Superman/Batman: Public Enemies (2009)

A long time coming — I finally remembered to put Superman/Batman: Public Enemiesat the top of the movie queue. The kids and I sat and watched it tonight, and it was certainly about time. We had watched the sequel Superman/Batman: Apocalypse back in February 2011. The movie came out in 2009, and features some returning actors and actresses who have acted in previous DC Animated Universe films and shows:

  • Clancy Brown — Lex Luthor
  • Kevin Conroy — Batman
  • Tim Daly — Superman
  • CCH Pounder — Amanda Waller
  • John C. McGinley — Metallo

So what’s the film about?

When Lex Luthor gets elected US President, he uses the threat of an oncoming kryptonite meteor striking Earth as a rationale to frame Superman.

Yup, Luthor becomes the U.S. President, frames Superman for a murder, and puts a $1 billion dollar bounty on Superman’s capture. Superman (and Batman) work together to solve the mystery, and also to evade the multitude of supervillains, metahumans, and other superheroes who are now working for the Federal gov’t (and Luthor.)

It was nice to see the Batman and Superman characters in a traditional “Batman and Superman against the world” film, where they’re on the run and fighting against a slew of heroes and villains. There are so many character cameos — Solomon Grundy, Mongol, Hawkman, Captain Marvel, Black Manta, Grodd, etc. There was a nice rapport between Batman and Superman — allies who know each other and respect for each other. I wasn’t crazy how Superman was drawn, but to each his own. I found the climax to be a little “meh”, but it’s a decent animated film for DC Comic fans.

The voice acting was good. The video quality is fine, but the audio on the blu-ray was only Dolby Digital 5.1 quality. I’m not sure why, since you have disc capacity for better sound like DTS HD-MA. DD 5.1 could have been enough to make it still interesting, but there was very little (if any) surround sound — it was very much front-focused stereo audio.

Superman/Batman: Public Enemies (2009

Superman/Batman: Public Enemies (2009

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