With the animated movie Batman: Assault on Arkham set for release later this year, Anthony Stokes feels that Arkham Asylum would be better suited as a live-action movie….
A lot of the time I find myself stuck in the middle of excitement and disappointment with news that is generally regarded as a reason to celebrate. For example, Captain America 3 and Thor 3 being announced means that Marvel Studios won’t be as focused on launching original properties. There are always implications that are bigger then the news itself. That being said, I was excited by the announcement of a movie based upon Batman: Arkham Asylum, until I realised it was an animated movie.
Personally, I’ve never been much of a fan of animated superhero movies. They just don’t have the same attention to detail as the live action movies, and it seems there’s never as much effort put into them either. Even the DC animated movies which are supposedly great, such as Justice League: The Flashpoint Paradox and Justice League: War – they have great premises but are hampered by weak dialogue and character development. And Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, which I thought was the best of the genre, I’d still prefer to read the comic book. Batman: Arkham Asylum has much more potential as a live action movie than it does as an animated movie, and here’s why…
First off, it’s going to be hard for Warner Bros. to get audiences invested in Batman again with its DC Cinematic Universe incarnation. Fans were skeptical enough with The Amazing Spider-Man coming out five years after Spider-Man 3, but Warner Bros. will be re-introducing a completely different Batman from Christopher Nolan’s trilogy four years after The Dark Knight Rises. A great way to pull in fans would be to make a currently popular iteration of the character and his story influence the movies. At this point the Arkham video games are probably the most popular form of Batman fiction and would bring in casual audiences, video gamers, and fans of the comics alike.
Fans have been cheering for a more comic book faithful adaption of Batman. As much as I like Nolan’s Batman, he didn’t do detective work. In The Dark Knight he pulled a fingerprint off of a bullet and used a sonar machine to stop The Joker, relying more on technology than his skills of deduction. And if he’s going to be an important part of the Justice League, he and his villains need to be more fantastical. Nothing in any of the previous Batman or Superman movies suggest that Batman could stand a fighting chance against Superman. Going off the Arkham Batman, they could keep him somewhat grounded, while still building him up to face bigger and badder threats. More or less, Arkham Asylum is a spiritual sequel to Batman: The Animated Series, and using this as the basis for the new Batman would be a great way to throw fans a bone whilst providing a great template for the character.
An Arkham movie would also enable the filmmakers to throw in each and every Batman villain without them being shoved in for fan service, much like what The Amazing Spider-Man 2 seems to be doing. The entire Rogue’s Gallery could show up and it would make sense in context of the film and serve the story. But most importantly, it would also set the foundation for an Arkham City movie. Ben Affleck is playing The Dark Knight in Batman vs. Superman and his style is bleak and grim, and focuses around dangerous locations with a lot of personality. He knows how to draw out tension and I have no doubt that he’d be great at making an Arkham Asylum movie with touches of horror sensibilities , but where he’d excel at is making Arkham City come to life. There’s no other directors better suited to direct a Batman solo movie and while his skills behind the cowl are untested, his skills behind the camera are not.
I’ll still watch the Batman: Assault on Arkham animated movie, but I feel like it’s a waste of potential. It would make much more of an impact as a movie. It deserves a big screen adaption and so do the fans. And I’m not trying to suggest that the animated movie will be particularly bad, but I don’t think anybody will argue that a direct-to-DVD superhero movie is even partially as effective as a live-action one. I just hope the higher ups at Warner Bros. and DC consider it, so that we can get a new Batman who can step out of Nolan and Bale’s shadow.
Anthony Stokes is a blogger and independent filmmaker who also assists with the music blog DopesterMusic and co-hosts the podcast Delusional Losers.
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Originally published February 14, 2014. Updated April 11, 2018.
