For the 2022 film, see here.
Trivia for the animated series The Batman
- Acting for Two:
- Actor Existence Limbo: Due to having numerous Celebrity Voice Actors, some villains were reduced to cameo roles after their debut episodes.
- Cowboy BeBop at His Computer: Several online descriptions for DVD sales of season one would describe the series as taking place after Batman Begins, when the series is in fact a completely different continuity from The Dark Knight Trilogy, which in turn began a year after the series.
- Executive Meddling: Some of the intellectual property from Batman was being used in multiple adaptations (all owned by the Warner Brothers, however). Not wanting to create conflict between different adaptations' interpretations of characters, some things were off-limits for the writing staff. Here are specific examples:
- Robin was forbidden from appearing until Teen Titans ended, meaning Batgirl actually becomes a sidekick first, which makes for an interesting mythology shake-up and promotes her from the usual third-fiddle.
- Some of the villains used in the The Dark Knight Trilogy, most notably Scarecrow and Two-Face, were also forbidden from appearing. Clayface was used in place of Two-Face for the "best friend turned into a criminal" schtick. The episode "Strange New World" was written to introduce Scarecrow and there was even a Design made of him, but once the writing staff found out that he was still off-limits, they opted to go with Professor Hugo Strange instead.
- Exiled from Continuity:
- Ra's al Ghul, Scarecrow, and Two-Face weren't allowed to show up due to their appearances in The Dark Knight Trilogy and a Bat-Embargo being enforced at the time that forbade certain Batman characters from being used in more than one adaptation at the same time, which resulted in a rewrite for "Strange New World" that had Hugo Strange replacing Scarecrow and Clayface filling Two-Face's role as a criminal who used to be Bruce Wayne's closest friend. Interestingly enough, this doesn’t apply to The Joker, who appears as a reoccurring threat in the show, despite appearing in The Dark Knight.
- Robin was not allowed to appear in the first three seasons because the show ran concurrently with Teen Titans, in which Robin had a starring role.
- Wonder Woman was forbidden from appearing with the Justice League in Season 5 because a rule for her character at the time was that she could not appear in any series in which she wasn't a main character.
- Fake Nationality: The Scottish Alastair Duncan voices the English Alfred Pennyworth.
- The Other Darrin:
- Out of Holiday Episode: Despite the episode Grundy's Night being the series' Halloween Episode, the episode aired in August, two months before Halloween.
- Playing Against Type:
- Real-Life Relative:
- Robin and Scorn in "The End of The Batman" are played by real life brothers Evan and Daryl Sabara respectively. Even earlier than that, Daryl voiced one of Dick's classmates in "Riddler's Revenge".
- Hector Indriago, the Latin Spanish voice of Batman in this series and several others, is the nephew of Frank Maneiro, who, in addition to voicing Mayor Marion Grange, was previously the voice of Batman in the DC Animated Universe.
- Recursive Adaptation: Lucius Fox is based a good deal of The Dark Knight Trilogy's version of Lucius Fox—an old friend of Thomas Wayne, knows Bruce is Batman, and is an armorer for the Dark Knight. Goes into Comic-Book Fantasy Casting territory in that this incarnation looks a good deal like Morgan Freeman.
- Role Reprise:
- During the fifth season, Superman, Lois Lane, and Lex Luthor were voiced by George Newbern, Dana Delany, and Clancy Brown respectively, reprising their roles from the DC Animated Universe. Averted, however, with Charlie Schlatter voicing The Flash, as while he did voice the Flash in Superman: The Animated Series, that was Wally West and the Flash here is, according to Word of God, Barry Allen.
- In the French dub, several voice actors from previous adaptations reprised their roles here:
- From the Batman Film Series: Jacques Ciron as Alfred, Philippe Peythieu as the Penguin, and Emmanuèle Bondeville as Catwoman.
- From the DCAU: In addition to Alfred and the Penguin, Pierre Hatet as the Joker, Jean-Claude Sachot as Commissioner Gordon and Mr. Freezenote third voice in the DCAU in the case of Freeze, Christophe Lemoine as Jimmy Olsen, and Nicolas Marié as Hawkmannote second voice in the DCAU in the case of Hawkman. Inverted in the case of Robin/Dick Grayson's voice actor, Alexis Tomassian. While he did voice a Robin in the DCAU, it was Tim Drake, while Dick Grayson in that continuity was voiced by George Caudron as Robin and a few different voice actors as Nightwing.
- From Legion of Super Heroes: Emmanuel Garijo as Superman.
- The second Hungarian dub brought back Tomasz Galbenisz (the Joker in Batman: The Brave and the Bold) and Róbert Kajtár (second voice of Alfred in the second dub of Batman: The Animated Series) for their respective roles. This makes the episode in which Joker masquerades as Batman an unintentional double-reprise for Galbenisz, as he's also dubbed Batman in The New Scooby-Doo Movies.
- Screwed by the Network: While it wasn't suffering any ratings or timeslot issues, it was basically canceled by order of 4Kids Entertainment as the fifth season was in the middle of production. Why? So that they could start their own block, of course. Luckily it managed to remain on Kids' WB replacement for a few more months, just for the sake of reruns, before quietly disappearing.
- Talking to Themself:
- Both Ragdoll and Killer Moth are voiced by Jeff Bennett, and they shared quite a few scenes together in "Team Penguin".
- The Cold Open of "Rumors", which had Killer Croc fighting Rumor. Both of them are voiced by Ron Perlman.
- A more literal example was in both "Strange Minds" and "The Metalface of Comedy", in which there were multiple Jokers, all of them voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson.
- What Could Have Been:
- As mentioned in Executive Meddling, the original idea of what became Strange New World, the villain was the Scarecrow, with concept art even being made believing they were allowed to use him after being off-limits for 3 seasons, but as he was still off-limits, he was replaced with Hugo Strange. However, given the episode's plot and Scarecrow's modus operandi, it was probably for the best as he'd have given the twist away.
- Likewise, a proposed but rejected idea of a follow-up DTV to The Batman vs. Dracula would be an adaptation of Batman: Hush (and was likely done pre-Season 4 given the image
◊ made for it depicts Ethan Bennett's Clayface). Likewise, the villain on Rumors was originally supposed to have been Hush, too. - Maurice LaMarche mentioned at a Fan Expo that he auditioned to voice the Joker.
- It's been rumored that Marilyn Manson was originally cast to voice The Riddler (which would explain the character design), but had to drop out, so they cast Robert Englund instead.
- Some of the concept art features Penguin◊ looking far more cartoonish, Joker◊ and Croc◊ looking far more ghoulish, the Riddler◊ wearing a fullbody outfit with a large frame (this design was very likely reworked into Cluemaster's), and the aforementioned Scarecrow, whose design implemented chains and a sickle.
- The book Batman: The Definitive History of the Dark Knight in Comics, Film, and Beyond also showed some more concept art from the series, including a massive Scarface holding the Ventriloquist as if the roles were reversed, and an alternate design of Penguin with a more oriental aesthetic.
- Two Face was considered to appear in the tie in comic. Cover art depicting him was even made.
- Alan Burnett Wanted to use Wonder Woman in the final season but was unable to.
- Wonder Woman and Bizzaro were planned to appear in the tie-in comic, concept art was even made but the series was cancelled shortly afterwards.
- You Sound Familiar: Long-time Batman fans will probably recognize the first voice of Hugo Strange as the very first television actor for The Riddler.
