CREDITS: Written by Steve Perry and Alan Burnett; directed by Dan Riba.
REVIEW: I'm not going to dispute the fact that the machine that speeds up or slows down time doesn't lead to some very cool bits - Batman running with a developing explosion in his hands, the Batmobile caught in time, the various tableaux of frozen moments - but what the heck is this doing in the Batman show?! Given that Batman and Robin use it to turn themselves into super-speedsters in time for the climax... It just doesn't feel of a piece with the rest of the series, like it's a Justice League script that went back through time (and in fact, there IS a Justice League episode that features the Flash running with a developing explosion in his hands).
Is that the whole of my criticism of this episode? Pretty much. There are some comical elements I like, like the Mayor making fun of the giant gavel he has to yield to open a new courthouse, and Robin gets a few good one-liners. I also like that they wait before letting us in on the Clock King's point of view, leading with mystery, then with wonder. Odd that they name-drop Veronica Vreeland and do nothing with her. So yeah, this is mostly about finding a cool SF episode inappropriate for the world the series has built.
IN THE COMICS: Robin uses the phrase "faster than a speeding bullet"; one wonders if he knows of Superman, who strictly speaking has yet to debut.
SOUNDS LIKE: Roscoe Lee Browne (Barney Miller, Soap, Kingpin on the Spider-Man cartoon) voices Dr. Wakati.
REWATCHABILITY: Medium - Cool stuff, it just doesn't belong on BTAS.
Comments
(And even in the case of Ra's al Ghul vs. the Mummy, I had similar problems with a villain being contorted to where the story made sense for them.)