UPDATE: While the video has been updated, none of the commentary below (from 2016) has! Please consider this a re-post!
In the last episode, Batman came to Robin's rescue when Harley Quinn invaded their secret Batcave outpost at Panessa Studios. The dynamic duo was able to apprehend one of the three infected Joker patients that Harley broke out from their quarantine cells, but there are still two more (plus Harley herself) still on the loose.
Just to start with the elephant in the room, I'm not sure how to feel about Robin chokeslamming Christina Bell at the end of this predator encounter. I mean, obviously violence against women is heinous in all its forms, but we're talking about a dangerous supervillainess here who's already shot one henchman as a joke and scratched out the eyes of another one on a whim, so Robin's action is justified on self defense grounds. But it doesn't necessarily make it any easier to watch. Additionally, in a little behind the scenes note, if I wasn't lightning fast on countering Christina's attack, she actually WOULD have clawed half of Robin's face off and we wouldn't get to hear any of his comic dialogue suggesting Christina as a replacement sidekick.
Speaking of Robin (the Tim Drake variety), I think this is a good opportunity to say that I would like to see Jake Gyllenhaal in this role. I think he's got the right mixture of intensity and charm to pull off the Robin vibe, and I don't think it matters that his sister Maggie already appeared in Christopher Nolan's Batman universe. Also he looks really good with a shaved head, which is the hairstyle of choice for this version of Robin, when he's not wearing his hood. Speaking of which, I personally got a kick out of the implication that Tim Drake added a hood to his cape, not necessarily for any practical crime fighting reason, but rather because of receding hairline issues.
But as it happens, Tim Drake is not the only Robin featured in this episode. Apparently all this teamwork has gotten Batman thinking about the tragic fate that befell the former Robin, Jason Todd. And thanks to the Joker infection permeating his psyche, these thoughts manifest themselves into hallucinatory flashbacks of what happened to Jason after he was kidnapped and tortured by the Joker over a period of more than a year. These chilling scenes are taken from the comic book story arc called "A Death in the Family," where readers got to decide the fate of Jason Todd. They also allow me to suggest another acting choice for this brief, three-scene cameo: Norman Reedus. His gruff demeanor fits with the image of Jason Todd as the "bad boy" Robin, and plus he wouldn't even need to cut his hair or shave from his Walking Dead look, since I don't think Joker would have given him regular grooming during his kidnapping period.
The first two of these hallucinations are punctuated by two boss fights: one combat oriented against Albert King (watch it again and try to picture Shaq as the gargantuan boxer) and one music oriented against Johnny Charisma (ditto with Adam Levine as the crooner, even though Mark Hamill's hallucinatory Joker steals the solo spotlight. Then the third one is preceded by a shocking cinematic sequence where we learn an unexpected truth about the fourth (and symptomless) Joker infected, Henry Adams. Turns out he wasn't immune to Jokeritis, but rather he was able to hide the effects of the infection while he earned Batman's trust and set up a disastrous double-cross! Now do you see how an actor of Bill Nighy's caliber could knock this role out of the park?
But it's not just Henry's condition that's revealed in this cutscene: Robin also learns that Batman is the final Joker patient! At first it seems like the Boy Wonder convinces the Dark Knight to quarantine himself until Robin can finish synthesizing the cure, leading to the third and final "Death in the Family" flashback, where Joker kills Jason and utters a phrase that we've seen scrawled on the wall of the Clock Tower when Oracle was kidnapped: "What happens when you drag your friends into this crazy little game of ours." But in a shocking twist, this convoluted fear toxin hallucination actually started before Batman even locked himself in the cell, and what really happened was that Batman deftly countered Robin and put him in the cell instead. It's not necessarily wrong to think that Batman is the only hero who can deal with the situation at hand, but it's definitely out of character for the Caped Crusader to turn on his partner. We'll find out the consequences of his actions in the next episode!
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