On the red carpet at the Clayface premiere in Los Angeles on 13 October, James Gunn was asked which animated properties might make decent films, and he picked Batman Beyond. “I love Batman Beyond. So that’s a great thing for the future,” the DC Studios co-chief told Hola! USA. He added that it was the sort of thing that started in animation and could make a good movie.
Within hours the internet had recast Michael Keaton as old Bruce, debated who should play Terry McGinnis, and decided this was all “live-action”. Gunn never said live-action. He didn’t name a format, a writer, a date or anybody at all. He said he liked a cartoon. Studio heads saying they like things is roughly how Hollywood spends its Mondays.
Still, it’s a cartoon worth liking. Bruce Timm, Paul Dini and Alan Burnett’s 1999 series began, the story goes, with a network wanting a younger Batman, which by rights should have produced something dreadful. Instead it gave us a teenage Batman in a neon cyberpunk Neo-Gotham, wearing a suit with wings and cloaking. In his ear was a Bruce Wayne grown into the crabbiest pensioner in the DC universe, played by Kevin Conroy at his gravel-gargling best. It ran until 2001, managed a properly nasty film in Return of the Joker, and left a generation saying “schway” without irony.
It has also spent a quarter of a century in development. A live-action version was mooted around 2000. More recently, Christina Hodson’s take, with Keaton returning and Michelle Pfeiffer linked, was shelved shortly after Gunn and Peter Safran arrived. There was also talk of an animated feature in the Spider-Verse mould. Terry McGinnis has been grounded less often.
The timing is awkward too. The DCU hasn’t properly introduced its present-day Batman yet. That job falls to The Brave and the Bold, with Damian Wayne in tow, while Matt Reeves’ films keep their own separate patch of Gotham. Planning a Batman for half a century hence before you’ve cast the current one is putting the cart well in front of the Batmobile.
To be fair to Gunn, his enthusiasms have a habit of turning into productions. This is the man who made a talking raccoon a box-office draw and gave Peacemaker his own series. For now, though, file Batman Beyond under “schway” rather than “greenlit”.
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