Batman: TAS, episode #63: Fire from Olympus

A lot of things go into creating an animated presentation. Like anything, it begins with the writing, but then also depends on the art style of the studio doing the work, the pacing set by the director (just how many frames to a scene, etc.), and the sounds of characters (voices), events/effects, and the music that accompanies some or all of it. BTAS was hailed for its opening theme and for much of the musical work that accompanied its moody depiction of The Batman. This episode, Fire from Olympus, is no different and is among the best soundtracks of the entire series. While we open with the traditional noirish approach of a shopkeeper who knows too much being cornered in an alley, the music soon takes us to the fantastical realm of Maxie Zeus (Steve Susskind), former Greek shipping magnate (just a bit too on the nose...) and now local crimelord who imagines himself the reincarnation of the greatest of the ancient Greek gods. We're transported from our street-level noir to much more of a Doc Savage-style adventure, with the music to go with it, telling us how majestic our environs are and how fantastical all of the action is, even as the artwork in the presentation of The Batman stays close to the Neal Adams-inspired concepts first seen back in 1968. Indeed, so dark is the presentation of our hero that Maxie regularly refers to him as "my brother, Lord Hades."

The fact that they stuck to Neal's approach on the character makes sense in this respect, since Maxie is a Denny O'Neil creation from 1979, albeit long after Adams had left the character. He's also one of the goofier villains of the Batman gallery, highlighted by his appearance during the execrable Bane stories as being freed from Arkham Asylum along with the rest of the gang and promptly running himself into a tree. I'm not quite certain whether O'Neil had a higher calling for the character in mind or if it was just one of those villains you drop in to fill an issue. That was my first reaction to this episode, as well, given what I knew of Maxie, but it ends up being one of the more interesting episodes of the whole first season. There are so many nice (and sometimes odd) touches scattered throughout it that it lives in the memory longer than many others. Speaking of memory, it has to be said that, if you know Greek mythology, it's an odd juxtaposition to hear Clio (Bess Armstrong) bemoan the loss of her romantic attachment to Maxie when the original Clio, one of the three Muses and daughter of Mnemosyne, goddess of memory, was also daughter of Zeus... Not that that kind of thing was unusual among the gods, of course. It's also amusing to hear Maxie's astonishment that The Batman is, in fact, not his brother since "Batman is a mere mortal! What mortal could ascend to Olympus?" That, of course, is the entire reason that our hero is the most enduring character of DC's stable, in that he is "just" a mortal, with no superpowers attached, but is still able to function in the world of the superpowered and usually come out ahead of them.

There are a fair number of great visual notes contained in this episode, as well. When Jim Gordon and The Batman are watching the classified film about the Electronic Discharge Cannon (forgetting for the moment why a police commissioner would have access to such a thing) and the weapon fires, we see our hero step back from the screen in obvious disgust at the creation of such a weapon. Likewise, when The Batman first leaves Maxie's presence under the watchful "eyes" of the harpies' cannons (forgetting also why these harpies (creatures with half-bird and half-woman bodies) look like gargoyles, rather than harpies), he gives a dramatic toss of his cloak as he turns, which is an unusual motion for our main character, but possibly appropriate when dealing with someone who considers himself a god. That unusual use of costume extends to multiple scenes where the cowl collar, normally kept high around his throat, extends halfway down his chest, often concealing the famous chest emblem. But, again, it's the music that really drives things forward, with the grandiloquent sounds proclaiming not only the majesty of (neo) Zeus but also the theme of action story that underlies everything here. The music guides us through this dramatic foray in a way that escapes Clio's cynical assessment of it, when she complains to The Batman about Maxie: "He's not living in the real world anymore. Maybe you can relate to that...?" On that note, we also get a police blimp(!) included in the action for one of only a few times in the series, regardless of what the opening credits and regular backgrounds repeatedly show us.

All of that said, it isn't without a couple faults. One of the main ones is in the course of the story, where Clio is captured by Stavros (Nicholas Savalas), one of Maxie's goons, in the elevator right before a commercial break. When we return to the top of the Olympus, we then see Clio casually strolling right through a clearly marked 'Exit' door, apparently untroubled by recent events. Also, it seems like they couldn't resist borrowing one of the most-remembered motifs from Clash of the Titans, which is the chessboard that the gods observe while us mere mortals (and The Batman!) act out our lives on the ground. If it was an homage, fine, but it seems like something clumsier than that. And the ending is a little awkward, in that Maxie finds himself imprisoned in that selfsame Arkham Asylum, while pointing out the resemblances of our other regular villains to various gods and goddesses that he would expect to see there. Except that all of them are in their usual clothing, rather than prison grays. Maybe that's just a creation of Maxie's overworked imagination, but it makes the conclusion feel a bit more trite than it otherwise would. But there's a last nice bit of tragedy as he declares: "Now, at last, mighty Zeus is home!"

Next, we meet one of the more interesting additions to the rogues' gallery from the late 80s, not too long before this series was created, in Read My Lips.