DCU’s Batman Reboot Perfect For Introducing This Villain

The relaunch of the DCU by James Gunn has DC Comics fans dreaming on just what the next few years of movies may offer. And right at the top of the list of most of those dreams is getting to see some heroes and some villains that haven’t appeared in a live action movie just yet. That’s especially the case when talking about Batman, because so many of the live action Batman movies have only featured the more traditional villains like The Penguin, The Riddler and The Joker. It seems the time has never been more right for James Gunn to roll out one villain in particular who has never really gotten anything close to justice as far as a live action appearance in The Man-Bat.

Gunn has also given life to dreams of his character because he’s made it very clear he wants to take on some underrated characters that haven’t gotten their own projects that much. While he was talking about Booster Gold and The Huntress, his desire to bring new characters to the screen could mean that Man-Bat will eventually find his way into a movie was well.

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Man-Bat Has Been An Afterthought Even When He Appears

This particular Batman villain, whose abilities and appearance can be easily deduced from his name was a massive, massive fan favorite among Batman the Animated Series fans, as well as from DC Comics fans. He’s someone that those same fans have been calling for to appear in live action Batman for a while now. But for now, they haven’t gotten their wish. At least not in a bigger than a blink and you missed it appearance, or in appearances that never see the light of day.

Joel Schumacher’s Batman Forever famously doubled down on the lighthearted elements in Tim Burton’s Batman and Batman Returns and in fact, took things to another level with his versions of The Riddler, Two-Face, Mr. Freeze, Poison Ivy, and Bane. However, Batman Forever wasn’t originally planned as being as light hearted and campy as it ended up being in the final cut. In one of Batman Forever‘s deleted scenes, Bruce Wayne comes face to face with Man-Bat, which represents Batman’s deepest fears and his obsession with turning them into courage. This Man-Bat only exists as a nightmarish figment of Bruce Wayne’s unconscious mind. And as it turns out, that’s really the only way Man-Bat has appeared in live action, even when he finally makes it into the movie itself.

In a Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice sequence where Bruce Wayne imagines he’s visiting his parents’ graves, he notices blood dripping from them and then, Man-Bat pops out and attacks him. This version of Man-Bat is also more of a representation of Wayne’s fears of what he has become and that representation has merged with the pain of his childhood to create a nightmarish creature.

Neither one of these creatures are even officially referred to as Man-Bat, but they could both pass for the Batman villain if they were given real screen time and named. They embody what the character is supposed to be, which is obviously a mutated man that is now more bat than anything else. So, in reality, while Man-Bat has been hinted at, he’s never really appeared in any live-action project.

‘Gods and Monsters’ Is The Perfect Entry Point

With Gunn’s rebooting of the MCU, there really doesn’t appear to be a better place to introduce Man-Bat into the live-action realm. This phase of the DCU is literally called “Gods and Monster” and it’s obvious right from the jump that Gunn has no qualms about introducing non-humans into the mix with Creature Commandos.

Obviously, of Man-Bat was introduced in that show, it would be a welcome development but doesn’t quite fit the bill as far as live-action. However, there is more reason to hope that someone like Man-Bat could make an appearance in a film, even if he doesn’t get his own. Gunn has also sent plenty of signals that this phase of the DCU will focus on villains more than the DCEU even came close to trying to do.

A Clayface film is in the works. There’s also rumblings of a Bane movie coming. And while Man-Bat would be hard to carry a film on its own, being a character in one of those movies would only make so much sense. As would that kind of new character making an appearance in whatever form the new Batman will take in the DCU.

Gunn seems plenty open to some more outlandish creatures in his projects. He’s already done some of that with Peacemaker and the alien invasion that took up all of Season 1. Batman fans should expect the appearance of the Man-Bat character sooner or later.

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Batman: The Animated Series

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