By As part of a recent feature piece about the upcoming “The Batman” spin-off series “The Penguin,” filmmaker Matt Reeves discussed the other spin-off series based on the property.
In early July, news came that a potential “Arkham Asylum” series in development had been scrapped. That project was first announced four years ago and emerged from the embers of a another scrapped project set within the Gotham City Police Department seen in “The Batman” film.
Speaking with EW, Reeves says the recent dropping of the former show is that HBO executives suggested they wanted to focus more on ‘marquee characters’ from the Batman universe.
Explaining his original aims with the “Gotham P.D.” project, which was set one year before events of “The Batman,” he says:
“As we were writing the movie [‘The Batman’], I was like, ‘Hey, you know what? I think there are some cool shows that we could do. It was actually why I wanted to make our deal at Warner Bros.
It wasn’t going to be a Batman story, it was going about about this corrupt cop. And it was going to be about how the worst gang in Gotham were the GCPD.
And [the cop] was going to come across paths, he would have touched paths with Gordon who would have been – it would have been someone to measure him against. But it would be a battle for [the cop’s] soul.”
Reeves revealed back in 2022 that the original plan for the series was to take inspiration from Sidney Lumet’s “Prince of the City”. That project failed to get the go ahead, so Reeves pivoted to the idea of a spin-off centered on Arkham Asylum. Antonio Campos came onboard to serve as writer and showrunner of that series.
That was more recently tabled after executives at HBO offered their guidance on where “The Batman” universe should go with its shows – namely stick to the bigger characters:
“They were like, ‘We like what you’re doing, and we want to lean harder into the marquee characters. What’s interesting is that, in the movie, the big red herring of the story is it seems like the person they’re looking for, that the Riddler’s pointing to must be the Penguin, some kind of informant. This movie creates a power vacuum, and because Penguin is so underestimated, people don’t really see who he is.”
Reeves confirms some ideas for his “Gotham P.D.” series did end up in “The Penguin” which is set one week after the conclusion of “The Batman” and serves as a bridge between it and the upcoming sequel in 2026. A producer confirms the series ends “going almost directly into the second film”.
The eight-episode “The Penguin” is set to premiere on HBO and stream on Max on September 19th.
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