Summary
Batman: Caped Crusadermight still be finding its footing with some sections of the fanbase, but the critically acclaimed new show has already added a pretty herculean feat to its list of accolades early into its run on streaming.
Batmanhas seen several adaptations over his long tenure as the premiere detective in comics, but none have been quite as true to form and well-loved asBatman: The Animated Series,a masterwork that originally aired from 1992 to 1995 and expanded on the Batman mythos we know today in the best way. Notably creating the likes of Harley Quinn and the now-canon backstory for Victor Fries,Batman: The Animated Serieshas lived on without anything worthy of taking its place in the cultural zeitgeist. Bruce Timm was one of the men behind the magic on the show and would announce a spiritual successor to the original series inBatman: Caped Crusader. TheBatman: The Animated Seriescreator was notably excited forCaped Crusaderas it gave him a chance to work on his true, unfettered version, which wasn’t possible with the original series made for kids programming.
The show would be dropped by Warner Bros. Discovery but would be saved by Amazon’s Prime Video service, which would issue a two-season order forCaped Crusader,with the first making its premiere in As noted byForbesin a recent report,Batman: Caped Crusadertook the number 1 spot on Prime Video, toppling The Boys from that position and leaving it in second place. This is in spite ofThe Boys’fourth season breaking prior records for the franchisein spite of the divisive nature of the season and the mixed reception it initially received. The report also noted that this is unusual for the service, with Prime Video rankings usually holding steady for a good while.
This is great news for Prime Video as italready greenlit another installment via the original two-season order, and there are indicators that even more could be on the way if this sort of attention keeps up. Given the run of the original show and the episode count expected for each season, there’s little doubt that this new take on the Dark Knight could stand for a couple more renewals to finish telling its story, after which the creatives on the team will no doubt take on the tried and true tactic of putting Superman in it to keep things interesting.
WhileBatman: Caped Crusadermight have dropped the ball on one essential aspectand suffered from not having the iconic Kevin Conroy in the lead role due to his unfortunate passing, the show is still many leagues better than its contemporaries. Timm arguably gave his best to the original animated show, as constraints tend to do more for quality than creatives care to admit, and it shows inCaped Crusader’sfailure to truly live up toBatman: The Animated Series.However, that’s a perfectly fine mark to miss, and while it’s no replacement for the original, the show that did get made is solid and doing well with critics. Fans have the usual objections to many of the seemingly inexplicable changes the show makes to canon, and so there’s no clear picture yet of whereCaped Crusaderwill fall in the long term. However, the show’s
How long Caped Crusader stays on top remains to be seen, asa prequel show forThe Boysis finally getting made, and the mainline show itself is set for a massive final season with all sorts of important story resolutions keeping fans in their seats. Whichever one of the two wins when these two projects materialize, or if some other new Prime Video programming will take the top spot, the real winner here is still Prime Video for betting on these projects.
Batman: Caped Crusaderis currently available to stream on Amazon’s Prime Video platform.
Batman
Batman is one of the most popular and well-known superheroes of all time. Created in 1939 by Bob Kane and Bill Finger, Batman has evolved over the decades into a cultural icon.As a child, Bruce Wayne’s parents were murdered in front of him. Since that day, Bruce made it his mission to fight back against the criminal element in Gotham City. Taking on the appearance of what scares him most, Batman faces off against powerful villains like the Joker, Two-Face, Bane, and the Penguin.
