Terror in the Sky

"Terror in the Sky" was the 45th-produced episode of Batman: The Animated Series, but it got bumped up to be the 37th-aired episode on Nov. 12, 1992.

This episode marks the return of Man-Bat, which made me very happy. That was the first villain of this show, and it shouldn't be forgotten. Bringing it back, with a new twist deserves a point.

Making Francine the Man-Bat ... er, Woman-Bat, was a great idea, but they kind of had a hard time handling Francine when she wasn't a bat. I guess the transformations were making her moody and giving her headaches, or maybe her headaches were causing the transformations? I'm not sure. In any case, she was completely annoying the whole episode, culminating in an extremely cheesy scene where she had a complete meltdown despite being perfectly fine two seconds earlier. Such random changes in mood were the norm in the '90s Spider-Man cartoon, but thankfully rare in Batman. However, whenever something like this happens, I have to take a point off.

But I will raise the score back to a 6 for a great scene with Dr. March. He is the prototypical mad scientist, but unlike other mad scientists, he actually admitted he was wrong. Watching the depressed doctor burn his notes was really a beautiful scene.

A large portion of this episode is devoted to Batman chasing the Woman-Bat around in his Batplane. However, it never got boring because it was so well done. The cinematic nature of it made me forget I was watching a 20-year-old Saturday morning cartoon. The music was also powerful and fun when a brief moment of "Night on Bald Mountain" was played. Truly a work of art.

Episodes like this prove why this show still holds up two decades later. This isn't near one of the best Batman episodes — it is perfectly average — but when the average episodes are this good, then you have an amazing show.

Final score: 7