Warner Premiere

Sat down Saturday to watch the first of the Warner Premiere / DC animated movies roll off the assembly line: SUPERMAN- DOOMSDAY.

My first impression is that this is an okay movie and a great DVD. We have a 70 minute feature animated movie based on the DEATH OF SUPERMAN story arc from the 90's, along with several great extras - a sneak peak of NEW FRONTIER (their next production), the actors, a videogame of sorts, and a look back at the whole comic storyline from the people involved.

I have seen better filmmaking from the Warners animated crew before, but this is a monster task to distill the whole "Death of Superman" storyline. My first question would be, "Why only 70 minutes?" I think theproducion could have benefitted from 10-15 extra minutes to add how the death of the world's greatest hero affected the rest of the masks running around. It would have better reflected the comic series as well. That said, it all somehow worked. There were moments of pure emotion that were better than the dreadful SUPERMAN RETURNS.

I am eagerly awaiting the animated adaption of NEW FRONTIER and have to say that if DC is looking at these movies as stand-alones then please put the following classics into the hat when next choosing which storyline to make into an animated feature:

BATMAN: GOTHAM BY GASLIGHT

ADAM STRANGE

THE DOOM PATROL (seen all too briefly in TEEN TITANS)

NIGHTWING and FLAMEBIRD

THE ATOM

DEADMAN

(Note: If they do a BLUE BEETLE let it be in the anime style that's been adapted for the TEEN TITANS series. )

All in all I am excited by the direction the animated unit is pursuing - adapting the classic DC stories for D2DVD features - and hope the features become a staple of their business plan so they can expand to new work. I would love to see 4 of these a year.