Filmmaker Matt Reeves and Warner Bros. are obviously going for it with their new iteration of the caped crusader, called, simply, “The Batman.” For one, it’s going to be nearly three hours long, that’s confirmed and bold as hell, it’s not at all connected to the current cinematic DC Universe, and The Batman is a younger version played by Robert Pattinson.
In a new Esquire interview, Reeves explains a lot of his intentions. For one, while many of the early reports made it sound like when Ben Affleck gave up the reins on directing the original “The Batman” iteration, Reeves would take over that version of the film and direct Affleck the hero. But to hear it from Reeves, that was actually never the plan, and his idea was always starting over with a Batman that wasn’t connected to the DCEU.
“Ben [Affleck] had been working on a version of the script,” Reeves told the magazine, “and I said, ‘Here’s the thing: I respect that the DC Universe has become an extended universe and all the movies were kind of connected. But another Batman film, it shouldn’t have to carry the weight of connecting the characters from all those other movies. I didn’t want them in there.”
So, it really sounds as if Reeves never intended to make a Batman film with Affleck or one connected to the DCEU (again, reports made it nebulous at first). Perhaps some of those early reports from Warner Bros. were to assuage fans, who were a) disappointed to hear Affleck wasn’t directing, b) where the toxic Snydercut fans who often cause drama online, and c) perhaps already had a strong inkling that Affleck would be eventually abandoning the character regardless.
Additionally, Reeves says he took great inspiration from Frank Miller’s “Batman: Year One,” the 1987 four-issue run written by Miller and illustrated by artist David Mazzucchelli, that mostly skipped over the origin story and depicted Batman in his first year in action, learning the ropes of his craft, much younger,
“We’ve seen it so many times,” Reeves said, knowing he wanted to avoid telling the origin story again. “It’s been done too much. I knew we couldn’t do that.”
As he’s said in the past, Reeves said he also drew inspiration from Gus Van Sant’s “Last Days,” which imagined a fictionalized version of Kurt Cobain, who had become a recluse hidden away from society, and saw parallels for his interpretation of Bruce Wayne.
“Early on, when I was writing, I started listening to Nirvana,” he explained, noting that the grunge band’s “Something In the Way” is featured in the movie’s first trailer and became the overall “voice” of the film. “When I considered, ‘How do you do Bruce Wayne in a way that hasn’t been seen before?’ I started thinking, ‘What if some tragedy happened [i.e.: Wayne sees his parents murdered] and this guy becomes so reclusive, we don’t know what he’s doing? Is this guy some kind of wayward, reckless, drug addict?’ And the truth is that he is a kind of drug addict. His drug is his addiction to this drive for revenge. He’s like a Batman Kurt Cobain.”
Reeves also addressed the backlash to casting Robert Pattinson and shrewdly noted that fans have rejected the casting of every Batman in modern history at first.
“There has been no actor, when his announcement that he was going to be playing Batman in one of the feature films was announced, that has not received a backlash,” Reeves said, adding that he felt much of the griping from people online had come from fans who only knew Pattinson from the “Twilight” films and not his indie work, starring in films for auteurs like David Cronenberg, Werner Herzog, the Safdie Brothers and more.
“The people who were excited, I knew it was because they knew Rob’s work post-Twilight. The people who weren’t excited, I knew it was because they didn’t know Rob’s work post-Twilight,” he said, also citing the Safdie’s “Good Time” as a major reason he knew Pattinson would be capable in the role.
READ MORE: The Essentials: Robert Pattinson’s 10 Best Performances
Reeves goes into major depth about all of that, how he knew Pattinson was his Batman immediately after that, and having to convince Warner Bros. Still, you should dive into the full Esquire article for more, and after that, while you’re at it, track down Pattinson indies like “Good Times,” Cronenberg’s thriller “Cosmopolis” (2012), David Michôd’s dystopian western “The Rover” (2014), James Gray’s adventure drama “The Lost City of Z” (2016), Claire Denis’ science-fiction drama “High Life” (2018), and many more if you have not seen them. They more than prove Pattison’s got the goods and the chops.