WB Animation have been consistently putting out a lot of entertaining cartoons and movies for a while now. Their adaptations of DC Comics properties in particular have been some of their best efforts with their latest classic being Batman: Assault on Arkham (a.k.a. a pretty fantastic Suicide Squad movie that just happens to feature Batman). Not all their projects have been up to par but for the most part they have been enjoyable. Now looking at the series of animated features they've been producing for several years at this point (starting with Superman: Doomsday), one would wonder how there can be such a difference in quality from Justice League: War to Son of Batman. The credits of these movies will reveal to any intrepid fan that to put out the number of movies they do a year it only makes sense that they would outsource to multiple different studios. Therein lies my interest. Each studio has a different style with my favourite at the moment being Moi Animation who (mostly) never disappoint. They however aren't the only good studio WB Animation has at their disposal. More after the customary video.
The first of the studios being used by WB animation we'll look at is Telecom Animation Film. They produced the following DCAU Original Movies:
- Green Lantern: First Flight
- Justice League: Doom
- Superman Vs The Elite
Their work is the best from the contributions of the Japanese studios WB have in their employ. They have access to some of the best animators to have worked on a WB project such as Toshihiko Masuda, Yoshinobu Michihata and Hisao Yokobori. They have worked on WB Animation projects for decades now but in recent times in terms of their straight to video movies these 3 are the only ones they've produced thus far. These movies have some of the best animated sequences in these movies with JL: Doom having some of the best explosion effects animation you'll see in a DCAU Original Movie. They've also had the pleasure of working with some of the better stories to adapt. Lets have a look at each movie individually.
Green Lantern: First Flight
First flight was a really well done Green Lantern movie (for a Hal Jordan led piece *scoffs*) which gets everything right in 75 minutes more that a 2 hour hollywood movie managed. The story is a pretty straightforward cop story with the twist obviously being they're space cops. Something the live action movie failed utterly to convey. Rookie cop gets taken under the veterans wing. Actually its basically training day in space mostly. Lauren Montgomery mentioned in an interview i think that was her intent from the beginning and Alan Burnett's script pulls this off fairly easily. It's a fun ride from beginning to end with great action and a set of likable characters and well characterised villains. I have to give props to Sinestro's voice actor especially. He is by far the best voice actor to have portrayed him.
On the animation front, this was pretty amazingly consistent throughout. Every scene flows very well which is not a surprise considering the epic list of storyboarders on this one. Everyone involved is basically doing bigger things now with some moving up to directing long after this project. This includes the likes of Tim Eldred, Lesean Thomas, Sam Liu, Jay Oliva, Brandon Vietti, Ethan Spaulding alongside the director of this movie, Lauren Montgomery and a few others. This leads to everything being generally very well laid out and flowing very well. There really isn't much to complain about there. Character design duties are split between Montgomery, Jose Lopez, Thomas Perkins and Walter Gatus. Mostly the designs are pretty good to look at though there may be a little too much going on with Hal's face in my opinion but that's just a minor gripe. I really like a lot of the designs otherwise. The directors over at TAF on this one include Kazuhide Tomonaga (who worked on A Feat of Clay Part 2 most notably), Hiroshi Shiodori and Yuichiro Yano. They did their jobs well because the quality of animation for both the effects and the characters is generally consistently good throughout. The somewhat simple designs allow the animators to be able to convey complex movements while not being shackled to hyper detail as can be the case with some productions. Stand out moments with Hisao Yokobori's scene of course, the bouncy quality of the aliens a lot of the time, nice effects consistently. Its just a very well produced movie that way. It's probably the best animated of all these DC features and it's a shame WB doesn't use TAF more often nowadays but i guess TAF are busy with their japanese projects now with the one they work on most consistently being Aikatsu. The other thing that really stands out is some of the really nice backgrounds and coloring in the latter half. Hiroshi Nitta was art director and he did a pretty good job. Otherwise if i continue i'd just keep gushing and that wouldn't be fun to read now would it. I'd give this a 4/5. I really liked it. There's always a certain cadence with which the tone is managed in the movies Lauren Montgomery directs which is present even if the story isn't the strongest and it is most certainly evident here.
