The Lego Batman Movie
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Always be yourself... unless you can be Batman.
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"What is the password?" Iron Man sucks. "Thank you."
— Batman and Batcomputer
The Lego Batman Movie is a 2017 American-Danish-Australian computer-animated action superhero comedy film produced by the Warner Animation Group, DC Entertainment, RatPac Entertainment, Lego System A/S, Dan Lin's Lin Pictures, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller's Lord Miller Productions, Roy Lee's Vertigo Entertainment, and Animal Logic, and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. It was directed by Chris McKay, and written by Seth Grahame-Smith, Chris McKenna, Erik Sommers, Jared Stern and John Whittington, and produced by Dan Lin, Roy Lee, Phil Lord and Christopher Miller. Based on the Lego Batman toy line, the film is an international co-production of the United States, Australia and Denmark, the first spin-off installment of The Lego Movie film series and the second installment overall. The film's world premiere was conducted in Dublin, Ireland on January 29, 2017, whereupon it went into general release from February 8; it was released in Denmark on February 9, and in the United States the day after. The film was released in Australia on March 30, 2017.
Plot
There are big changes brewing in Gotham, but if Batman (Will Arnett) wants to save the city from the Joker's (Zach Galifianakis) hostile takeover, he may have to drop the lone vigilante thing, try to work with others and maybe, just maybe, learn to lighten up. Maybe his superhero sidekick Robin (Michael Cera) and loyal butler Alfred (Ralph Fiennes) can show him a thing or two.
Why Friends Are Family
- The idea of having Lego Batman theatrical film is a good idea and it is well-executed.
- Its decently faithful to the Batman franchise and has tons of references to the 1960's Batman show featuring Adam West, the Burton Batman films, and more.
- The action scenes are a blast to watch, highly helped by the animation.
- It pokes fun at the DC lore. For example, part of the opening does poke fun at Batman's rivalry with Superman.
- The animation is amazing, to giving more fresh backgrounds and style. Like The Lego Movie, it uses the CGI animation instead of stop motion, which is unique, not a rehash, provided by Animal Logic.
- Batman is a likable and well-developed protagonist and Will Arnett is still great at playing him.
- Previous movies such as The Killing Joke faced criticism on Barbara Gordon's characterization, making her The Load whose sole purpose was to be Batman's love interest. This persisted despite their age difference and the dislike of the ship in general. Here, while Bruce has a crush on Barbara, she makes it clear that while she idolizes him she's not interested in him romantically. She also is a highly competent commissioner who manages to defeat Voldemort.
- Robin is very likable and cute, and Michael Cera does a great job voicing him.
- The Joker is a excellent villain and Zach Galifianakis did a fairly good job of voicing him (even though it doesn’t quite fit all that well).
- It teaches its audience about teamwork and knowing when you should tell others that you need help.
- The soundtrack is pretty epic by Lorne Balfe. Special mention goes to "Battle Royale", which even found a way to incorporate the original Adam West theme.
- The opening music, "Black", is so Batmanesque, it would work even for a non-parody/satire/homage. It manages to combine elements from all the incarnations of the Batman theme into one.
- Then there's the more introspective, melodic "A Long Farewell".
- It's not an original piece, but "(I Just) Died In Your Arms" was the perfect song to play during the two scenes where Bruce is gawking over Barbara. It makes the scenes even funnier, and in a strange way, beautiful.
- "Who's the (Bat)Man" by Patrick Stump of Fall Out Boy is an epic heavy metal song describing how awesome Batman is. In the movie proper, it plays when Batman is beating up his entire Rogues Gallery. Yes, it's as awesome as it sounds.
- "Friends are Family" by Oh Hush is this movie's equivalent of "Everything is Awesome", being an upbeat and extremely catchy pop song. To make it better, Batman starts rapping in the middle of it.
- "I Found You" is a sweet little tune that pops up in the movie's soundtrack from time to time, especially in relation to Robin. It's sung by a talented 10-year-old boy from Robin's point of view.
- The recurring song in the movie is Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror", which is covered very well by Alex Aiono, to the point some people like it more than the original.
- While not in the movie itself, trailers and other ads had a very catchy electronic remix of "We Built This City" as background music.
- Most of the jokes are funny, such as when Batman opens the doors to his home by saying "Iron Man sucks!" for Batcomputer.
- There are some fairly emotional and suspenseful scenes, such as when Alfred nearly falls off the Jet, and with Batman being almost a father to Robin is heartwarming.
- The voice acting is great.
- It has a hilarious pop culture reference where Batman laughs maniacally at Tom Cruise saying "You complete me" while watching Jerry Maguire.
- In Alfred's flashback, they manage to reference Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and the Christopher Nolan Batman trilogy, and much more.
- A stellar blend of action, adventure, humor, and drama.
- Awesome minor apperances from Superman and the Justice League, and Batman's rogues gallery.
- The villains from the Phantom Zone were a great addition to the villains in the movie, some were also referenced in LEGO Dimensions, so it was fit that some of the villains were in both Dimensions, and The LEGO Batman Movie, such as The Wizard of Oz, Dalaks from Doctor Who, and Voltomort from Harry Potter, etc., though it was little confusing and supposed to focus on Batman/DC Comics and the Bat-Family.
