The Batman Was Inspired By Matt Reeves' Own Teacher's Comic Books
Writer/director Matt Reeves reveals The Batman is inspired by his own teacher's comic books and learned such while conducting research for the film. Reeves took over the helm from former writer/director/producer/star Ben Affleck following his initial retirement from the DC Extended Universe due to personal health concerns. The Planet of the Apes reboot filmmaker has reworked the solo Batman film to launch a new franchise with Robert Pattinson donning the cape and cowl.
The Batman picks up in Bruce Wayne's second year of fighting crime in Gotham City as he discovers a deep web of corruption with seeming ties to his family's past. Meanwhile, the Dark Knight must also grapple with the emergence of The Riddler, a serial killer leaving cryptic messages at his various crime scenes as he targets members of Gotham's elite, including Wayne himself. In order to make progress in his work, Batman must make new allies in Gotham's underworld, namely cat burglar Selina Kyle, better known as Catwoman.
While speaking with Entertainment Weekly for the film, Matt Reeves opened up about development on The Batman. The writer/director revealed while he was conducting the research for the franchise reboot, Reeves would learn that Jeph Loeb, his teacher in film school, was the one who penned the comic books that primarily inspired the story. See what Reeves said below:
"It's so weird because I didn't know till I did all of this deep dive that it was literally my screenwriting teacher from USC — the person who told me that I should become a writer — Jeph Loeb, who wrote those stories. He was very responsible for me pursuing that because when I went to film school, I was very set on being a director. I'd always written what I was doing as a kid and when I was making short films when I was young because I thought these are the means to get to make a movie. And I never really separated the two. And when I was in [Loeb's] screenwriting class, he said, 'You have to continue pursuing this because this is something I feel you can do.' When I started going through all the comics and I saw that he'd written [them], I was like, 'This is crazy.' And then I loved it."
Reeves has previously discussed his primary influences for The Batman, primarily borrowing from The Long Halloween, Year One and Ego. The former two have already been noted by comic book fans in the various trailers for the film, between the hunt for a serial killer in Gotham to the development of Batman and Jim Gordon's relationship in fighting crime in their city. Unlike the comics, however, Reeves would elect to use The Riddler as the central antagonist after finding parallels between the cryptic villain and the infamous Zodiac Killer while coming across John Douglas and Mark Olshaker's Mindhunter.
Even outside of his work in The Batman comics, Jeph Loeb is highly regarded for his contributions in both the DC and Marvel spheres, some of which include Daredevil: Yellow, Spider-Man: Blue and Hulk: Gray. Given Reeves' desire to actually explore the Dark Knight's standing as the World's Greatest Detective, utilizing Loeb's Long Halloween is an appropriate source of inspiration that many audiences are eager to see make its way to the screen, especially after it recently got the animated movie treatment with Jensen Ackles voicing the titular DC hero. The wait is nearly over as The Batman hits theaters on March 4.
Source: EW