BATMAN: CAPED CRUSADER Is "Everything" Bruce Timm Wanted to Do with BATMAN: THE ANIMATED SERIES
A lot of Batman: The Animated Series fans are excited about the upcoming project Batman: Caped Crusader. This animated series has been in development for some time with J.J. Abrams, Matt Reeves, Bruce Timm, and comic writer Ed Brubaker leading the charge.
It’s been a few months since we’ve had any kind of update on the series. The last bit of news we reported was that the series landed a two-season order at Amazon after HBO made the stupid decision to cancel it.
During a recent appearance at the Annecy Animation Festival, producer Peter Gieraldi teased that Caped Crusader is going to be more of the "complete vision" Timm had for the fan-favorite Batman: The Animated Series, he explained.
"It's everything that Bruce Timm wanted to do in the original series but because it ran on a kid's channel, he wasn't able to do it. So this definitely skews older. It's more of his complete vision."
This is why fans are actually excited about this series. Timm previously talked about the show sharing that it is “more Batman: The Animated Series than Batman: The Animated Series."
The show will capture what Timm was originally looking to do with the original animated series, saying, "It kind of goes back to the original principles of the show that we originally came up with in the early '90s. There were certain limitations on what we could do in terms of adult content; in terms of violence and adult themes." He went on to say, "My idea is basically to say, 'OK, it's 1990 again, I get to do what I want to do this time, and I got JJ and Matt backing me up."
Abrams said that Batman: Caped Crusader, "Really is an incredibly complex psychological story about someone who, in a way, needs to be redeemed – and that's kind of what at least this first season is about."
The series is being written by acclaimed comic book writer Ed Brubaker who said: “Their vision for the show, with a slightly more pulpy take on the character, and a new way of looking at the world of Gotham, set in the past but viewed through a modern lens really sold me, and so far every part of it has been a blast to work on. I can’t wait until the rest of the world can see what we’ve been building the last few months in the writers room. All I can say is, it’s not what anyone is expecting … but in a good way.”
Reeves explained that the show will focus on a version of Batman who is completely alone in his journey, saying: "There's not the Justice League. It doesn't exist. There aren't any other superheroes. It's Batman. You're watching this lone figure swimming through the cesspool of Gotham. It's Batman, alone."
It was also explained that Batman won’t have all of his gadgets as the show takes place before a time he started investing money in that stuff. "So he's going to be very low-tech, initially. You know, as he develops as a character, we'll start introducing those gadgets and the audience can see how he developed the Batmobile using different prototypes. That's part of the fun of this series is we're finding him discovering these things that, [in] most other Batman series, they already were there."
I can’t wait to actually see some footage from this series, and while the series will be darker than Batman: The Animated Series, I hope that the storytelling is just as strong.