Let me stipulate upfront that I have never played a Lara Croft game or saw the first film adaptation of the Tomb Raider franchise. I have a passing familiarity with her thanks to the virtue of Lara being the first major adventure video game female star (where are the others?). As a result, I approached the Blu-ray release of the March Tomb Raider film, out tomorrow from Warner Home Entertainment, with an open mind.

While Angelina Jolie seemed picture perfect in her turn, the slightly smaller, more athletic Alicia Vikander has made the part her own. It helps that the film is effectively her origin story and for 118 fun minutes, we watch her go from clueless Millennial to adventurer after being told she has to claim dad’s inheritance or lose it all…now. She is 21, aimless, and seeking a purpose when life hands it to her and she decides to grab it. Then hang on to it, when she heads for the isle of Yamatai. Dad (Dominic West) leaves a message warning her off, but by then she’s invested and goes for it. I gather this script from Geneva Robertson-Dworet and Alastair Siddons is based on the 2013 reboot of the video game franchise.

Lara Croft feels right and solid as a character, thanks in a large part to Vikander’s strong acting in any role. Unfortunately, Lord Richard Croft, rival Mathais Vogel (Walton Goggins), and other supporting roles are less well-defined, a disservice to actors involved, notably Kristin Scott Thomas and Derek Jacobi.

The movie zips along just fine and the stunts and escapades feel good, more than just an 8-bit video game come to life, but there’s also an unevenness throughout spoiling the fun.

The film comes in a variety of packages and the Blu-ray, DVD; Digital HD combo pack was reviewed. Word is the 4K UltraHD looks spectacular and since it was shot digitally, it looks pretty darn sharp in 1080p. The lossless Dolby Atmos/TrueHD 7.1 and DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio tracks are equally attractive.

The film underperformed at the box office, which is a real shame, but it may explain why we get a mere four bonus features. First up, is Tomb Raider: Uncovered (7:04) as cast and crew talk production; Croft Training (6:03), Vikander prepares and gets buff; Breaking Down the Rapids (5:33), Director Roar Uthaug leads us through the set piece; and, Lara Croft: Evolution of an Icon (9:51), a nice history of the video game that became a phenomenon with fans/experts Megan Marie and Erika Ishii giving us gushing context.

The Bridge: How the Roeblings Connected Brooklyn to New York
By Peter J. Tomasi and Sara DuVall
208 pages, $24.99, Abrams ComicArts

Once upon a time, Brooklyn was a city separate from New York, separated by a river and giving rise to vastly different cultures. Yet, people commuted from the Brooklyn shore to Manhattan Island and in the 19^th Century, a visionary engineer thought a bridge was needed to connect the two.

The feat of engineering is something worth celebrating and David McCullough did that with his 1972 The Great Bridge, which served as the source for Ken Burns America Collection: Brooklyn Bridge. But, there are other ways to tell that story and Peter Tomasi, a comics writer and editor, has been longing to tell this story for years.

Thankfully, his dream, like John Roebling’s, has become a reality. Unlike the elder Roebling, at least Tomasi is still around to see it. Tomasi is known for how his humanizes his heroes, making them relatable in ways that do not diminish their amazing accomplishments. Partnered with Sara DuVall, we get to see the people who toiled for decades to make the Bridge a reality.

As with so much of the 19^th century, the story begins with the Civil War as John’s son, Washington, experiences much. A Union soldier, he had been trained at his father’s side and more than once used his knowledge to help construct bridges for the soldiers to use. He saw much, endured much, and brought home those memories and more than few injuries.

Washington also fell in love, meeting Emily Warren at an officers’ dance. They were infatuated with one another and they formed a partnership that was stronger than the steel wire the Roeblings’ factory produced.

No sooner did Washington return from the war in 1865 than he and his father embarked on drafting plans to convince the governments of two cities that a bridge was not only necessary but also possible to build. By this point, the cold, taciturn John has ingrained a worldview and work ethic in Washington that ensured the two would work compatibly which proved fortuitous when the suborn older man died from an untreated infection.

