Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero is a great movie not just compared to other animated ventures within DC’s quality animation arsenal but one hell of a Batman movie in its own right.
Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero
(1998)
Genre(s): Animation, Action, Adventure
Warner Archive | NR – 67 min. – $21.99 | March 27, 2018
Date Published: 03/12/2018 | Author: The Movieman
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THE MOVIE — 4.0/5 |
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Plot Synopsis: Batman (KEVIN CONROY) faces his coolest case ever when Mr. Freeze (MICHAEL ANSARA) returns to Gotham City and kidnaps Barbara Gordon aka Batgirl (MARY KAY BERGMAN). While unraveling the mystery of her disappearance, Batman and Robin (LOREN LESTER) discover that she is part of Mr. Freeze’s frigid plan to save his dying wife – no matter what the cost. With time running out, Batman and Robin must find Gotham’s most cold-blooded villain and prevent him from putting Batgirl “on ice” forever.
Quick Hit Review: Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero was a wonderful animated movie and although it doesn’t quite measure up in both style and substance to Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, it still tells a great story with some actual depth to villains who aren’t completely evil, and where you can have even a tiny bit of sympathy, which I did for Mr. Freeze. The animation itself wasn’t always the best, though other shots were absolutely beautiful. Not saying anything new that hasn’t been said before, the DC live action division could take a page from their animated counterparts; I also hope a character like Mr. Freeze gets a second shot in a feature film if only to erase the atrocity that was the Schwarzenegger version. |
SPECIAL FEATURES – 2.0/5 |
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Not especially stacked with material, but there are Art of Batman: Music Montage (2:31; SD) and Get the Picture: How to Draw Batman (0:51; SD) featurettes, a Trailer (1:03; SD) and four episodes that comprise “The Mr. Freeze” Saga” where you can watch two episodes of Batman: The Animated Series, then SubZero followed by an episode The New Batman Adventures and Batman Beyond. Cool to have these included, though these are in standard definition (except SubZero of course). |
VIDEO – 4.0/5 |
| SubZero freezes itself onto Blu-ray courtesy of the Warner Archive Collection MOD program. The film is presented with a 1.33 full frame aspect ratio and given a very nice 1080p high-definition transfer. While I doubt that any major restoration work was done, this was an impressive looking picture nevertheless with some bright colors throughout, stark black levels and no apparent instances of artifacting, aliasing, dust marks, scratches or other flaws. |
AUDIO – 3.0/5 |
| The included DTS-HD Master Audio Stereo track isn’t anything amazing and, at best, is adequate but not much more. Dialogue does come through relatively well enough though the depth is rather muted such as the explosions during the finale which lacked very much zest, even by animated standards. |
OVERALL – 3.5/5 |
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Overall, Batman & Mr. Freeze: SubZero is a great movie not just compared to other animated ventures within DC’s quality animation arsenal but one hell of a Batman movie in its own right, perhaps only behind Batman ’89, Mask of the Phantasm and The Dark Knight; pretty good company. This Blu-ray release offers up a good video transfer, okay audio and some throwaway features, though nice to have the animated series’ to watch in conjunction with this movie. |
Check out some more 1080p screen caps by going to page 2. Please note, these do contain spoilers.