On the animation front, this was pretty amazingly consistent throughout. Every scene flows very well which is not a surprise considering the epic list of storyboarders on this one. Everyone involved is basically doing bigger things now with some moving up to directing long after this project. This includes the likes of Tim Eldred, Lesean Thomas, Sam Liu, Jay Oliva, Brandon Vietti, Ethan Spaulding alongside the director of this movie, Lauren Montgomery and a few others. This leads to everything being generally very well laid out and flowing very well. There really isn't much to complain about there. Character design duties are split between Montgomery, Jose Lopez, Thomas Perkins and Walter Gatus. Mostly the designs are pretty good to look at though there may be a little too much going on with Hal's face in my opinion but that's just a minor gripe. I really like a lot of the designs otherwise. The directors over at TAF on this one include Kazuhide Tomonaga (who worked on A Feat of Clay Part 2 most notably), Hiroshi Shiodori and Yuichiro Yano. They did their jobs well because the quality of animation for both the effects and the characters is generally consistently good throughout. The somewhat simple designs allow the animators to be able to convey complex movements while not being shackled to hyper detail as can be the case with some productions. Stand out moments with Hisao Yokobori's scene of course, the bouncy quality of the aliens a lot of the time, nice effects consistently. Its just a very well produced movie that way. It's probably the best animated of all these DC features and it's a shame WB doesn't use TAF more often nowadays but i guess TAF are busy with their japanese projects now with the one they work on most consistently being Aikatsu. The other thing that really stands out is some of the really nice backgrounds and coloring in the latter half. Hiroshi Nitta was art director and he did a pretty good job. Otherwise if i continue i'd just keep gushing and that wouldn't be fun to read now would it. I'd give this a 4/5. I really liked it. There's always a certain cadence with which the tone is managed in the movies Lauren Montgomery directs which is present even if the story isn't the strongest and it is most certainly evident here.
Superman VS The Elite
Superman Vs The Elite was a very well done character piece showcasing why I love the character of superman so much. It's mostly a critique on the complaints some people have of superman about him being a boy scout or too perfect therefore hes boring. It introduces a group of characters that do the one thing Supes would never do which is kill. It continues to build with people adoring them for doing what Supes doesn't until it gets to the point where Supes gives in and goes berserk and we get a lesson as to why he doesn't do these things. Overall it's probably one of my favourite Superman story ever and its not hard to see why. Its a very enjoyable flick. Being directed by Sam Liu who was responsible for Planet Hulk and the Hulk Vs animated marvel movies, its to be expected as they were by far then best things that came form that initiative over at marvel with staff from there who you'd recognise now for their DC output. Jay Oliva being the most prominent one but Character designer Phil Bourassa also worked on a couple of those projects too.
On the animation front this is a bit of a mixed bag. That's not to say that it's bad because like Justice League: Doom, it has some great moments animation-wise. The approach here is very different to other recent animated DC features. The style is very much exaggerated and just by looking at the designs of the characters by Jon Suzuki, you can see the approach was very much to play into old school TAF's squash and stretch approach to animation.
Ultimately with staff spread across this and Doom, only a few sections of the movie featured anything close to that and they are in the video above. Speaking of which, you can really see the difference in approach clearly in the way this was boarding compared to Doom. In this the sequences and long and stretched out and some cuts last up to 20-30 seconds of continuous action. The story boarders on this come courtesy of Christie Tseng (not sure if its the same person that worked on character designs on Korra), Adam Van Wyk, Micheal Chang and Lynell Forestall. In general i wouldn't complain about how everything flows though as usual not many interesting or impressive layouts but not many american productions have those anyway. In general the fight scenes are pretty good though not nearly as well executed as the ones in more recent DC features. As you might expect, the places where the designs aren't used as effectively as one would like are obviously everywhere else. The models stay stiff generally and the colouring is very plain. While reading one of Jon Suzuki's blog posts on the character designs he stated ...
