Catwoman: Hunted

Going into this, I wondered what a stand-alone Catwoman movie would look like and here u have Catwoman: Hunted.

It took a while personally, to recognise the animation style for this cartoon. It didn't look good at first where the characters' anatomy were not seamless but it got better and after seeing that it's anime, it became more appreciable. It seemed to work well for the action scenes but a huge problem with that is the way the manoeuvres were handled. All laws of physics were broken, taking suspension of belief to a new level.

The voice acting is not among the best we have seen but it's one you can get by with. That being said, what killed the dialogue was the cringe worthy humour. At first, one would think that the light tone and humour meant that it was targeted at kids or very young teens. The first quarter also seemed to deliberate dodge any gory displays as well. But as the movie progressed the directors seemed to forget their layout altogether and just deliver one gruesome shot after another. Back to the dialogue and banter, I couldn't believe what I was hearing but as it went on, I found myself laughing at the movie's ridiculous attempt at any form of humour. Whenever the actress voicing Catwoman/Selina Kyle was delivering her lines, the sentences seemed to drag as if to patronize the viewer. Cheesy one liners were thrown back and forth and yet, some phrases still managed to be in-audible.

It's a movie with quite a simple plot, lots of female characters and a welcome agenda against human trafficking, "young girls" as expressly stated by Catwoman at a point.

Still it doesn't know who it's meant to be aimed at.

Catwoman: Hunted is kinda pointless since it lacks any major characters arcs, twists or real narrative but it's a good animated movie that's fast paced enough to be simple and energetic fun.

Elizabeth Gillies gives a really good lead performance and certainly has the charm and energy necessary to play Catwoman. She has solid chemistry with Stephanie Beatriz, who is an effectively cold Batwoman.

The anime influence in the animation definitely helps it standout amongst a increasingly crowded set of films. The music by Robert J. Kral is a mixed bag with some of it being way too much but other parts fitting the scene rather well.

An enjoyable self contained story that still hints at a wider world. Mostly down to earth action oriented cohesive plot with believable motivation. I know it does not sound like much but its more than most movies have delivered in recent history.

The voice Elizabeth Gillies used was like honey.

Catwoman was balanced and playful. Batwoman was softer than in her previous screen appearances. Both were a delight.

It has been a long while since I so fully enjoyed a DC movie. I defiantly enjoyed it a lot more than Justice Society: World War II or their attempts at adapting big name stories like injustice or superman red son,etc.

The only minor thing I would say slightly detracted from the movie is the number of villains, particularly the presence of one near the final fight felt unnecessary. While I greatly enjoyed the fight sequence itself, I felt the same could have been accomplished by simply having the final antagonist do those actions.

The writing felt all over the place, lacks any twists or turns and just plays out in a very generic and formulaic way. No character arcs or anything of the sort to be found here, which is disappointing.

When I heard Yutaka Yamada was composing the score for this, I was really expecting this movie to go all in on a thrilling and unpredictable heist story along the lines of Great Pretender (which Yamada also did the score for) so this being the end result ended up being very disappointing for me.

Not gonna lie, I didn't really know how to feel about this movie when it first got announced, I was just kind of happy that Catwoman will finally get a new solo movie, Like seriously, when was the last we got a GOOD solo Catwoman movie for crying out loud, Firstly, we got the hilariously awful 2004 live-action Catwoman movie and then we got a 2D animated Catwoman showcase a couple of years ago, and that was kind of it..

So I was pretty excited for the movie and thankfully it didn't disappoint, This movie was so much fun, Even though the was basically 80% action and 20% Catwoman messing with Batwoman, I still had a lot of fun with it!

Catwoman attends a Masquerade party with Black Mask, Of course, Catwoman being Catwoman, she wandered on her own to go and steal the green priceless diamond that is locked behind a giant bank safe, As I said, this movie doesn't really have that much of a story, It's more an action movie more than anything and thankfully, the action is great!

The animation is pretty great too, except some animation looking a bit goofy here and there and CGI cars looking a bit outdated, I think this art style really fits Catwoman's character, The producers said that the biggest inspiration for this movie was "Lupin III" and I could totally see that!

The jazzy smooth score is really good too, The voice cast is really good too, and the fact that Batwoman is voiced by the same chick who voiced Mirabel in Disney's Encanto is just incredible!

Of course I have some complaints like how the movie introduces like 8 characters and doesn't really do that much with them, I guess I shouldn't blame the movie is only 1 hour and 18 minutes, so I guess they didn't really had that much to work with, but still even with that, I still think that Catwoman: Hunted is really fun, charming colorful action flick!

And I already know a lot of Batman fans won't like this movie because it's not dark and gritty and suspenseful like other animated DC movies, but hey, having a little bit of fun won't kill anyone right, Not every Batwoman related thing has to be The Dark Knight trilogy, Live a little :)