Batman Ninja

Batman Ninja is an incredibly stylish and original anime that just so happens to feature Batman and co. While the animation occasionally falters and the English dub can best be described as 'serviceable', it succeeds at delivering an excellent and decidedly different animated Batman feature. I truly hope that DC will continue to deliver more animated features like Batman Ninja.

8/10

• Many of the lowest reviews on IMDB seem to take issue with the Japanese influences and the departure from the usual 'grounded' Batman universe(s). If you dislike Japanese media and/or can't handle a film that will greatly differ from popular Batman movies & source material, then this is not for you.

I'm not someone who reviews films online, but this was so pitifully done that it deserves some criticism.

Given that anime is a visually-focused story telling medium, it can be expected that dialogue will rarely be taken seriously. Unlike western animation, scripts are usually only developed after the animation is complete. For this reason, WB allowed for the English language version to develop independently from the Japanese, expecting that doing so would ensure that the film was authentically Batman while allowing the animation team in Japan to focus on making an authentically anime creation of their own. However, the result is the most mindless Batman script ever created in an animated film. The animation has its moments, but is completely overshadowed by the dumbest and least observant Batman ever created. For the world's greatest detective to ask who a group of samurai wearing Joker masks are working for is just lazy storytelling. This Batman has none of the characteristics that make him an attractive character and the voice acting feals forced and overdone.

I never trust these types of crossover endeavors because they rarely allow for either medium's strengths to fully materialize. Reading that this was to be scripted independently in English made me curious to see if there would be some more substance to the story to go along with the flashy animation, but it's a hard pass. There's some chance that the Japanese version might make a little more sense, but I don't see how this poorly constructed story allows for much improvement. A hard pass.

I love Batman. I love anime. I love cheesy anime conversations. But I hate an emptied character and script despite a huge potential.

Batman is NEVER about his gadgets. Look at the Arkham Knight game, Red Hood thinks Batman is all about his gadgets and nothing without them, but Batman proves him wrong with his gigantic intellect and training. Granted, he relies on his gadgets on his day-to-day operations. However he never despairs when he loses any of them. On the contrary, he willingly sacrifice his gadgets and tools like they are nothing, because he is the weapon.

If anyone says "its's an interpretation of Batman" an interpretation is about nuances, settings, surroundings; not the main subject. If you take what makes Batman out of Batman, it's not an interpretation, it's Dark Knight Rises...

Decent artwork though...

This movie runs like the cut scenes from a game like 'Justice League, gods among us' or the likes. The plot was good but dialog very poor and only used to string fight scenes together. In many ways it felt like an advert for all the various Anime formats crammed into one movie based on a popular western brand. In short I loved what the movie tried to do but the end result missed the mark. 4/10

One of the oddest films I have ever seen hands down. I have no idea what was going on for majority of the film. The voice acting was pretty bad, and the animation was odd - the style changed so often I can't say if it was good or bad. Despite all of this I will not forget it - a recommendation if you're gonna watch with friends and not take it seriously, but it's not good.