Batman: Caped Crusader Trailer Takes The Dark Knight Back to His Roots… Kind Of

Television

Batman is going back to the beginning. Today, DC and Amazon released a trailer for the upcoming Amazon Prime series Batman: Caped Crusader. From Bruce Timm, one of the creators of Batman: The Animated Series, Batman: Caped Crusader is based on the earliest Batman comics by Bob Kane (more or less), set in the 1940s and with Batman in his original comic book costume. Hamish Linklater provides the voice of Batman, with Christina Ricci as Catwoman, Diedrich Bader as Harvey Dent, Jamie Chung as Harley Quinn (see what I mean by “more or less”?), and Gary Anthony Williams, Minnie Driver, and McKenna Grace in undisclosed roles. Produced by Matt Reeves and J.J. Abrams along with Timm, Batman: Caped Crusader premieres on Amazon Prime Video on August 1, 2024, and you can see the trailer below:

I really want Batman: Caped Crusader to be good, and I love a lot of the elements in the trailer. It looks great, and I like how they’re using Batman’s original comic book costume and invoking the feel of those early comics. There was a sense of Gothic horror to them mixed with the romanticism of adventure stories, and the trailer captures that with the sword fights mixed with shadow and fog. I also like Hamish Linklater’s Batman voice; it’s gruff and intimidating, much better than some of the more recent voice actors DC Animation has cast. What makes me worried about this show are comments Bruce Timm has made. At DC Fandome in 2021 (via Bounding Into Comics), Timm said, “The way we deal with the characters, it’s going to be quite a bit more modern in terms of inclusivity, representation, things like that.” Earlier this year, he talked about Harley Quinn, who is now Asian by design, with Entertainment Weekly:

“I co-created the character, so I have a lot of love and affection for her, but I thought there might be something interesting about bringing her on the show, just not as Joker’s girlfriend… So how do we do that? A big part was just doing a basic flip. The original Dr. Quinzel was a little bit more serious, and then when she became Harley, she got really goofy and weird. So we thought, what if we reverse that? When she’s Dr. Quinzel, she’s a little bit more whimsical and fun, and then when she’s Harley Quinn, she’s scary.”

In other words, Harley Quinn is a completely different character in Batman: Caped Crusader, one who don’t need no Joker. And that’s what I’m worried about; they’re pushing modernity so far that they’re fundamentally changing characters. Harley is who we know about; what changes is Timm going to make to the others? It also doesn’t fill me with confidence that J.J. Abrams and Matt Reeves are involved; I didn’t care for The Batman, and I don’t want Abrams’ mystery box nonsense all over it, mostly because he never has an answer for what’s in his boxes. It’s a shame because the trailer is mostly cool, but I know too much about the intentions behind Batman: Caped Crusader to be excited.