshop worked hard on that phone.

So spoiled.

Then again, I’ve misled you. For years, I’ve implied that stupid bullshit and greatness live apart, in a state of war. But they can share one body. This overlong, half-written, and underfunded movie makes me smile every time. That’s straight-to-DVD magic. Or straight to streaming if I confront time. Don’t make me confront time.

Ratings spawn madness and hate mail. They’re the most dangerous move you can make online short of girl. Today, I’ll still call Batman Ninja a two star effort. Not mediocre, but a struggle between garbage and gold. If you despise, love, or sleep through Batman Ninja, you’re right. You’re reviewing an inkblot.

The studio, Kamikaze Douga, knows chaos. If you live outside the Otaku Box (e.g., in God’s light), they made the best Star Wars: Visions short. If you’re a minimum security nerd, they made the Jojo openings behind ill-advised star tattoos. Like mine. And if you’re trapped in weeaboo hell, this paragraph’s pointless. You already know they made Pop Team Epic, the first sketch show to grant immunity to Ritalin.

That streak continues. Unintentionally.

My treasure’s an hour in. I’ll help you feel that journey.

No jumping ahead. The tale begins with pre-ninja Batman sneaking up on an opponent. Namely Gorilla Grodd, who Justice League elevated from The Flash’s punching bag to everyone’s. In villainy, career progress feels like internal bleeding.

In case schools taught you to read instead of DC: Grodd’s a gorilla mad scientist, and great. He had to be evil. Since birth, he’s been stronger than hairless apes and funnier than hairy apes. For Grodd, Earth’s one giant rush hour escalator, full of wasted carbon blocking both lanes. Stand on the right, walk on the left. Nothing could be simpler. Yet Grodd misses transfers so that the last Pokemon Go player can grind bankruptcy.

Anyway, Batman slips into his evil tower.

Well, Batman doesn’t sneak. He announces himself and gets lobbed through a window. Maybe he has a little to learn.

Gotham’s 90% cathedral.

Grodd's evil experiment misfires. What kind? A novice might tell you. An artist might show you. Douga has mechs to get to, and flies to their (first) premise. Leaving Bruce as lost as the viewer:

We’re doing Bat-isekai. The first draft had a truck instead of a gorilla. Working title: The Time I Reincarnated in The Same World as Still-Batman.

Grodd’s ambitiously literal plot device dumped Batman in the past. Not Gotham’s, where Bruce Wayne could raid a haunted plantation run by his great-grandfather. I mailed six versions of that script, and received six boxes of shredded paper. He’s in Hollywood’s version of feudal Japan. A rich setting offering countless fresh–

Okay.

The Joker’s already in charge of the past. How? Solid question. It’d make a great story. But today’s all pomp and no circumstance.

Got it.

Mmm-hmm.

I’m listening.

And suddenly, I’m back in.

Every phase of Batman Ninja needs a minute to stretch. And ten to change. When it gets loose, it’s fun. Not the reflection on justice of a good/bad Frank Miller clone. But the hectic nonsense you’d expect from the pitch “Batman anime.” Our target tone is The Brave and the Bold on C4, and we get close.

Shame it starts over three times. Starting with a Bat-Beating.

Per Nintendo tradition, Batman loses all of his toys. A fair price for facing a mech with a non-mech. We know Bruce’s budget, and the Justice League’s time travel commuter benefits. But without his tech, Batman folds like a child without their cell…only friend through the plague. Their tiny window to the surviving world. Their parent-supplied dopamine patch. Jeez, now I feel like shit. A Metroid joke would’ve been better.

Anyway, dire straits. His sidekicks bail him out, despite a bad case of Bleach poisoning.

Except Nightwing. He always looks like that.

The kids lead an army of human shields called the Bat Clan, who believe one day a legendar– it’s Bruce. The foretold ninja savior is Bruce. Batman has tech billionaire self-esteem, so he needs a private religion. Then the BatCult allies with Grodd, instead of someone more reliable like Two-Face.

Leading to reboot two: Gorilla Grodd usurping a frail, unstable clown. Which, on its own, works. Talking gorillas battering mimes is why I read anything, and evangelize comic books in particular. What flops is the flashback revealing Grodd’s plan…to go back in time. And mindjack four other Batman villains, forcing them to act against their nature and…attack Batman.

Bruce takes this well.

Sorry, wrong notes. He despairs with a speed I’ve never seen outside of a casino or election party.

The Bat-dysthymia passes, and Batman swears to meet prophecy. To master the shadows. To turn fear against evil. To become a ninja.

And then the movie runs out of money.

This could be a still from Gotham Warriors. But it’s here too, for ninja exposition that costs less than this text. It’s an inexplicable dickup–Batman Ninja starts four times and ends twice, so there’s room to cut. I should call it unforgivable. But I know what they’re saving money for. That, and the sheer, penny-pinching audacity makes me cackle like a pre-plague child.

