10 Terrifying Batman: The Animated Series Episodes That Gave You Nightmares

The final season of Batman: The Animated Series, when it was called The New Batman Adventures, has a bad reputation for not being as dark and mature as the preceding three seasons. It does have one of the best episodes in all of Batman's animated history though, called Over the Edge.

The episode begins with Commissioner Gordon and the GCPD storming into the Batcave, Batman and Robin try to escape, but the Batmobile is blown up by a bazooka. With the hangar blocked, Batman and Robin have only one escape option and they dive into the dock. Commissioner Gordon is about to shoot the Dark Knight but Alfred jumps on him, giving them enough time to escape.

What caused such a vendetta with the commish? Well, the episode flashes back to when Batman, Robin and Batgirl are on the trail of the Scarecrow, but Batgirl gets ahead of the dynamic duo and tries to face the villain alone. A solid hit from Crane's staff knocks Batgirl off the building, sending her plummeting to the street where she dies on impact.

From the cop car, James Gordon steps out, taking the mask of the now-dead sidekick and seeing his daughter bloodied and broken.

The oddly-graphic death of Batgirl has been burned into the subconscious of all who've seen it, because it's the only time where an actual superhero has been killed off on-camera in a children's cartoon. Throw in Gordon hunting Batman down and smashing any sense of security in the process, and it's easy to see why Over the Edge isn't just a brilliant episode of BTAS, but one of its scariest too.