Batman: The Long Halloween Part Two (2021) Review

Part One of the epic animated adaptation of Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale’s Batman: The Long Halloween, was a brilliant and entertaining whodunit with the inexperienced Dark Knight as in the dark as everyone else over the identity of the Holiday Killer who had been murdering Gotham’s gangsters.

The thrilling conclusion to this super hero crime thriller opens with Bruce Wayne (voiced by Supernatural’s Jensen Ackles) entwined in vines, entranced by Poison Ivy’s (Mandalorian and Battlestar Galactica’s Katee Sackhoff) evil powers leaving the city and Police Captain James Gordon (Billy Burke from Twilight) lost without the masked vigilante.

Luckily Catwoman (Naya Rivera in sadly her last role) has Batman’s back and after saving him from Ivy’s insidious clutches the dynamic duo carry on their quest to reveal the serial killer who is working their way through the family members and friends of Gotham’s Godfather Carmine Falcone (Titus Welliver).

But The Roman has sought his own allies against his mysterious assailant not only hiring Poison Ivy to bewitch Wayne and siphon off his cash into his own corrupt coffers but freeing Scarecrow and the Mad Hatter from Arkham Asylum as partners to keep his criminal business from falling apart.

With the populace and police now under attack from both a series of super villains as well as the Holiday Killer, Batman has his hands full and fails to see that his friend District Attorney Harvey Dent (Josh Duhamel) who is also on a crusade to stop the cities underworld, being pushed closer and closer to the edge.

After an attempt on his life fails Dent is left horribly disfigured and what is left of his sanity slips away giving rise to a new menace for the caped crusader to take on. Now calling himself Two-Face the disturbed Dent is determined to take down Falcone by any means necessary leading up to an explosive climax where Batman must battle his rouges gallery in attempt to solve the case and save his friend.

As mention in my review of Batman: The Long Halloween, Part One what makes this particular story so fascinating is the fallibility of its central hero who having only just started crime fighting is still finding his feet whether it’s for kicking villains in the face or following the clues to uncover the killer.

As before the animation is excellent as are the talented voice cast and the design expertly evokes both Tim Burton’s grand gothic Batman as well as the amazing animated series which is still underappreciated for its innovation (as well as for inventing the character of Harley Quinn).

Don’t be mistaken through this is no kids cartoon and Part Two caries on the darker tone of the first film dropping F-bombs alongside plenty of blood drenched violence and disturbing moments. With horror infused villains like the Hannibal Lecter-esque Calendar Man, monstrous Solomon Grundy, Mad Hatter and more importantly the Scarecrow in tow the films relishes playing up Batman’s sinister side.

Most unsettling of all is the transformation of Dent into Two-Face that is wonderfully elaborated in this second instalment making the movie as much about him as it is about the bat.

Played insanely differently by Aaron Eckhart in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight and Tommy Lee Jones in Joel Schumacher’s Batman Forever neither film gave the wicked and warped supervillain the screen time he deserved, an omission rectified by The Long Halloween which attempts to make the audience not only understand but also sympathise with this sick minded psychopath by seeing his origin played out in full.

Ending where it began on Halloween night one year later, Batman: The Long Halloween Part Two provides the perfect conclusion to this sensational comic adaptation delivery answers to all the questions raised in Part One and some bonus revelations besides.

In many ways it is hard to analyse these two films separately seeing as they are two sides of the same tale and should be viewed in one go although perhaps given that it is really Two-Faces story it couldn’t have been told any other way.

Batman: The Long Halloween Part One and Batman: The Long Halloween Part Two are available now on Digital, DVD, Blu-ray™ & Blu-ray™ steelbook now. Read our Review of Part One HERE

Movie Rating:

Trailer: