The Lego Batman Movie

Animated comic superhero adventure featuring the voices of Will Arnett, Zach Galifianakis, Michael Cera, Rosario Dawson and Ralph Fiennes. Directed by Chris McKay. Opens Friday at major theatres. 104 minutes. PG

The Caped Crusader squares off against just about every cartoon villain imaginable in The Lego Batman Movie, but the real adversary may just be himself.

Yes, in spite of being incredibly wise, as he humbly informs us (“I also have huge pecs”), he can’t own up to the loneliness of the life he’s chosen: “I don’t talk about feelings. I never have any.”

He sits alone in his Batcave, crunching on microwaved lobster thermidor thoughtfully prepared for him by his loyal butler Alfred (Ralph Fiennes).

This may seem like an awfully solemn turn for a spinoff of The Lego Movie, a comic franchise built out of plastic bricks and sarcasm.

Fear not: like the explosive “KAPOWs!” and “THWACKs!” of the campy 1960s Batman TV series, which this movie not only sends up but actually imitates, the moping is shoved aside. The serious Batguys of Christopher Nolan and Tim Burton movies are merely name-checked, apart from the gravelly voice.

The Lego Movie’s anarchic spirit and pop-cult battiness continues, as grumpy Batman (Will Arnett) informs goofy Joker (Zach Galifianakis) that just because they constantly fight each other, it doesn’t mean they’re BFFs.

“There is no us. Batman and Joker are not a thing!”

At least Joker gets more screen time here than he did in Suicide Squad, as he plots yet again to blow up Gotham City with an “unnecessarily complicated bomb.” And the Batman vs. Superman jousting is so much better (and funnier) than in last year’s why-so-serious Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, which just about killed two live-action comic book franchises.

If anything, The Lego Batman Movie may be a little too energetic. First-time director Chris McKay, late of the Cartoon Network’s Robot Chicken, throws at the screen seemingly everything his committee of screenwriters scripted.

Michael Cera is amusingly introduced as the adopted Robin, giving Batman a companion along with daddy issues: “Don’t call me Dad!”

Rosario Dawson makes for a sassy new Commissioner Gordon, named Barbara Gordon, who has little patience for “an unsupervised man in a Halloween costume.” Expect her to feature more prominently in future installments.

There are riffs on Michael Jackson, the “You complete me” scene from Jerry Maguire and the wry observation that Gotham City is still the most crime-ridden metropolis on the planet, even with Batman doing his vigilante thing.

At times it seems the makers of The Batman Lego Movie really wish they could be making an “R”-rated comedy like Deadpool.

But the film doesn’t have the mandate for that kind of bare-knuckle comedy, not if it wants to maintain its family-friendly “PG” rating and keep stacking up profitable sequels like plastic bricks.

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