Contextualising Practice Essay

How does the context in which a work is seen in alter its meaning and interpretation?

Adapting Under the Hood into an Animated Feature.

I am writing to explore how adapting the comic Batman: Under the Hood (UTH, collected as Batman: Under the Red Hood) into the animated film Batman: Under the Red Hood (B:UTRH) alters the meaning and interpretation of the story.

Robin is synonymous with the name Batman, having only debuted a year after his mentor, so when the original Robin, Dick Grayson, became Nightwing, DC introduced a replacement: Jason Todd. Unlike Dick, an optimistic acrobat who grew up in the circus, Jason was a street kid with attitude. According to Batman editor Dennis O’Neil “They did hate him.” when referring to fan reaction towards Jason (Pearson, 1991:21). This shows that the fans didn’t like changes to what had been the norm for 40+ years, Jason was the complete opposite to Grayson. Many didn’t seem to like that Todd was a replacement to Grayson’s Robin, who Batman had fired, as they didn’t see him worthy of this.

Eventually O’Neil had the idea to let fans decide whether or not Jason should die with a vote, an idea Batman writer at the time Jim Starlin jumped on, having wanted to kill off the character for some time, finding the idea of a teenage sidekick ridiculous (Best, 2003). The four part A Death in the Family, followed Todd searching for his mother, only to be kidnapped by the Joker. The second issue ended with the iconic scene of the Joker savagely beating Jason to the brink of death, before leaving him in an exploding building. The next page asked fans whether or not the character should die by voting. With a difference of 72, Robin was killed, making fans responsible for Batman’s greatest failure (Starlin, 1989). This was controversial, with many people seeing the vote as a publicity stunt centred on killing a child. Additionally numerous news outlets were stating this Robin to be Grayson, the well-loved character many of the public had grown-up with, upsetting many people (Langley, 2012).

In 2005 writer Judd Winick decided on following up this story with UTH, which would see Batman exploring the mystery of a new criminal in Gotham by the name of Red Hood. It is eventually revealed to be Todd, back from the dead, and out for Joker’s blood (Winick, 2011).  This was controversial for bringing him back after fans had voted on the death (JayToddz for the masses, 2010), as well as the means by which he was resurrected, a retcon tied into the then current companywide crossover event Infinite Crisis. Despite this, the story is important within the larger Batman mythos for bringing back such an iconic character, and the story itself, is generally well liked by fans. Judd Winick himself had originally said that he was more focused on the story between Batman, Bruce Wayne, and Jason Todd than the how, what and why of his return (Newasrama, 2005).

The DC Universe Animated Original Movies line were being used to adapt popular comic book stories into animation. Writer Judd Winick approached producers Bruce Timm and Alan Burnett with his story and within a 45 minute pitch over the phone (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, 2013) Winick had addressed how to fix all the problems with the story that had Timm had thought of such as addressing the length and the context.

As with most comic storylines, UTH was tied to many other storylines going on in the comics at the time, like Infinite Crisis, as well as directly following on from the Batman Family crossover War Games that set up the Black Mask as Gotham’s crime overlord as well as explained the absence of characters such as Robin and Batgirl. In film however, the status quo at the beginning of the story is to be considered the norm, as such these characters weren’t referenced to help streamline the universe. Additionally, the comic relies on readers to know about the Batman mythos, they were expected to know that the Joker had killed Todd, although it happened 17 years prior (Starlin, 1988). When translating into a film however, the medium relies on a tight, self-contained story due to it reaching a larger audience unfamiliar with the source material, as well as not being a continuous ongoing story. To fill the viewer’s in on what’s necessary to the plot, the film would have to also adapt A Death in the Family. This was done briefly in the opening of the film, removing Jason’s mother from the scenes, focusing solely on the information importnant to UTH.

Furthermore, the original story was two separate arcs spanning more than a year with other stories in between (Winnick, 2005), whereas the film treats the story as a whole. This meant that the film would have to skip this gap as it isn’t relevant to the story of Jason’s return affecting Batman. This fact is what led to the disappearance of Nightwing halfway through the film, after originally only being in the first comic arc. This was due to him dealing with the destruction of his city Bludhaven in the comics, an event which was felt within UTH, but was again cut from the film due to both its ties to Infinite Crisis and irrelevancy to the actual plot. In the comics Dick was busy in New York City having re-evaluated his role of Nightwing after the War Games story (Grayson, 2006a&b), whereas in the film, he was explained away with a leg injury after the first battle with Jason. To try and make up for this, Nightwing does receive a cameo in the films closing montage showing us that he’s back in action. Additionally Nightwing’s opening scene features a criminal explaining that he was the original Robin, both to his partner and the viewer, to help explain his place within the story.

