There’s an extension to the bat family in this animated movie as Bruce Wayne meets his secret son. Damian has already lucked out in the gene pool and he follows quite the legacy. With Batman as his biological father, and Talia al Ghul his Mim and in turn, R’as al Ghul being his grandfather you’d be forgiven for assuming his life would go down a certain route.
Of all the DC animated movies I’ve watched this would probably rank as last place on my list. That doesn’t mean it’s terrible but I felt like it just didn’t reach its full potential. I enjoy The League of Assassins but they didn’t come across as the huge threat they pose to be. Talia was highly sexualised and while of course its completely plausible there’s more sides to her character than just being kick ass, seeing her go all Jessica Rabbit kind of took away from her character. I felt like there were issues with the dialogue which at times made the movie seem unpolished. Lastly, Damian just comes across as hugely unlikeable. A pompous brat in fact. We often like characters who are villainous and do bad things but with Damian there just didn’t seem to be any redeeming qualities. I couldn’t help but just feel annoyed every time he was on screen.
Having said all that there were also many good things about this. The bat suit and batmobile had a real classic look which drew me back to my childhood and a Batman I’m very familiar with. I think Jason O’Mara does an ace job in bringing Batman to life once again. Alfred was pure joy and delivered many one liners which were pretty funny. I’d have to actually say this would be one of my favourite appearances from Alfred. Nightwing featured in the movie and who doesn’t love seeing Dick Grayson!! I also really enjoyed Deathstroke and his part kind of served as an introduction to him without giving us a huge backstory.
While Son of Batman isn’t the strongest DC movie out there it’s still worth a watch and hopefully serves as a set up for greater stories to come.