- Batman's rapping and Beatbox is so rewatchable to listen to.
Bad Qualities
- The joke about Dick Grayson's name may have gotten a little too inappropriate for its target audience, even if it was kind of funny.
- It was a little confusing and invasive to add villains from other media, such as Agent Smith, the Wicked Witch of the West, Voldemort, the Gremlins, Sauron, the Daleks, King Kong, etc., considering the movie was supposed to focus on Batman/DC Comics and the Bat-Family. But it was justified and make sense, since it was referencing to Lego Dimensions.
- Speaking of villains, while most of the extra villains such as Orca Man, Zebra Man, Condiment King, etc. were interesting, many of them were kind of pointless and didn't really fit at all, making them underutilized.
- Sometimes it ignores its source material.
- While he does a fairly good job at it, Zach Galifianakis as The Joker doesn’t quite fit all that well. (It would have been better if Mark Hamill voiced The Joker.)
- The unnecessary faster pacing can make the movie hard to follow sometimes.
- While the animation is amazing, some of the effects like water and smoke are not made of Lego like the first movie did it for having the effects from Lego.
- Some continuity errors, especially when Superman mentions to have imprisoned General Zod at the Phantom Zone, thus inspiring Batman to do the same with the Joker, but once the Joker arrives at the Phantom Zone, Zod is nowhere to be seen. However, he does appear multiple times when Joker returns to Gotham with the villains from the Phantom Zone, albeit not as prominently featured.
Reception
The Lego Batman Movie received generally positive reviews from critics, audiences and fans alike for its animation, voice acting, soundtrack, visual style, and humor. On review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 90% based on 304 reviews, with an average rating of 7.54/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "The Lego Batman Movie continues its block-buster franchise's winning streak with another round of dizzyingly funny—and beautifully animated—family-friendly mayhem". It was ranked the 14th best superhero movie of all time on the site. On Metacritic, the film has a score of 75 out of 100, based on 48 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A–" on an A+ to F scale.
DeviantArt user JacobHessReviews gave this movie an rating of 9/10 (Amazing), saying how this is a very well built animated film.[1]
Box office
Just like The Lego Movie, The Lego Batman Movie performed well at the box office, grossed $175.8 million in the United States and Canada and $136.2 million in other territories for a worldwide gross of $312 million, against a production budget of $80 million.
Videos
Trivia
- Robin and Batgirl, including Excalibur Batman, were playable characters in LEGO Dimensions. Apart from Will Arnett and Rosario Dawson, Michael Cera won't reprise his voice vole.
- In 2019, prior to the release of The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part, Chris Miller stated that all of the Lego movies are based on the imagination of a child character, with The Lego Movie events happening in young Finn's mind. Miller affirmed that The Lego Batman Movie was also from the imagination of Finn and Bianca, though the characters did not appear within the film, although Bianca was alluded to as Phyllis' boss.
- As like The Lego Movie, over twenty Lego sets inspired by scenes from the film were released for the film including two sets of Collectible Minifigures.
- Initial reports indicated that Mariah Carey was playing Commissioner Gordon. However, she was actually cast as Mayor McCaskill.
- A scene from The Lego Movie is reused in the film, depicting Emmet falling down from Lord Buisiness's tower into the real world, as television journalists explain what would happen if Joker detonates his bomb.
- As with The Lego Movie, the second of the closing credits is presented in the background of changing LEGO colors. The cast is divided into groups.
- There are no opening credits, not even the title.
- While most of the villains are based on their comic book appearances, some resemble their live-action movie counterparts. The Penguin resembles Danny DeVito from Batman Returns (1992), Poison Ivy resembles Uma Thurman from Batman & Robin (1997), Bane wears a brown and white parka, a staple of Tom Hardy's portrayal in The Dark Knight Rises (2012) (Bane actually looks identical to The Dark Knight comics) and Two-Face resembles Billy Dee Williams from Batman (1989), as well as being voiced by him.
- Unlike The Lego Movie, this film does not feature any of the figures with the toy's iconic yellow skin, but instead, has more human and monstrous skin tones. The closest is a brief clip from The Lego Movie, featuring an obstructed view of Emmet falling into the void that leads to the real world, shown when the Gotham newscaster discusses the fragile plates, on which the city is built. This also confirms that this film takes place after the events of The Lego Movie.
- While the depiction of the Gremlins in this movie have the visual appearance of their representation in the Joe Dante films Gremlins (1984) and Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990), their role as dismantlers of airplanes actually more closely resembles their depiction in the original 1943 Roald Dahl children's book (Dahl's first children's book) which was written as a companion to an animated Disney film that was never produced.
- Zoë Kravitz was cast as Catwoman in a cameo role, and eventually was cast as the same character in live-action in The Batman.
- This is the only Lego film to not feature any live-action scenes, unless you count Alfred's flashback for 1966.
- On a marquee in the background in Gotham is a "Two Shades Darker" screening at that theater. Fifty Shades Darker (2017) screened at theaters nationwide the same weekend as The Lego Batman Movie (2017).
- This is the first animated DC film to be produced by Warner Animation Group. The second being DC League of Super-Pets.
- Additionally, both movies were animated by Animal Logic.
Template:Warner Animation Group
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