"I also attempted to change up the color palette a bit, at least in the concept phase. Ultimately, it did not make it into the final color. I was hoping that we would rely less on local color and have scenes be dominated by environmental color: ie, time of day, artificial light, or even go monochromatic if the scene dictated as such. Perhaps this would have played off nicely against the cartoony TV show if only that segment was colored with a more 'normal' palette, or even one that matched the animation of the time."[link to original post]
As you can see i the character designs above, this type of colour choice in my opinion would have worked better to contrast with the cartoony designs but that's not how it went ultimately and that's a shame. Overall i give it a 2/5 for the animation. Movies is pretty good otherwise.
On the animation front this is a bit of a mixed bag. That's not to say that it's bad because like Justice League: Doom, it has some great moments animation-wise. The approach here is very different to other recent animated DC features. The style is very much exaggerated and just by looking at the designs of the characters by Jon Suzuki, you can see the approach was very much to play into old school TAF's squash and stretch approach to animation.
Ultimately with staff spread across this and Doom, only a few sections of the movie featured anything close to that and they are in the video above. Speaking of which, you can really see the difference in approach clearly in the way this was boarding compared to Doom. In this the sequences and long and stretched out and some cuts last up to 20-30 seconds of continuous action. The story boarders on this come courtesy of Christie Tseng (not sure if its the same person that worked on character designs on Korra), Adam Van Wyk, Micheal Chang and Lynell Forestall. In general i wouldn't complain about how everything flows though as usual not many interesting or impressive layouts but not many american productions have those anyway. In general the fight scenes are pretty good though not nearly as well executed as the ones in more recent DC features. As you might expect, the places where the designs aren't used as effectively as one would like are obviously everywhere else. The models stay stiff generally and the colouring is very plain. While reading one of Jon Suzuki's blog posts on the character designs he stated ...
"I also attempted to change up the color palette a bit, at least in the concept phase. Ultimately, it did not make it into the final color. I was hoping that we would rely less on local color and have scenes be dominated by environmental color: ie, time of day, artificial light, or even go monochromatic if the scene dictated as such. Perhaps this would have played off nicely against the cartoony TV show if only that segment was colored with a more 'normal' palette, or even one that matched the animation of the time."[link to original post]
As you can see i the character designs above, this type of colour choice in my opinion would have worked better to contrast with the cartoony designs but that's not how it went ultimately and that's a shame. Overall i give it a 2/5 for the animation. Movies is pretty good otherwise.
Justice League: Doom
Justice League Doom wasn't quite as good as those two but does tell an interesting enough Justice League tale. The comic book story it adapts is the "Tower of Babel" which entails the Legion of Doom poaching Batman's plans to take down other Justice League members in case they ever go rogue. As is to be expected, a bunch of fights actings almost as vignettes take place with each league member and their corresponding opponent. For example we have Wonder Woman fighting Cheetah and Green Lantern fighting Star Sapphire. It's an entertaining watch but not really a story with a strong throughline like the other animated Justice League efforts.
On the animation front it was overall a good TAF production. Not their best considering they were apparently working on this and Superman VS The Elite at the same time. This obviously resulted in neither being as consistent as Green Lantern First Flight but there are definitely some standout sequences as you see in the video above. Storyboarders on this production were mostly japanese with the sole western presence being Melchior Zwyer who is now known for directing some excellent episodes of The Legend of Korra. The japanese story boarders include TAF regulars, Toshihiko Masuda, Yuichiro Yano, Hisao Yokobori and Kazuhide Tomonaga. DC productions do have some staff from the contracted studio help out on storyboards sometimes but i think this has to be the most dramatic japanese presence of the productions. This most likely is due to WB animations well placed trust in TAF as they have collaborated many times though these days they seem to prefer MOI Animation. The vast majority of the movie isn't overly flashy as can be the case with western action series as the opportunities for work on action production dwindles. There is a focus on a lot of quick cuts in the actions scenes however which is where the most effort is generally focused when storyboarding. The focus in the end looked to be an opportunity for TAF to do a lot of effects animation shots of smoke, explosions, beams, debris and such. Watching it you can see they make sure to have sequences incorporate these elements and thats most evident in the opening fight with the Royal Flush Gang and the Finale with Superman in space and before the Rocket launches. In this way it can be a bit disappointing as TAF sometimes have some really nice character animation scene to give Hisao Yokobori like the sequence in which the alien is sucked into space from a small hole in First Flight. Either way the big takeaway here is the Great effects animation work TAF did with some decent character animation though nothing impressive. The Character designs here are the work of Phil Bourassa and his usual crew such as Dusty Abell and Jon Suzuki providing additional designs. Personally the designs of the main league members i thought were great besides Cyborg who i feel Bourassa designed better in later DC productions. The Legion of Doom is fine with the best designs being Vandal Savage and Star Sapphire.
