There’s been a lot of superhero media these days focused on
the well-worn trope of the murderous vigilante. Batman: Arkham Knight’s
titular antagonist is essentially a militarized version of Batman who’s willing
to kill his foes and it was just recently announced that Punisher will be the
main villain of Netflix’s Daredevil
season 2. With all that in mind
now seems like the perfect time to revisit Batman:
Mask of the Phantasm, the hands down best iteration of this particular
storyline as well as probably the best Batman film all around. For those of you unfortunate enough to
be unaware of this film, Mask of the
Phantasm was a 1993 animated feature that spun out of Bruce Timm’s award
winning Batman the animated series
(which is why this is a Static Thoughts article.) The film deals with a mysterious new vigilante named the
Phantasm who’s been killing off Gotham mobsters and letting Batman take the
blame. That’s the outward plot
anyway; the deeper focus of the film is on the very definition of Batman and how
he relates to personal loss, revenge, and justice.