The difference in Washington, much as it separates Tomasi from many of his comic book peers, is the touch of humanity. Over the years between construction (1869) and opening (1883), Roebling goes out of his way to ensure the men’s safety, shortening work hours, having an on-site doctor, etc. His loyalty to the men is inspiring as is his relationship with Emily. She comes into her own as his cheerleader, champion, and ultimately surrogate when he is too ill to leave their home.

With 208 pages to work with, DuVall paces things nicely and her art, simple and clear, helped by Rob Leigh’s strong lettering and nice palette from colorists Gabriel Eltaeb and John Kalisz. They help us see the depths men had to dig before hitting bedrock, the physical and emotional toll the work took, as well as the political shenanigans that almost derailed the project in its final phase.

Overall, this is a masterful use of the graphic novel format to tell an important story in a compelling way. Highly recommended for readers of all ages.

In the 1950s, Batman was transformed into a variety of beings or wore a colorful assortment of costumes to goose sales. Thankfully, that silliness was retired with the New Look and wasn’t resurrected until the Elseworlds what if stories of the 1990s. That same approach has now crept from the page to the screen with Batman Ninja, out now on DVD from Warner Home Entertainment.

This anime-style adventure comes from director Junpei Mizusaki, (producer of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure), working from a script by Kazuki Nakashima (Kill La Kill, Gurren Lagann) and character designs from Takashi Okazaki (Afro Samurai). As a result, it comes with a strong pedigree for the creative approach.

Rather than a posit an ancient Japan that needed a protector styled in the form of a bat, this gonzo story actually takes the heroes and villains of Gotham City and transports them into the past. It’s weird, wild, wacky and not at all to my taste so your mileage will almost certainly vary.

We have the Dark Knight (Kōichi Yamadera/Roger Craig Smith) sent to feudal Japan without his high-tech gadgets and has to go back to the basics to save the locals from the Joker (Wataru Takagi/Tony Hale), Catwoman (Ai Kakuma/Grey Griffin), Harley Quinn (Rie Kugimiya/Tara Strong), Two-Face (Toshiyuki Morikawa/Eric Bauza), Gorilla Grodd (Takehito Koyasu/Fred Tatasciore), Deathstroke (Junichi Suwabe/Fred Tatasciore), Penguin (Chō/Tom Kenny), Bane (Kenta Miyake), and Poison Ivy (Atsuko Tanaka/Tara Strong). Also transported are Alfred (Hōchū Ōtsuka/Adam Croasdell), Nightwing (Daisuke Ono/Adam Croasdell), Robin (Yuki Kaji/Yuri Lowenthal), Red Robin (Kengo Kawanishi/Will Friedle), and Red Hood (Akira Ishida/Yuri Lowenthal). Along the way, he finds new allies and becomes a ronin of sorts, a masterless samurai out to protect the innocent from the wicked, fulfilling a prophecy about a foreign bat ninja coming to save them.

I guess

 the creators thought they were getting one shot at this project and therefore threw in every trope you could ask for, making it feel weirdly familiar but also oddly humdrum. The most interesting turn comes when villains lose their memories and acclimatize to their surroundings. There’s also a nice twist with Grodd.

Produced in Japan, the Blu-ray release offers up both the original Japanese vocal cast and an English audio track. Visually, it is an amazing piece of animation, mixing traditional drawings with 3-D virtual realities so you’ve not quite seen a Batman animated feature like this before.

The Blu-ray comes with a handful of useful features delving into this project’s background. We start with East/West Batman (10:00) where Mike Carlin (Creative Director Animation, DC Entertainment), Ames Kirshen (VP Interactive & Animation DC Entertainment), Eric S. Garcia (Producer, English Screenwriter), Leo Chu (Producer, English Screenwriter), and Junpei (Director),  Mizusaki, Nakashima, and Okazak take turns discussing the challenges with bringing an American super-hero to Japanese storytelling.

Then there’s Batman: Made in Japan (15:00) which goes further into the traditional Japanese storytelling elements while focusing on Okazaki.

Of course, there’s New York Comic Con Presents Batman Ninja (40:00).