Petals dropped by the same flower

Ninja Batman vs. Yakuza League (20/10)

Tied with Ninja Batman for the title of "Bear's favorite piece of Batman media." This picks up the day after the events of Ninja Batman, though you don't really need to watch the previous movie to understand what's happening here.

After Bruce, Dick, Jason, Tim, Damian, Alfred, and their rogues gallery return to the modern era, strange things start to happen in Gotham. For example: It's started raining yakuza and nobody thinks this is weird. It quickly becomes apparent that someone's changed reality and now they have to fix things before Gotham is overtaken by a yakuza version of the Justice League.

Okay, first things first. This is, in many ways, just as ridiculous as Ninja Batman. But it still has its own flair which I very much appreciate!

Within 10 minutes it's revealed that (what seems to be) Japan is floating upside down in the sky above Gotham. Because of shenanigans, only people who've time traveled can see it. The yakuza are falling from sky-Japan into Gotham, so the Batfamily decides to investigate. Bruce and Damian fly to sky-Japan to get a better idea of what they're up against. Dick and Tim (and eventually Jason) deal with the remaining yakuza in Gotham. Both groups soon find themselves facing off against members of the Justice League.

This incarnation of the League is called the Hagane yakuza family with Zeshika the Emerald Ray (Jessica Cruz), Ahsa the Aqua Dragon (Arthur Curry), Bari the Fleet of Foot (Barry Allen), and Kuraku the Man of Steel (Clark Kent) as members. Daiana makes her dramatic entrance to save Bruce and Damian from Ahsa and it turns out that instead of being a member of the Hagane family, she's the Eagle Goddess Daiana, head of the Amazone family and still one of the good gals.

( All the spoilers. )

Random stuff:

• I am so fond of this version of the Amazons. I wanted to screech when they called Daiana "Nee-san." I LOVE THEM.
• Daiana calling Bruce and his kids the "Bat (Yakuza) Family" 😭
• Not only have we been twice blessed by Ninja Batman, but we're also about to be blessed by Aztec Batman! According to an interview by Anime News Network, Batman Azteca: Choque de Imperios is scheduled for release this September 2025.

Note to self: Do not drink co-amoxiclav ever again unless it's the only antibiotic available/that will work.

Drank the first tablet Saturday night because of a possible ear infection and was out of commission because of side effects until this morning 💀 I'm now on other meds, but omfg. That was horrible.

The Curious Case of the Pygmy Nuthatch

You see, there’s a scene in [Charlie's Angels] that tormented me, that kept me up at night, and that lately has had me interrogating a wide variety of seemingly devoted, and certainly well-compensated, filmmaking professionals. That’s because the bird in Charlie’s Angels is, I believe, the wrongest bird in the history of cinema—and one of the weirdest and most inexplicable flubs in any movie I can remember. It is elaborately, even ornately wrong. It has haunted not just me but, as I’d later learn, the birding community at large for almost a quarter of a century.

ngl this was a riveting read 😆