In general i much prefer this style to what Bourassa's design sense has evolved into these days which features hyper muscular features and overly wide heads with puzzling facial proportions. The backgrounds here though are generally good thanks to art director Hiroshi Nitta. They are a more restrained painterly style and don't feature as much of a processed look as backgrounds can look in WB productions now, especially in Young Justice. Overall the production was good though you can tell staff was split between working on this and Superman VS The Elite which may have necessitated hiring of freelances like Hironori Tanaka whose work here is mostly restrained to keep consistent with the rest of the animation. You can really tell because there's no way Tanaka wouldn't be restraining himself with his hair animation looking like that. And that's my thoughts on the animation in Justice League: Doom. I rate the animation 3/5.
On the animation front it was overall a good TAF production. Not their best considering they were apparently working on this and Superman VS The Elite at the same time. This obviously resulted in neither being as consistent as Green Lantern First Flight but there are definitely some standout sequences as you see in the video above. Storyboarders on this production were mostly japanese with the sole western presence being Melchior Zwyer who is now known for directing some excellent episodes of The Legend of Korra. The japanese story boarders include TAF regulars, Toshihiko Masuda, Yuichiro Yano, Hisao Yokobori and Kazuhide Tomonaga. DC productions do have some staff from the contracted studio help out on storyboards sometimes but i think this has to be the most dramatic japanese presence of the productions. This most likely is due to WB animations well placed trust in TAF as they have collaborated many times though these days they seem to prefer MOI Animation. The vast majority of the movie isn't overly flashy as can be the case with western action series as the opportunities for work on action production dwindles. There is a focus on a lot of quick cuts in the actions scenes however which is where the most effort is generally focused when storyboarding. The focus in the end looked to be an opportunity for TAF to do a lot of effects animation shots of smoke, explosions, beams, debris and such. Watching it you can see they make sure to have sequences incorporate these elements and thats most evident in the opening fight with the Royal Flush Gang and the Finale with Superman in space and before the Rocket launches. In this way it can be a bit disappointing as TAF sometimes have some really nice character animation scene to give Hisao Yokobori like the sequence in which the alien is sucked into space from a small hole in First Flight. Either way the big takeaway here is the Great effects animation work TAF did with some decent character animation though nothing impressive. The Character designs here are the work of Phil Bourassa and his usual crew such as Dusty Abell and Jon Suzuki providing additional designs. Personally the designs of the main league members i thought were great besides Cyborg who i feel Bourassa designed better in later DC productions. The Legion of Doom is fine with the best designs being Vandal Savage and Star Sapphire.
In general i much prefer this style to what Bourassa's design sense has evolved into these days which features hyper muscular features and overly wide heads with puzzling facial proportions. The backgrounds here though are generally good thanks to art director Hiroshi Nitta. They are a more restrained painterly style and don't feature as much of a processed look as backgrounds can look in WB productions now, especially in Young Justice. Overall the production was good though you can tell staff was split between working on this and Superman VS The Elite which may have necessitated hiring of freelances like Hironori Tanaka whose work here is mostly restrained to keep consistent with the rest of the animation. You can really tell because there's no way Tanaka wouldn't be restraining himself with his hair animation looking like that. And that's my thoughts on the animation in Justice League: Doom. I rate the animation 3/5.
The next studio we'll look at is MOI Animation. As one of the busiest Korean studios working right now its no surprise they've done quite a few DCAU Original Movies.
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