Hooked Up
Episode #21 - Hooked Up
Original Airdate - November 13th, 1999
Batman must rescue Max when she becomes addicted to a virtual reality
world created by the Spellbinder.
Media by Bird Boy
Review by Tim "Two-Face" Leighton |
Credits:
Written by Robert Goodman
Directed by Dan Riba
Music by Kristopher Carter
Animation by Koko Enterprise Co., LTD., Dong Yang Animation Co.,
LTD.
Voices:
Will Friedle as Terry McGinnis
Kevin Conroy as Bruce Wayne
Cree Summer as Max Gibson
Jon Cypher as Spellbinder
Jason Marsden as Donny
Charlie Rocket as Donny's Dad
Michael Rosenbaum as Wendell
Greg Eagles as Max's Dad
Telma Hopkins as Max's Mom
Mark Jonathan Davis as Virtual Anchor
Eliott Goretsky as Kip
Jennifer Hale as Jessie
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Review
A new type of technology - the VR Room - is all the rave and sweeping
across Gotham. The VR Room allows Gotham's youth to totally zone out of
reality and live in a picture-perfect fantasy world; after their time in
the room is up, they are sent out to steal more money (or credits, as
they're called in this show) as payment for using the room. Spellbinder
is raking in the dough.
OK, let me get all the negativity out of the way...why is it that such a
large chunk of the episodes of this series deal with an addiction or fad
of some type? Is that what the producers think of us "youths" these
days? There was "The Winning Edge", "Splicers", and now this. All of
them, for better or worse, dealt with the topics well, but come on -
originality, pelase!
That said, I really did enjoy the episode. It harkened back to
"Perchance to Dream" from the original animated series, where the Mad
Hatter hooked up Batman to a machine to keep him in a fantasy world.
Spellbinder seems to be a futuristic version of the Mad Hatter, as I've
stated in my review of "Spellbound"; unlike that episode, Spellbinder
here is very interesting.
The various dreams of the VR victims - Donny the rock star, the
love-magnet from the fast-food joint, and Max's "perfect" family - were
all entertaining AND provided insight into their lives. I never thought
we'd get to see someone autograph a bra on this series - we still
didn't, but we came close!
The animation was superb, and the action scenes were perfect. I thought
the first action scene with Terry VS. Donny (a reject from Team Rocket,
I swear) was particularly well done - over the top, but well done. It
just goes to show how desperate these addicts can get. It was also nice
to see Terry grow a lot darker after he realizes just how dangerous
Spellbinder's technology is - he claims to want to beat the answer out
of someone's face and, and, and...not surprisingly, Bruce keeps him in
check.
As noted, Spellbinder was more entertaining in this, his second outing.
We still don't get to know much about him, and what makes him tick - we
just see him as the brains behind the operation. No more, no less. He is
still in dire need of character development, but that lack of
development doesn't hurt this episode in the least.
The other major plot-point in this episode is Max's persistence to
become a more integral part of the Bat-team. Both Bruce and Terry
adamantly refuse, and in the end still never let her go all the way;
however, after she manages to help defeat Spellbinder - not just with
her brain, but with brawn - Terry shows some more respect for her.
(Makes me wonder, though - I've seen some BATMAN BEYOND toy previews and
one of them included a Robin figure - could she get a costume of her own
someday?)
Thank God that this episode didn't preach and talk down to the viewer.
Thank you for sparing us, Mr. Goodman - it's very easy to fall into that
trap with moralistic episodes, but you steered clear of that.
Aside from a terribly quick ending, this episode was great - which is
rare in season two.
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