Once upon a time ago, there was an idea. Oh wait, that’s Marvel. Once upon a time ago, executives at Warner Bros. had a plan. There was a thing called the so-called Snyderverse, Zack Snyder would lead it, and it would be the plan to take the DC Universe into the future. Dozens and dozens of films were put into development, but after the underperformance of the poorly received “Batman Vs. Superman,” “Suicide Squad,” and the abject failure of “Justice League,” the DCEU splintered, collapsed and many of the planned projects in the queue fell apart (here’s a long list of everything that is happening and is likely no longer happening or long dead).
One of those long-presumed dead projects was “Nightwing,” a movie centered around Dick Grayson, aka Robin. In the comics, when Grayson gets older, is sick of playing the Robin role and feels like he’s aged out of it, he creates the new persona Nightwing, which is essentially the same person and character, but a new suit and something more fitting to his age (late 20s or early 30s approx). Chris McKay, the filmmaker behind “The Lego Batman” movie, was going to direct that movie many moons ago, but as the DCEU fell apart, most assumed the project died on the vine. Not son, apparently. Playlist writer Mike DeAngelo recently spoke to Chris McKay about Amazon‘s “The Forever War” sci-fi movie, which he directed for the Playlist Podcast (that conversation soon), and the filmmaker said he doesn’t believe “Nightwing” is dead yet and could still happen.
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“It’s definitely taking a very long time to put that movie together, but I wouldn’t say it’s 100% dead in the water,” he explained. “It’s a movie that I still want to make. It’s a character I love. And then it’s a world that I’m passionate about. I’ve always been a big Batman universe fan, you know, that’s the very first superhero that I fell in love with. But Robin as a character who grew from working under Batman to going on his own and becoming Nightwing and going to Bloodhaven and things like that. That journey, because I went on that journey as a comic book reader, you know, as I grew up, Robin grew up and became Nightwing, so it’s part of my history.”
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McKay explained what he hoped to do with the movie, the tone, and said the film would even have a “Great Santini”-vibe.
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“The idea was to make something that was, in the same way, ‘The Tomorrow War’ was action-packed. In fact, I think ‘Nightwing; would have been even more action-packed, but also be a really emotional story, and this might be a little bit of a spoiler, but it would have been a little bit like a ‘Great Santini’ type movie. Somebody who grows up under somebody who is a dark mentor and how that affects him and the relationship…There’s the emotional story of Dick Grayson in the Nightwing movie is going to be very powerful when we get a chance to make it.”
For those unclear who the Great Santini is or means, The Great Santini was a charismatic trapeze artist who performed in the circus. Called the World’s Champion Flame-Diver, the character also appeared as a circus act in the 1931 film “Side Show.” If you know Robin’s origin story in the comics, you know he was also part of a family of trapeze artists, but his parents died in a tragic accident. There is also “The Great Santini” (1979) movie starring Robert Duvall, based on the novel by Pat Conroy. While that movie has nothing to do with the circus, it is based on a love/hate relationship between a father and a son, which also mirrors the Robin/Batman relationship in the comics when Grayson starts to resent and hate Batman as he becomes older (though to be fair, even Conroy says there’s an element of the father/son story that’s tied to the circus since his estranged father saw the Great Santini perform as a child). In fact, part of the entire Nightwing persona is about creating his own identity and shedding himself of the Batman baggage. Presumably, all of that texture is wrapped up in there together.
Back to the “Nightwing” movie, did Warner Bros. have a plan? Because at the time, the whole thing seemed a little scattershot to a lot of pundits. The answer, according to McKay, is a definite yes.
“They definitely had a plan. Lots of plans,” McKay said. “I think the only thing with Nightwing is we were sort of toying with [the question of] does it need to work with what was already being created or not. So sometimes there was a little bit of a push and pull with that as far as what are we going to be attached to.”
McKay also suggested that the “Nightwing” could live in the DCEU multiverse now that that’s been introduced as a thing to justify stand-alone movies not tied to the current era of Aquaman, Wonder Woman, and Shazam, like Matt Reeves’ “The Batman” film. “That was also the time that they started playing with the Todd Phillips ‘Joker’ [movie],” he explained. “That was sort of the nascent stage of some of that stuff. So, can there be an alternate universe of stories and that kind of thing. I’m glad they’re embracing the things that they’re now embracing, and I think they had a lot of great recent success with DC, and I’m hoping that that buoys them. I think I’m really encouraged by a lot of the things they’re doing. That’s why I’m hoping [‘The Tomorrow War’] comes out and people like it, and maybe I can convince them to make the Nightwing movie again.”
Fingers crossed for those that hope to see it one day? “The Tomorrow War” comes out July 23. More from that conversation soon.