Matt Reeves' THE BATMAN Spinoff Series Will Put a Focus on James Gordon

Matt Reeves is in the process of developing a spinoff series for The Batman for HBO Max, which is set in the Gotham City police department. It’s been explained that the show “will build upon the film’s examination of the anatomy of corruption in Gotham City, launching a new Batman universe across multiple platforms. The series will extend the world established in the movie and further explore the myriad of complex characters of Gotham.”

Reeves shared, "The idea for this story was Gotham [having] this depth of corruption and have a story... that goes into the inner workings of the city.” He also mentioned that the series will be set in Batman Year One when the “masked vigilante…starts to unsettle the city.” It will zero in on the city’s corruption that “goes back many years,” and the story will be told from the perspective of a crooked detective, who has a connection to the dark past of the city.

The filmmaker also said, "The idea is we go back to Year One. Year One is the beginning, it's the first appearance of this masked vigilante that states to unsettle the city."

A lot of fans assumed that this series would be inspired by the DC Comics series Gotham Central, which followed a group of Gotham City detectives. However, this series will not be that. Writer Ed Brubaker recently appeared on Kevin Smith and Marc Bernadin‘s Fatman Beyond podcast, and he revealed that this spinoff series will focus more on James Gordon, who is played by Jeffrey Wright in The Batman. Brubaker said:

“I was like ‘maybe they’re really going to make Gotham Central this time,’ and so I reached out to a producer who works for Matt Reeves and he says, ‘no, that’s not really Gotham Central. They’re making sure that they don’t call it Gotham Central and it’s more of a spinoff from the movie. It’s like the James Gordon show.”

I’m curious about this show and while we already got a Gotham PD series with the Fox series Gotham, there’s no doubt that this show is going to be very different from that. Joe Barton is the showrunner on the series and last month he took to Twitter to tease the tone of the show, saying, “There are no good cops.”

The series is being produced by The Batman producer Dylan Clark, with Matt Reeves executive producing.