10 Most Heartbreaking Moments In The DC Animated Universe

9. Ace's Origins - Batman Beyond

Batman Beyond Ace in the Hole
Warner Bros.

After years spent resisting demands from studios to give the Caped Crusader a dog in Batman: The Animated Series, Alan Burnett, Bruce Timm and Paul Dini finally relented in Batman Beyond. The end result was Ace, a fantastic update on the goofy "Bat Hound" who had once been a staple of the Dark Knight's Silver Age hijinks.

Ace, a big Dane mix, got plenty of moments to shine in Batman Beyond - in particular when Terry sends him after Joker's goons in the Return of the Joker movie. He also got a whole episode dedicated to him in the show's Season 2 finale, fittingly titled "Ace in the Hole".

The episode shows us how Bruce came to find Ace, and it is heartbreakingly good. Ace goes missing after chasing down a figure from his past, and we learn that he was bred for fighting in a flashback.

The sequence then goes on to elaborate on how he managed to escape his captors, and how that eventually took him to crime alley the same night Bruce was there to pay his respects to his slain parents. Ace helps the former Batman fend-off a mugger, and - obviously seeing a little bit of himself in the mutt - he decides to take him home.

Ace and Bruce are two kindred spirits and the episode itself is a real tear-jerker. The moment where the pair are reunited is so sweet, and while it's potentially more heartwarming than heartbreaking, I defy you not to get a little misty eyed seeing puppy Ace getting mistreated at the start.

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WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.