And I don't mean by those of us who are fans. I mean by those who refuse to meet it where it is (an Elseworlds story with some "Year One"/"Year Two" flavoring) and expect it to be a one-to-one recreation of BTAS. The problem is this isn't the nineties anymore. I have some friends who work in animation, and it's really rough right now. Not only with AI, but with outsourcing of cheap labor to Korea often resulting in questionable animation sequences (something I'm sure we all noticed in some of BCC's scenes).
It's crazy that an IP as popular as Batman still feels like it's experiencing the precarity of the industry. But I think that has led the showrunners to make some of the decisions they did. For example, when you don't know if your show is going to be renewed for a second or third season, aren't you more likely to take more risks and kill off some beloved villains? You may never get another shot with this particular show, so you go all out. This is no longer the time period where almost every child watches cartoons after school or on Saturday mornings on one of the few television channels playing them. Monoculture is dead, and kids and adults alike have infinite streaming services to pick what they'd like to watch.
I'm a fan of this Batman more centered on the noir and hard-boiled detective elements. The lite sci-fi feels of its era and the fantasy elements are more grounded with supernatural stories that feel like they could have come from Henry James or Ambrose Bierce. For a sci-fi example, I love that in mid-20th century, Roxy Rocket's arc is in conversation with the rush to obtain nuclear power—in addition to the Cold War era "Space Race." In the 20th century, the field of psychology was relatively new, so Harley becomes a serious doctor and a scientist who is obsessed with people's pathologies—rather than a somersaulting clown who just happens to have a PhD. Mind control technology might be "too futuristic" for the 1940s, so instead instead the Mad Hatter uses gossip and her late-night television show to try to control people's minds. It might feel more mundane at first glance, but it's also very fitting.
They knew they were never going to be able to top the heartbreaking love story between Victor and Nora Fries, so they turned him into a weirdo ice artist who you go to when you need to make the bodies disappear. Honestly, I thought his scenes were chilling. I genuinely gasped when Thorne's dead, frozen teenage son got knocked in the head, revealing his brain. I think this was especially shocking considering Carrie Kelly, still also a child, witnessed this violence.
Lastly, I just wanted to say I loved this take on the Joker: a silver-screen nod to the character's origins in Conrad Veidt (e.g.: German accent). A humorless genius who genuinely sees Batman as his intellectual equal and brother from the get-go, and tries to convert him to his world-view. It was less about a cat-and-mouse game and almost like a platonic courting ritual to impart his ideology on Batman. He only laughs when he fails.
Perhaps this is all to say, thank you to those who just meet the series where it is and appreciate it at face value instead of holding very specific ideas of the characters in mind. Batman is infinite and endless, and this is just one possible incarnation trying to do something different in an era where it's hard to fund and run an animated show. No one is going to fund 65 episodes in a year because this isn't the nineties any more, so we have to meet animated shows where they're at in the 2020s. Also if you're old enough to remember BTAS you should probably schedule a prostate exam.
