UPDATED WITH VIDEO: Wil Wheaton Takes the Blue Beetle Back to His Silver Age Roots on Batman: The Brave and the Bold

Scroll to the bottom for the new video. There have been some very good animated versions of Batman in the last couple decades, from the gritty noir Batman, the Animated Series, to the slightly dystopian futuristic Batman Beyond. The thing that has tied them together has been sticking to the darker tone of the post-Frank […]

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Trolleccc2008_wilwheaton Scroll to the bottom for the new video.

There have been some very good animated versions of Batman in the last couple decades, from the gritty noir Batman, the
Animated Series, to the slightly dystopian futuristic Batman Beyond. The thing that has tied them together has been sticking to the darker tone of the post-Frank
Miller Dark Knight era of Batman comics. It's a good thing, of course, but it has also made Batman a little less accessible to younger
(potential) fans.

That's all changed now, with Batman: The Brave and the Bold (Fridays, 8 p.m. e/p on Cartoon Network). This new animated Batman, while not as campy as the '60s live-action television show, takes a step back into the lighter world of the Silver Age of comics, and brings a more buddy/action sensibility to this familiar hero. This lighter tone doesn't water down the continuity for the true comic book fans, though. And if you don't believe me, just ask honorary GeekDad Wil Wheaton.

Actually, that's what I did.

Wednesday night, I got the opportunity to talk to Wil at length about the new series, and his role as the Silver Age-era hero Blue Beetle (aka
Ted Kord), in an upcoming episode titled "The Fall of the Blue Beetle." As a lifelong Batman fan (which answered my "Marvel or DC" question before I got a chance to ask it), Wil told me he really likes the tone of the new show:

I'm probably the world's biggest Batman fan. Batman's the reason that I read comic books... [Brave and the Bold] is just another take on the Batman universe. Batman has always been, by its very definition, a little dark and very serious; and I mean, look: it's about a vigilante who's driven by the need to avenge the murders of his parents that he saw when he was a child. Clearly, he has some issues... But I
really like what they're doing with The Brave and the Bold
because it is stylized. You know, Dark Knight changed everything, and Year One changed everything. There was before [those comics] and after. And [The Brave and the Bold] is just, like, before.

You can take it from Wil, and me, that the series is a lot of fun and accessible to a younger audience, while still throwing in tons of characters and continuity points that will leave comic book fans smiling and nodding in appreciation. Use Wil's episode (airing Friday, January 23rd at
8 p.m. on Cartoon Network - check your local listings!) as a starting point to check it out yourself, and then go back and pick up the rest on iTunes, or wait for the re-runs.

And if you'd like to hear my entire conversation with Wil, we are releasing it through our regular podcast feed, which you can get through iTunes, or you can
download the file here, or listen to it in the embedded player below.

UPDATED: I just received this clip of Wil as the Blue Beetle. The last line is PRICELESS!

https://downloads.wired.com/podcasts/assets/thegeekdads/Scarab.mov

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