Besides, I have a short memory. Like our third reboot, a short in a third style about the Joker getting and losing amnesia. It seems pointless, but it sets up Joker usurping Grodd usurping Joker usurping Grodd.

Jason Todd does his old “please let me kill the fucking Joker,” bit. For the uninitiated, it’s a nuanced conflict: Jason wants to kill the fucking Joker, like everyone that’s not Batman, including the Joker. But louder.

Batman upholds the shadow warriors’ first law: thou shalt not kill. Bringing him one step closer to ninjahood. He drags Jason Todd out of Bin Laden’s cave, to join their pacifist army and beat Dishonored the hard way. It’ll take a lot of nonlethal prompts to beat a gorilla into traction, but Batman believes in the cult that believes in him.

Leading to our main event. The reason we’re here today. Right now, the ratio of pointless bullshit to Sumo Bane seems off. This is, to an intact brain, a bad film. But the last stretch stops huffing dollar store paint, and empties a full can of Montana black into each nostril. Clawing its way, brain-first, to mediocrity. As Brooklyn sinks into a borough of Atlantis, I’ll take that stupid, stupid ride.

Batman Ninja knows white saviors attract harsh jeers and worse applause. So it centers a white devil civil war. Gotham’s five deadliest nerds do time travel right: building an army of fanatics, a giant robot, and a timeline snarl nine McFlys couldn’t fix with ten Terminators.

I’m here for the robots, e.g. mechs piloted by Batman villains.They are my children. Like all children, they disappoint me with each breath. And I would die for them.

We’ll start with Slade.

Deathstroke’s become King of the Weebs. Batman tries, but he’s having a shit time. Every minute of Warlord Slade’s life is joy. He’ll only go back to central air and internal plumbing in a casket. I’m not saying he’s right. I just understand, moreso than I get my neighbors, friends, or self.

There’s one role model here, and he’s not in the title.

Poison Ivy has…a boat? Okay, I guess. I expected more.

My bad. It transforms.

Pristine. Make that two role models. Now, what’s Two-Face’s first mech? If his can’t transform, they’ve failed two genres, fandoms, and nations at once.

Decent start, but a transformation needs to bring it home. Step up. I already forgave four minutes without animation. And forty without writing. Don’t fuck me here.

Beautiful, but late work only gets an A.

The Penguin’s a nuanced Bat-foe: he has three or so traits instead of one. It’ll be hard to get him right.

It sucks! Which it should; it’s the Penguin’s. His entire bit is raging inadequacy in a world of Greek Gods. A cool PenguinBot would insult Danny Devito’s craft.

There was a movie before this, right? Was Grodd in it? How’s he doing?

Well-played. Why struggle in Smash Bros. when the tryhards take each other out? Grodd coasts in the first fight’s castle. I doubt he even recharged it.

They fight for ten plotless, incomprehensible minutes of gut-laughter. Streaming fees well spent. Grodd picks up the edge, because camping always works.

As for Batman & Family? Fight commentary. The almost-ninjas plan to camp Grodd once he’s done camping. Kamikaze Douga is committed to its stupid, stupid question, which robs us of Waynetech’s spin on Pacific Rim. For ages, I’ve said to put themes and character before action. I was wrong. I’m a moron. I can’t merge without flipping the car. Graduating Princeton just means not punching a Walton.

They still get counter-counter-camped.

The clown’s our final boss. In theory, there were other outcomes. Likely better. But marketing shinobi would die for this ending. Batman Ninja chooses peace, and has Joker forget his amnesia.

Grodd loses with grace.

Robin’s endless babble pays off: Grodd’s flute summons an ape kaiju made of normal-sized monkeys. You didn’t miss something. It just happens. The monkeys link limbs like furry cheerleaders, and make a mech out of meat. Each punch sends monkeys flying like the Space Race.

Batman Ninja derailed five minutes in, and the train’s starting to hit buildings. It fills my heart.

Why didn’t Grodd use it? Easy: Grodd’s a total dick. Would you leave your tree to fight Deathstroke’s Gundam, or sleep in? Mangos don’t peel themselves.

After my fun, it’s time to appease the marketing clan. Batman’s faced every shade of death, but Batman Ninja ends on a unique trial. An experience testing every minute of non-ninja training.

Batman fistfights the Joker.

To defeat an anemic and chemically disabled clown, Bruce digs deep. He taps the lore of the Koga, Iga, and Hayabusa clans. Gaining the ability to discorporate in bats.

And throw Naruto hand signs. There’s no more stealth or fisticuffs holding his inner shinobi back.

Batman finally becomes a ninja.

Alright, I get it. Back to junior fascist propaganda. Or works misread as junior fascist propaganda.

This article was brought to you by our fine sponsor and Hot Dog Supreme: Doug Redmond, who transforms into the mighty MechaDoug, a giant robot made out of thousands of lesser Dougs.

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