Today I start the second season of Batman: The Animated Series. Of course, this is only according to the production order and DVD organization. According to the airing schedule, Season 1 lasted 60 episodes, Season 2 was 10 episodes, Season 3, also known as The Adventures of Batman & Robin, was 10 episodes, and a small Season 4 showed the last five episodes they had sitting around before the production team went on to make Superman cartoons. Then two years later, The New Batman Adventures produced two seasons with 13 and 11 episodes, respectively. It would be kind of fun to go through all these episodes in their airing order, but I prefer to see the progression through the production order (which is also easier for me to do). So here begins Volume 2 of the Batman DVDs, which is where the show really hit its prime. Unfortunately, this episode is not a good example of that.
"Eternal Youth" was the 29th-produced episode, but was oddly bumped up to be the 16th-aired episode on Sept. 23, 1992. (Wow, I didn't even intend this, but today marks the 20th anniversary of this episode's airing!) But I imagine the main reason it was bumped up in airing order was because it is the second official appearance of Poison Ivy, even though she did make several non-speaking cameos in Arkham Asylum and Scarecrow-induced hallucinations.
But even though Poison Ivy had been seen before, the producers of this episode must have thought Poison Ivy was still a relatively unknown villain. That's the only reason I can find for having them hide Ivy's face for half the episode, even though it was painfully obvious who was going around turning people into trees. Honestly, who else would turn people into trees? There was no surprise to keep or any great "reveal" when they finally showed the face of the red-headed woman wearing green tights. I have to take a point off for that.
But I will bring the score back to an average 5 for a nice Bruce Wayne scene. Bruce is at home working out when he gets a phone call about a company he's involved with starting a slash-and-burn operation in the rainforest without his permission. Here, we got to see the strong, angry side of Bruce the businessman, who was equally upset about harming the environment as he was about letting that deal slip past his attention until it was too late. I love having a Batman who doesn't immediately know everything and a Bruce who shows he deserves to be the head of a multi-billion dollar company.
The score falls back to a 4 for the unusual and unexplained appearance of Maggie Page. Who is she? Where did she come from? Apparently she's Alfred's love interest, but how and why? I'm all for expanding Alfred's character, but I would like a little background, please. I didn't really feel one way or the other about Maggie, I just wasn't sure where to place her in the Batman world. For better or worse, we never saw her again.
I'm going to take off another point for the ridiculous, overly-elaborate plot of this episode. So let's get this straight, Poison Ivy escaped Arkham, somehow came across millions of dollars to buy and set up an elaborate getaway spa for the rich and famous, just so she can turn them into trees for their crimes against nature. I'm all for Poison Ivy targeting leaders of environment-harming companies, but couldn't she have done that without the massive spa? This just felt too over-the-top, even by Ivy's standards. Things only get stranger when she sends the tape to Bruce, to punish him for the slash-and-burn operation, but Alfred and Maggie show up instead. After a few days, Ivy lets them go home for some reason. Later, they show up at the spa again, and Ivy immediately turns them into trees. I don't get it — if you were hoping to target Bruce Wayne, then why not wait for him, or insist that only he can use the spa's coupon. But if you were going to turn Alfred and Maggie into trees anyway, then why let them leave in the first place? Sloppy writing.
Speaking of sloppiness, I have to take the score down to a 2 for overall sloppy writing and animation. Things just looked bad and rough, and the little details that normally make the show so great were missing here. One example is having Poison Ivy's henchgirls spray down her victims without wearing gas masks or anything. Wouldn't they be at risk of turning into trees as well, especially with the extra-concentrate dose they hit Batman with? Come on, guys, step up your game.
I will bring the score back up to a 3 for the relatively decent ending. The giant tree at the end was pretty cool and exciting, but even better was the final scene where Bruce showed his sense of humor by giving Alfred and Maggie a potted plant while they were recovering from being trees. It was a nice little moment between Bruce and Alfred similar to the end of the April Fools Day episode. Alfred's usually the one giving Bruce a hard time, but every now and then the Dark Knight can strike back with a playful joke.
Final score: 3
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