Plot summary: Robin takes a shine to a runaway girl with no memories, causing some friction between him and Batman.
Each Saturday and Sunday Matt Waters recaps an episode of the legendary Batman: The Animated Series, building an overall ranking along the way. Plus best performances, the ever-popular Villain Watch and more!
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Notes
Episode Title: ‘Growing Pains’
Original Air Date: February 28th, 1998
Directed: Atsuko Tanaka (1)
Written: Paul Dini (27) (story) and Robert Goodman (2)
This episode is obviously a direct sequel to ‘Mudslide’, and potentially pre-dates ‘Holiday Knights’ despite being produced and aired after it. I still don’t know why a Christmas anthology was the first episode of this series.
The Kane building is named for Bob Kane, the asshole who went to the grave falsely claiming he was solely responsible for the creation of Batman. Bill Finger for life!
Depressingly, Atsuko Tanka is the first and only woman to direct an episode of BTAS/TNBA. She will direct one more episode before the series is up, but despite having 54 animation credits (including Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke!!!), she only got to direct 4 times. FOUR!
Recap
Robin saves a young girl from a biker gang but the would-be victim flees, refusing Tim’s help. He tries to talk Batman into looking for her, but Bruce coldly states there’s nothing they can do for her.
Undeterred, Tim later spots the girl heading into a bus station and again saves her when she almost wanders in front of a bus. The girl (who Tim names Annie) claims to have no memory beyond the fact a man is after her.
Right on cue, an enormous dude claiming to be her father attacks. Batman intervenes, leading to an extended chase sequence, during which the man leaps from a ridiculous height and lands on his feet without slowing down.
Eventually losing their man, the Dynamic Duo go back for Annie but she’s nowhere to be seen. Bruce takes a dirt sample and orders Tim to return home, but he of course refuses and heads out to try and find the girl.
Tim searches all over Gotham and eventually runs into Annie again. She thanks him for his concern with a kiss on the cheek and describes one of her only memories: a lighthouse.
Back at the cave, Bruce finishes analysing the sample and reacts in mild horror, racing off to rescue the kids thanks to a tracking device in Tim’s utility belt.
Journeying to the lighthouse from Annie’s memories and into a network of pipes down by the sea, the pair are confronted by none other than Clayface, who chases them into a chemical facility connected to the pipes.
Annie at last remembers the truth: After washing out to sea at the end of ‘Mudslide’, Clayface was exposed to some chemicals that helped him regain his form, albeit in a weakened state. Thus he split a portion of himself off and sent it to check if the coast was clear, and ‘Annie’ was born.
Robin does his best but Clayface is far too powerful and nearly kills him, so Annie hurls herself at her creator and is reabsorbed into him. Furious, Tim attacks Clayface wildly, inadvertently dousing the floor in a volatile solvent.
Batman rescues his sidekick moments before an explosion and fails to comfort the boy in the aftermath as Clayface is wheeled away in a containment chamber. When the police go over the crimes Hagen committed, Tim mutters “murder” and walks away. Damn, son.
Best Performance
Mathew Valencia continues to be one of the better child voice actors you could hope to encounter, with this episode pairing nicely with ‘Sins of the Father’ to demonstrate why people preferred the second Robin to the first. It’s a difficult thing for a performer of his age to pull of snark without being annoying, but Valencia nails it, with this episode also giving him some nice emotional material to work with in the form of his beau, Annie. Daydreaming, defiance and defeat; he really goes through it here.
Francesca Smith does a decent job as Annie, even if most of her dialogue is frightened exclamations. It’s a tragic little character, and while the design is doing most of the work (see below), Smith is doing everything she can with limited lines.
Ron Perlman is still a menacing Clayface, but it’s pure gruff threats this time, giving him less opportunity to demonstrate his talents.
Ranking
This is one of the better animated episodes in the whole show, with Annie’s design and movements in particular being pretty evocative of Japanese animation, which makes sense given the director’s resume. There’s also just a fluidity of movement that earlier episodes of the show simply weren’t capable of, including some slick ‘camera’ movements during the final confrontation with Clayface. Speaking of the villain, his appearances have been so limited because of how difficult he is to animate (hence spending over half of his screen time in disguise), but when they do use him, he’s a treat to behold; a completely different animal to the typical Batman villains.
In addition to all that, there are nice little design touches like Tim mussing up his hair when he changes into his Robin costume, and the opening motorcycle fight is a fun deviation from the standard action sequences.
There’s a strong history of Robin spotlight episodes, with ‘Robin’s Reckoning’ winning an Emmy, and while this isn’t as good as that, Tim’s characterisation is very strong. His desperate attempt to rescue Annie from an abusive ‘father’ is in keeping with his own background and also plays nicely into his prickly relationship with Bruce, which Alfred weighs in on for good measure. This kind of focus on the people behind the masks has been the strength of New Batman Adventures so far, and I hope it continues.