Although Winick has said that the particulars of the resurrection weren’t what he was interested in, the means by which Jason Todd was returned to life would be an integral change to the film. Rather than being explained within the story itself, Todd’s resurrection is recounted in an epilogue featured in Batman Annual #25. Here, it is explained that due to Superboy Prime punching the barrier between realities, ripples are sent through time which leads to Jason coming back to life six months after his death. This is the main tie in to the event Infinite Crisis as Superboy Prime is initially seen doing this in another tie in (Wolfman, 2006). After Jason digs his way out of his coffin, he goes into a coma for a year as a John Doe patient, upon awaking he escapes and lives on the streets for a year, with no memories, before being found by Talia al Ghul. After caring for Jason for yet another year, she decides to throw him in the rejuvenating Lazarus Pit of her father’s to restore the boys mind and memory. The movie however opts to go the much simpler route by having the Lazarus Pit be what actually brings Jason back to life, avoiding any ties to Infinite Crisis. Additionally, rather than Talia being the one to help Jason, she is replaced by her father Ra’s, and demoted to a cameo in the Lazarus Pit sequence. Again this helps streamline the story by reducing the film’s character count as well as not having to spend time introducing viewers to a character they may not know. This is an integral change to the film as Batman goes straight to Ra’s when searching for answers to Jason’s return, who recounts this story in flashback. This is far more straightforward than the comic where Batman travels the country, speaking to resurrected heroes, looking for answers. Batman goes to Ra’s in the film due to his ties with Jason’s death, he had been the one the dynamic duo were going after when the Joker kidnapped Todd, rather than searching for Todd’s mother.

The film reshuffles many events from the comics around as it is now one whole story, for instance in the comic Black Mask hires Mr Freeze to serve as a distraction to the Red Hood near the start of the story, whereas the film has Mask break the Joker out of Arkham Asylum towards the end of the film. From here, the Joker is then kidnapped by Todd who proceeds to beat him with a crow bar, reversing the situation form years earlier, putting the Joker in place for the final confrontation between the Red Hood and Batman. The Source Material shows Todd having the Joker tied up throughout most of the story, with the crowbar scene taking place much earlier before the finale. Similarly, rather than hiring the Secret Society of Super Villains to actually take down the Red Hood, an original group of assassins, The Fearsome Hand of Four, are sent, this helps keep down the running time of the film by having them simply be assassins, rather than established supervillains unknown to the audience. The team’s inclusion in the original was also a further tie in to Infinite Crisis.

Due to the set up with the death of Jason at the start of the film, much of the mystery of who the Red Hood is disappears, replaced with suspense, as such, the film doesn’t need to wait for the reveal to Batman that Jason is alive to explore their relationship together. This allows for the flashbacks to be more evenly spaced throughout the film than in the comic.

The film comes to a dramatic conclusion with a scene between Batman, the Red Hood and the Joker, which in parts is adapted word for word from the comic. In the scene, Jason asks Bruce why the Joker is still alive after he took Jason away from him. This is a rather important theme the story explores as the Joker has been accountable for hundreds of deaths since his debut in 1940 across ranges of different media (Langley, 2012), had the Joker been killed many years ago, these Deaths could have been prevented. Batman’s response in this story is that ‘if I allow myself to go down into that place… I’ll never come back.’(Winnick, 2011:308) even though Jason argues that he doesn’t have to kill any other villain just the man who killed his son. Batman’s argument here is that after allowing himself to kill the Joker, he doesn’t feel like he would be able to stop killing criminals as he is already in a  dark place and cannot afford to get any darker. Not long before killing Todd, the Joker had been responsible for paralysing Barbara Gordon and using graphic pictures of her to attempt to turn her father Commissioner Gordon insane (Moore, 2008), so after these attacks on Batman’s allies, Batman is seen to go after the Joker with intent to kill, failing only because someone seemingly got there first, allowing the Joker to escape death and Batman’s clutches once again (Starlin, 1989). It is interesting to note that upon hearing that Tim Drake, the third Robin, is dead, Nightwing beats the Joker to death and is happy he’s gone. The Joker is quickly resuscitated by Batman (Dixon, 2002a) and Dick is left feeling guilty and questions his role as a hero, however he does not start killing other villains, and is able to stop at the Joker (Dixon, 2002b). It could be argued that since Dick was trained by Batman, his reaction to killing the Joker could also be applied to Bruce, however Dick is a much lighter character, and although he was pushed over the line, it would be easier for him to come back from that line once coming to terms with what he did.

