The World’s Finest caught up with Batman: The Brave and The Bold producer James Tucker to discuss the new Batman: The Brave and The Bold – Complete Season Three two-disc DVD release collecting the last batch of episodes from the acclaimed Warner Bros. Animation series. The new home video release collects the final twelve episodes – and a certain ‘controversial’ episode from the second season – of the acclaimed animated series into one DVD title for the first time. The new two-disc DVD set hits shelves tomorrow, June 19th, 2012 – alongside the new The Best of Batman DVD two-disc set – and retails for MSRP $19.97. Continue below for a new brief interview with Tucker as he looks back on the final season of Batman: The Brave and The Bold and discusses the new Batman: The Brave and The Bold – Complete Season Three DVD release.
The World’s Finest: This DVD collection brings the final episodes of Batman: The Brave and The Bold to home video. Does bring a bit of finality-type feeling to it, a bit of closure, to see the entire series now out there?
James Tucker: I’ve been working on some very cool projects since wrapping up Batman: The Brave and the Bold, so I haven’t had much time to think about closure really. However, it is nice to finally see the whole series on DVD and to have it out there for folks to discover who may have missed it when it was on the air.
WF: “The Mask of Matches Malone” is included as a bonus episode in this release. As everyone knows, a scene during the ‘Birds of Prey’ number was altered due to its purported suggestive nature? When creating this episode, did you think it would cause the controversy that it did?
JT: No, our show always operated on two levels, one the kids could understand and another that was for the adults, and the network ‘got’ that. In storyboarding the musical number, I might have made it a little too suggestive in the one shot they had us change, but overall I felt there had been much more suggestive things done on some of the earlier series I’ve worked on.
WF: In all honesty, I thought the multiple deaths of Batman would cause an issue. Was there ever any worry or concern about Batman’s multiple deaths in the episode? It seems like, over the years, the show has managed to do some pretty extreme things without too many issues from the censors. Is that accurate?
JT: The multiple deaths in “Emperor Joker” were all fantasy deaths, the Joker magically killing Batman, so I didn’t expect any controversy over that at all. But I think having people misinterpret the our show to be ‘kiddie’ allowed us to get away with a lot more violence than we would have had we been more realistic in our design. We got to show several ‘deaths’ on air including Thomas and Martha Wayne, Joe Chill, The Doom Patrol, and B’wana Beast. I think we handled them all tastefully but without minimizing the impact, and the network allowed us to make the show the best way we could. I felt we had a good relationship with the broadcast standards folks at Cartoon Network. Probably the best relationship of any network I’ve worked with.
WF: Moving on, “Mitefall” wraps up the series, presented as the final episode on the two-disc set. For fans who may be catching this episode for the first time, what do you hope this episode accomplishes? For those long-time viewers anxious to revisit, any things we should keep an eye out for – any nods we may have missed when it aired last year?
JT: Our fans are pretty savvy so I don’t think there’s anything they could have missed. Also, it’s hard to talk about the episode without giving spoilers. I just hope if someone went to the trouble of buying this series set, that by the time they get to “Mitefall”, it will have a lot of extra meaning for them. I’ve read that it gets some folks misty-eyed, but in a good satisfying way. For those fans of our who really supported us and loved the show, I didn’t want the final episode to be downbeat as much as I wanted it to feel poignant, but hopeful. I think we achieved that.
WF: Speaking of which, this collection had a relatively fast turn-around on getting these episodes to home video. What are your thoughts on these two-disc collections of the show? Anything you wish they added in there (or could in a future Blu-ray, if that happens)?
JT: In a perfect world, the disc would have been fully loaded with features, but I knew not to expect that for this series of DVDs. Perhaps in 10 years if the show still resonates for fans, the home video people will want to do more extras for a reissue. Besides the obvious stuff like commentaries, there were some publicity pieces done for “Mayhem of the Music Meister” and “Chill of the Night” that would be nice to see on a disc. There’s a goofy internet thing I did where I show kids how to draw Batman, that was fun. And I know the composers to the series, Dynamic Music Partners, documented the making of the musical episode extensively, so there’s a lot of extra information that could be used from all that stuff. Until then, Ben Jones answers a lot of questions about the series on his Formspring page ( http://www.formspring.me/IdiotStyle ) and our background color stylist, Bill Dunn, has a great blog ( http://braveandboldbackgroundpaint.blogspot.com/ ) showing one painted background from every episode of the series with some comments about the making of the episodes which is as close to insider scoop as you can get for this show right now.
WF: To wrap this up, any final words to encourage fans (and their friends!) to rush out and pick up this new DVD collection on June 19th?
JT: To anyone who watched and loved the series, thanks again for your support! To the hopefully new fans who sample the third season of Batman: The Brave and the Bold, you’re in for a treat!
Click here to view images and read a review of the Batman: The Brave and The Bold – Complete Season Three, including package artwork and menu screens. A review, menu screens and package artwork for the The Best of Batman DVD collection, also due for release on June 19th, 2012, can be found here here.
Further details on the Batman: The Brave and The Bold – Complete Season Three DVD collection can be found at the The World’s Finest Batman: The Brave and The Bold subsite. The Batman: The Brave and The Bold Complete Season Three two-disc DVD release is set to hit shelves June 19th, 2012 for the suggested retail price of $19.97.
Stay tuned for further updates here soon at The World’s Finest, including more home video details.
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