Hey folks Valkor here and we’re just a couple short weeks
away from opening Knight to my most anticipated movie of 2008, Batman: The Dark
Knight. Am I a huge fan of the Bats? You bet your sweet ass I am! However to
satiate my thirst until the big Knight, Warner, with a collaboration of quality
artists, directors, writers, and voice talents, have put together an awesome DVD
that is a prequel to TDK, Batman: Gotham Knight.
Gotham Knight is a six part story, done in a way, much like the Animatrix was for the Matrix trilogy, where GK bridges the gap between Batman Begins and Dark Knight. Each story is done in a different animation style, but the stories themselves piece together nicely.

The first story “Have I Got A Story For You”, was sorta done before in the original Batman: The animated series. A group of kids gather together in a skate park to discuss why they’re late. Turns out each kid witnessed a fight between Batman and an unknown adversary; they each give their version of the story where Batman has a different look based on their perspective. That is until the truth stands right before them.
The second story “Crossfire” involves Detective Alan, a Major Crimes Unit agent, hand picked by James Gordon himself. He’s anti-Batman, but his eyes are soon open when he’s caught in the crossfire of two mobs goin at it, when who should come to the rescue?
“Field Test” is our third story where Lucius Fox introduces
Bruce Wayne to a new gadget that will help him deflect metal objects,
specifically bullets. Batman decides to test out the new device against
Story number four is “In Darkness Dwells”, where Batman, Jim Gordon, and the MCU are on the hunt for Killer Croc, but finds even more in the form of Jonathan Crane aka “The Scarecrow”.

Story number five “Working Through Pain” finds Batman
wounded. He flashes back to a time where he went to
Story number six and the finale, “Deadshot” has Batman trying to protect Jim Gordon from a sniper killer known as Deadshot, only to find out he was the target all along.

The Good:
Gotham Knight is an awesome companion piece that fits smack
dab in the middle of Batman Begins and The Dark Knight. While it doesn’t fill
in too much post BB, we get to see a bit more of what Bats has been up to, plus
you’ll see that he still has a lot to learn. The animation is plus, and definitely
high quality (none of that cheesy direct to video type animation), tossing in a
ton of CGI to really flesh out the grittiness of

The Bad:
I realize we’re dealing with short pieces here, but I feel
there’s one major miss here and it’s something that all the movies seem to skip
over; where was the “Detective” element of the character? The whole idea of
Batman is not so much that he plays in the shadows, the whole revenge for the
parents, and protecting

The Ugly:
Killer Croc…. Gruesome… just gruesome!

Reviews of The Dark Knight are starting to flow across the Net and hopefully I’ll be able to add my two cents soon enough. But until then Gotham Knight is the perfect hold me over until the big theatrical release. It’s been done up by some of the best, bringing out the best that is Batman… in animated form. Look for Gotham Knight on DVD and Blu Ray July 8th and out of TOV 5 stars, I’m giving it a 4.5. Gotham Knight has been Valkor tested and TOV Approved!
