MovieChat Forums > Superman: The Animated Series (1996) Discussion > Bruce Timm and the guys hating Professor...

Bruce Timm and the guys hating Professor Hamilton...

posted 8 years ago by DarthBill
8 replies | jump to latest

I remember reading/watching interviews with Bruce Timm and his colleagues where they all admitted that they hated Professor Hamilton, which ultimately factored into him becoming an antagonist in Justice League Unlimited during the CADMUS arc, but they never really said why they hated him so much, if they just didn't like him being "the Mr. Wizard character" or something else.

Does anyone out there know of any interviews where Timm and/or his colleagues expand on their dislike of Prof. Hamilton?

[–] PreachCaleb 8 years ago

I'd never heard that. Funny that they didn't like him yet gave him a perfectly reasonable excuse for joining Cadmus.

Let's be bad guys.

[–] WeirdRaptor 8 years ago

Or either its not true or the writing team had the maturity to find a reasonable excuse to get him onto the antagonistic side.

"All you have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to you." -Gandalf

[–] ZombieGiles 8 years ago

I like Hamilton. He's pretty much Superman's Alfred. Not in a parental sense but in a best friend sense.

[–] gluserty 8 years ago

I feel the same way ZombieGiles; he helped Superman grow, and he came up with The Fortress of Solitude idea too.

[–] SuperCore 8 years ago

I was glad they made him a competent and normal scientist in this series. In the comics he was a goofy fella.

"They have a grill, it's this grill. Now you have it...it's called America."

[–] DarthBill 8 years ago

Hamilton's change(s) in JLU (where he apparently started dying his hair) does bring up some interesting alternative interpretations of his character -

Was he always secretly an arrogant narcissist who took a little too much pride in being Superman's go to guy for science, or was he a genuinely good man who couldn't overcome the trauma of seeing what Superman would be like if he [brainwashed] into a villain? If the latter, did he really join Cadmus in JLU of his own free will or was he manipulated by Lex Luthor and company?

[–] PreachCaleb 8 years ago

I never saw him as arrogant. He was always genuine in wanting to help others.

I do think he let his fear of Superman's power get the better of him. I doubt anyone was manipulated into joining by Luthor. Luthor may have been secretly funding Cadmus, but he didn't create it or really run it.

You are sin.

[–] DarthBill 8 years ago

I never saw him as arrogant. He was always genuine in wanting to help others.

I do think he let his fear of Superman's power get the better of him. I doubt anyone was manipulated into joining by Luthor. Luthor may have been secretly funding Cadmus, but he didn't create it or really run it.

Yeah that's how I prefer to think of Hamilton - a good man who got blind-sided by post-traumatic stress and fear.