In the history of superheroes and comic books, there is perhaps no superhero lair quite as iconic as The BatCave! This winter, the team at DC Collectibles has gone all out to give Batman fans a chance to bring The BatCave home for themselves and make it a part of their collection with the new ‘Batman: The Animated Series’ BatCave Playset Diorama! This thing is huge and is easily one of the coolest things DC Collectibles has ever produced; but what makes it so cool? And the bigger question- should I buy one of these? We’re here to address all of this and more with our full review!
As we mentioned before, The BatCave playset is from DC Collectibles’ ‘Batman: The Animated Series’ line. As such, it’s design is heavily based on the BatCave’s look from this iconic 1992 cartoon series. The BatCave is approximately 21.4″x19″x15.5″ in size, which translates to “holy crap this thing is huge”! The main structure of the BatCave is a large flat surface with a matte paint to it. Fair warning- the flat portions of this thing seem to be partial to scuffing, so be careful with how you’re moving things on this platform! The BatCave also comes packed with a large fold up cardboard backdrop diorama so that you can get the full ‘cave’ effect for your display!
The main platform is designed to look like it has a rock formation going around the base. It also has a small set of stairs to the rear left hand side, which appear to be removable. A reason is never given as to why these are removable, but we’re hoping that it’s preemptively been tooled that way with hopes of more BatCave add ons in the future! The main base also sports a few small holes so that you’ll be able to comfortably secure and mount the BatComputer to it. When the BatComputer is installed, it’s easily removable if need be but is as snug as a bug unless you’re purposely trying to remove it.
The BatComputer is highly detailed and features some awesome light-up LED screens (more on these later)! The back of them is all wired up, and the whole thing is powered by a smaller external BatComputer add-on that houses the battery pack (x2 AA Batteries) and plugs safely into the main BatComputer component. It’s worth noting that the side-component of the BatComputer does not securely mount to the display base, so you can pretty easily place it wherever you want as long as it’s within a certain distance to the main BatComputer (due to the length of the cord that connects them).
As we mentioned, the BatComputer has a number of light-up LED screens! The BatCave comes packaged with a sheet of reusable interchangeable decals that are made to act as different screens for the BatComputer. One important thing to note about this playset is that when it initially released, there were some early production issues and the decals didn’t stick well and were generally pretty terrible. Thankfully, the team at DC Collectibles has resolved the issue and released a newly updated and fully functional decal sheet! The new ones look identical to the old ones, but work actually really well! The new run of BatCave’s come with the updated sticker sheets included, and DC Collectibles are even providing these replacement sheets completely free for anyone who bought the earlier release of the BatCave! As always DC Collectibles is on top of things and has excellent customer service so that their fans are taken care of! Anyone who has this set can get this issue resolved quickly! It’s also pretty awesome that even with all of the LED screens covered in decals, they still light-up the entire BatCave really well!
Outside of the BatComputer, the BatCave Playset includes a computer chair, a small snack cart, and an exclusive Alfred Pennyworth figure! Alfred is fully articulated and looks just as good as any of the single release figures that are available. Plus he is only available here, so if you wanted an Alfred this BatCave set is your only route to obtain him! Alfred comes packed with some alternative hands, a small snack tray, a feather duster a pitcher, a sugar bowl, a spoon, a teacup, and a saucer! He also includes his unique figure-stand. Overall Alfred is an awesome figure who is completely worth the price of admission on this box set!
Also included with The BatCave are a number of instructions! They’re all mostly straightforward; explaining how to attach the BatComputer, how to remove the stairs, battery installation and sticker/decal placement instructions. They also include a small instruction on how to use the display stand for the included Alfred figure! While most of this stuff is easy enough to figure out, it’s nice that these are included.
The BatCave itself as a whole is pretty insane! The massive size of it scales so well with the figures in this line, making it an amazing piece for your display case and for your Batman collection in general. I personally love the light-up BatComputer and that is has the swappable decals so that you can change the screens all the time. Alfred makes for the perfect accessory, as the Cave would probably seem pretty empty without him (I’d also like to point out that the Batman and Robin figures seen here aren’t included and are sold separately).
Overall, the DC Collectibles ‘Batman: The Animated Series’ BatCave Playset Diorama is an amazing piece! I had high expectations going in for this one personally, and they were all blown away. The design and execution from top to bottom are fantastic, and I don’t really have any complaints about it at all; especially since they moved so quickly to resolve the issue with the original decals! As a huge ‘Batman: The Animated Series’ fan, this set is a dream come true.
They really don’t make diorama playsets like this too often, and the phrase “they don’t make them like this anymore” comes to mind. DC Collectibles truly knocked this piece out of the park, and it’s the ultimate item for any Batman fan to add to their collection.
