'Batman: Caped Crusader' Trailer: Gothamites Commit Noir Crimes Up The Vigilante
'Batman: Caped Crusader' Trailer: Gothamites Commit Noir Crimes Up The Vigilante
The ten episode first season of the long-awaited series premieres on Amazon Prime Video on August 1
Batman: Caped Crusader is coming off of a lavish if not very specific cast reveal video and a poster release. But now, as we head closer toward its August 1 premiere on Prime Video, it’s time to see the animated series as it is animated and not just drawn. Batman’s official Twitter the day before released a “Trailer tomorrow” teaser and that was followed through on. The first trailer was released Wednesday, with IGN debuting it exclusively in their site’s native player ahead of releases by involved parties on their respective YouTube channels, and Twitter and Instagram pages.
The trailer, set to “Sicilian Defense” by Rok Nardin, begins with Gotham’s citizens calling in or being interviewed for their thoughts on Bats as he apprehends criminals. There’s a look of Firefly too. The police department (with Barbara?) is having private meetings and press conferences to address the issue of the vigilante. When the two parties meet it’s the last straw. There are also several looks at other rogues, both announced with their voices and those who haven’t really been revealed at all.
The cast we do know has Hamish Linklater as Bruce Wayne aka Batman, Jamie Chung as Harleen Quinzel aka Harley Quinn, Christina Ricci as Selina Kyle aka Catwoman and Diedrich Bader as Harvey Dent aka Two-Face, who got plenty of face time in the trailer, as well as Mckenna Grace, Paul Scheer, Minnie Driver, Eric Morgan Stuart, Michelle C. Bonilla, Krystal Joy Brown, John DiMaggio, Jason Watkins, Tom Kenny, Reid Scott, Gary Anthony Williams, Dan Donohue, David Krumholtz, Haley Joel Osment, and Toby Stephens. The series is produced by J. J. Abrams, Matt Reeves, and Bruce Timm, who’s back for the first time since the DCAU, running things with fellow executive producer James Tucker. He told IGN “Originally I'd had an idea about Batman where he was much more inspired by the old pulp heroes like Doc Savage and The Shadow and The Avenger,” continuing “And the thing those three guys had in common was that they were all very remote. They were not nice guys, they weren't like people you'd want to hang out with necessarily. They weren't cuddly and cracking jokes and stuff. They were very kind of superhuman to the point of not being human. And so that's kind of how I always wanted to present Batman.” Tucker would add And by making him as remote as he was, that allowed us to put a little more emphasis on the supporting cast.” Tucker has plenty of experience with Batman, starting at Batman Beyond and making his way through Batman: The Brave and the Bold and Harley Quinn “It feels more like an ensemble piece because we're as invested in some of the other characters now as we are in Batman because they're the humans in the story now. He's kind of removed, and so everyone else gets a lot more shine - Alfred, the Gordons, Montoya. All the secondary characters step up in importance in the story.”
But of course, with DCAU nostalgics all over the internet, Warner Bros. was first interested in getting Timm for that. His disinterest was completely understandable, but eventually the ‘40s noir style was making everyone happy. Especially with the storytelling capabilities of television animation that includes any sort of kid audience going wider, laxer limits, standards and practices are in place than there were when Justice League Unlimited ended, made it all the more enticing for Timm, and that it didn’t need to be toyetic either. As he put it, they “don’t have the same kind of limitations that we had back in the '90s where it was made specifically for a children's audience and we had to worry about making sure that would sell a certain number of toys”. He continued with “So that was also appealing. Getting a chance to do the show without the same kind of limitations was also very, very exciting. But it was really more on the way we looked at Batman and getting to make him really radically different than most other versions of Batman you've ever seen before.”
This isn’t a completely adult-aimed dark and gritty version either, considering the series was ordered for Cartoon Network’s Acme Night, intended for family viewing back when it was under Cartoon Network’s purview and the block was looking to be something more than a movie slot looking toward influences like “Universal horror movies, [and] swashbuckler movies like Errol Flynn movies,” Tucker explains. “Basically the cool movies that would've been out in the late '30s, early '40s, that at the time wouldn't have been thought of as kids' movies or anything.”
After a more than three year journey, Batman: Caped Crusader premieres its ten-episode first season on Prime Video on August 1. You’re getting DC’s higher-viewed upload.
Source: IGN