- The Laughing Fish
- Mask of the Phantasm
- Almost Got ‘im
- Heart of Ice
- Harlequinade
- The Trial
- Riddler’s Reform
- Double Talk
- Shadow of the Bat Part I
- I Am the Night
- Robin’s Reckoning Part I
- Baby-Doll
- Sins of the Father
- Batman & Mr. Freeze: Sub-Zero
- The Man Who Killed Batman
- Perchance to Dream
- Two-Face Part I
- You Scratch My Back
- Bane
- Batgirl Returns
- A Bullet For Bullock
- Joker’s Favor
- Read My Lips
- Feat of Clay Part II
- Catwalk
- The Demon’s Quest Part II
- Harley and Ivy
- Robin’s Reckoning Part II
- House & Garden
- Beware the Gray Ghost
- Growing Pains (NEW ENTRY)
- Holiday Knights
- Second Chance
- Mad as a Hatter
- Heart of Steel Part II
- Appointment In Crime Alley
- Two-Face Part II
- Pretty Poison
- Deep Freeze
- Harley’s Holiday
- Lock-Up
- Shadow of the Bat Part II
- Feat of Clay Part I
- Cold Comfort
- His Silicon Soul
- Off Balance
- Vendetta
- Birds of a Feather
- Joker’s Millions
- Heart of Steel Part I
- Never Fear
- On Leather Wings
- See No Evil
- The Clock King
- It’s Never Too Late
- Make ‘Em Laugh
- Joker’s Wild
- Eternal Youth
- The Cape and Cowl Conspiracy
- The Cat and the Claw Part I
- Zatanna
- Day of the Samurai
- Avatar
- The Demon’s Quest Part I
- The Mechanic
- The Strange Secret of Bruce Wayne
- Terror in the Sky
- P.O.V.
- Christmas with the Joker
- Fear of Victory
- Be a Clown
- The Worry Men
- What is Reality?
- Fire From Olympus
- Night of the Ninja
- Mudslide
- The Cat and the Claw Part II
- Nothing to Fear
- The Lion and the Unicorn
- Prophecy of Doom
- Tyger, Tyger
- Blind as a Bat
- If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Rich?
- Dreams In Darkness
- The Last Laugh
- Cat Scratch Fever
- Moon of the Wolf
- Paging the Crime Doctor
- Time Out of Joint
- Sideshow
- The Under-Dwellers
- The Forgotten
- Showdown
- The Terrible Trio
- I’ve Got Batman in My Basement
Villain Watch
Clayface (Ron Perlman) (fifth appearance)
One of the few untouched character designs, the possibilities of Clayface continue to haunt me. You can do virtually anything with him in a fight scene, with even his short appearance in ‘Holiday Knights’ proving that. If only the money and technology had been there to up Hagen’s appearances, he would for sure be a top five villain.
I do think this helps his standing compared to ‘Mudslide’, but not by much, because aside from what a treat he is in fight scenes, there’s not a huge amount going on behind his enormous yellow eyes. He facilitates a compelling story, and his reabsorption of Annie is haunting, but I’d love to see him hatching more schemes, rather than performing so many petty thefts.
- The Joker
- Harley Quinn
- Mr. Freeze
- Poison Ivy
- The Ventriloquist
- Catwoman
- Two-Face
- The Riddler
- The Phantasm
- Baby-Doll
- Bane
- Mad Hatter
- Clayface
- HARDAC (and Randa Duane)
- Ra’s al Ghul
- Lock-Up
- Penguin
- Lloyd Ventrix
- Scarecrow
- Killer Croc
- Rupert Thorne
- Count Vertigo
- Clock King
- Nivens
- Roland Daggett (and Germs & Bell!)
- Enrique el Gancho
- Josiah Wormwood
- Talia al Ghul
- Sid the Squid
- Queen Thoth Khepera
- Maxie Zeus
- Jimmy ‘Jazzman’ Peake
- Tony Zucco
- Man-Bat
- Rhino, Mugsy and Ratso
- Hugo Strange
- Red Claw
- Arnold Stromwell
- Mad Bomber
- Tygrus
- Kyodai Ken
- Condiment King/Pack Rat/Mighty Mom
- Grant Walker
- Gil Mason
- Nostromos (and Lucas!)
- Cameron Kaiser
- Dr. Dorian (and Garth)
- Mad Dog
- Ubu
- Professor Milo
- Romulus
- Arkady Duvall
- Sewer King
- Boss Biggis
- Montague Kane
- The Terrible Trio
Plugs
Eager for more long-form coverage of Batman? Why not check out my podcast with Mike Thomas, The Tape Crusaders, which reviewed every Batman movie and delved a tiny bit into the animated series.
My other recap column, Marvel Mondays, has now begun coverage of Loki. New episodes every Monday… obviously.
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