At the turn of the 21st century, movies based on DC Comics were all but non-existent. This was due in large part to a single event: the disastrous June 1997 release of Batman and Robin, the fourth movie in the live-action cycle launched in 1989 with Tim Burton’s Batman. Following 1995’s successful if more kid-friendly Batman Forever, that film’s director, Joel Schumacher, ramped up the camp factor for Batman and Robin. But the latter was a catastrophe, ripped by critics and fans and grossing a paltry $107 million at the North American box office. A fifth entry was scrapped and the Dark Knight was banished to a long stay in development hell.
By 2003, it had been six long years since Batman and Robin had consigned not just the Caped Crusader but DC Comics to screen limbo, even as films based on Marvel Comics characters, like Spider-Man and X-Men, were starting to rake in serious cash. It wasn’t for lack of trying on the part of DC parent company Warner Bros. however; studio execs had heard pitch after pitch on bringing back the Bat from filmmakers and writers like Pi director Darren Aronofsky, The Dark Knight Returns writer Frank Miller, and Seven screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker, to no avail.