 The comic ends with the building the characters are in exploding and it is left ambiguous whether or  not there are any survivors, all three of course survive and are featured in later comics but this is not revealed within the story itself, whereas the film shows Batman finding the Joker in the rubble with Jason having disappeared. Bruce then returns to the Batcave where Alfred asks whether they should take down the memorial to Jason, to which Bruce responds ‘This doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t change anything at all.’ (Winick, 2011:173) a scene which ended the story’s first part in the comics. Placing this at the very end of the story, and then following it with a scene of Jason putting on the Robin costume for the first time signify that the emotional backbone of the film lies in the relationship between Bruce and Jason.

The story of Under the (Red) Hood explores how the return of Jason effects Batman personally. The way in which the story is told to fit within the medium however, can alter the meaning and interpretation, the removal of scenes and characters allowed for a tighter story that’s emotional backbone was of Bruce and Jason’s relationship, rather than that being a part of the larger story, as in the comic. Placing the context of Jason’s death however at the beginning of the film takes away the mystery of the original story, leaving only suspense behind.

Word count: 2185

Resource List

Film

Batman: Under The Red Hood, (2010) Directed by B. Vietti, [DVD] Burbank: Warner Home Video.

Comics

Dixon, C. (w) Randall, R. (p.i) 2002a. “You Only Laugh Twice.” Joker: Last Laugh v1 #6. DC Comics.

Dixon, C. (w) McCarthy, T. (p) Kesel, K. (i) 2002b. “Red, Fright.” Nightwing v2 #63. DC Comics.

Grayson, D. (w) Hester, P. Chang, C. (p) Parks, A. (i), 2006a. Nightwing: Mobbed Up. Nightwing v2 #107-111. DC Comics.

Grayson, D. (w) Hester, P and Chang, C. Alves, W. Marz, M. Walker, B. (p) Parks, A. Wagner, E. Ramos, R. (i), 2006b. Nightwing: Renegade. Nightwing v2 #112-117. DC Comics.

Moore, A. (w)  Bolland, B. (p.i) 2008. Batman: The Killing Joke, Deluxe Edition. Deluxe Edition. DC Comics.

Starlin, J. (w) Aparo, J. (p) Decarlo, M. (i) A Death in The Family. Batman v1 #426-429 (Dec. 1988- Jan.1989). DC Comics.

Winick, J. Starlin, J. Loeb, J. (w) Mahnke, D. Lee, P. Davis, S. Battle, E. Aparo, J. Lee, J.(p) Nguyen, T. Smith, C. Ramos, R. Faucher, W. Stucker, L. Morales, M. Decarlo, M. Williams, S. (i), 2011. Batman: Under the Red Hood. Batman v1 #617-618, 635-641, 645-650 Batman v1 Annual 25. DC Comics.

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Davis, S., (2006), Jason's mind restored from the Lazarus Pit [ONLINE]. Available at:http://vignette4.wikia.nocookie.net/batman/images/5/53/Lp.PNG/revision/latest?cb=20111021020413[Accessed 27 March 2016].

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Mahnke, D., (2006), Secret Society of Supervillains attack Red Hood [ONLINE]. Available at: https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/ac/10/74/ac10749ff199c5540e3a8a5222fe3879.jpg [Accessed 27 March 2016].

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Battle, E, (2006), Jason with a gun to the Joker's Head [ONLINE]. Available at:http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-NRAKOdVLCR4/Vt_3MQ8mKSI/AAAAAAAAMoY/OFFyXUe6MMw/s16000-Ic42/RCO019.jpg [Accessed 27 March 2016].

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Warner Bros. Animation, (2010), Jason’s first time as Robin [ONLINE]. Available at:http://images5.fanpop.com/image/photos/28400000/Batman-Under-the-Red-Hood-dc-comics-28417538-1280-720.jpg [Accessed 27 March 2016].

Bibliography

Article

Salem, R. 2010. The Dark Knight just gets darker Batman: Under The Red Hood, Toronto Ont.

Websites

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Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. 2016. Batman: Under the Red Hood - [ONLINE] Available at:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman:_Under_the_Red_Hood. [Accessed 29 February 2016].

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Jett. 2010.  Writer Judd Winick Talks "BATMAN: UNDER THE RED HOOD" [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.batman-on-film.com/dccomics-on-film_BATMAN-UNDER-THE-RED-HOOD_Winick-interview_6-11-10.html. [Accessed 20 March 2016].

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NerdSync. (2015). How did JASON TODD Come Back to Life? || Comic Misconceptions || NerdSync. [Online Video]. 18 March 2015. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=af9Qa9MBHwI. [Accessed: 10 March 2016].

NerdSync. (2016). Should Batman KILL Joker?? || Comic Misconceptions || NerdSync. [Online Video]. 17 March 2016. Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgopovyODHU&nohtml5=False. [Accessed: 17 March 2016].