I often struggle to really appreciate these animated films, despite enjoying the comics and the characters. There’s something about the medium that simply fails to engage me the way live action or other animated films do. This adaptation of Frank Miller’s seminal The Dark Knight Returns (which I have read) was pretty great, however, and ends on a wonderful reveal that perfectly sets up the second half. That said, the film has a strange relationship with the recent Chris Nolan trilogy. Clearly the success of those films is what has made an adaptation like this possible, and Christopher Drake’s score clearly owes a debt to Hans Zimmer’s epic orchestrations. On the other hand, Miller’s source material was an obvious inspiration to Nolan when scripting his films, in particular the most recent, The Dark Knight Rises, and I can’t quite decide whether these overlaps help or hinder these different screen adaptations from co-existing. Nevertheless, I’m pumped for part two.