Rescuing Batman

The Los Angeles Times have posted a new article on the long journey and obstacles that the Dark Knight faced before making it to the silver screen once again this year.

When David Goyer, co-writer of the eagerly awaited "Batman Begins," attended a comic book convention in San Diego last summer, the audience of 7,000 was noticeably antsy. It was the first time anyone associated with the film was speaking publicly. "The first question I got," recalls Goyer, "was someone stood up in the audience and said, 'How can you guarantee this movie won't suck?' And everyone applauded."

In a way, that's the dilemma facing Warner Bros. as it gets ready to release the first Batman film in eight years on June 15. The challenge for the studio is to overcome the stigma of the last Batman film, the much-maligned "Batman & Robin" — a film so disliked it nearly killed off a franchise that has made $1.2 billion in worldwide box office grosses.

While Warner Bros. struggled to figure out how to distance the franchise from "Batman & Robin," the best strategy ultimately may have turned out to be just allowing enough time to pass. What made that solution particularly galling for the studio, which owns DC Comics, was that while Batman and Superman lay dormant, rival Marvel Enterprises comic characters such as Spider-Man, X-Men and Blade were creating hits all over town for competing studios Sony, 20th Century Fox and New Line Cinema, respectively.

Warner Bros. attempted to resurrect Batman four times before it finally decided to go ahead with "Batman Begins." "It took us a number of tries and a number of people to get to the place we got to," admits Warner Bros. president of production Jeff Robinov. "I think it would certainly be more helpful not to say someone failed. All that matters is we found the person who we believed in to do it."

That person was Christopher Nolan, the 34-year-old director of the indie hit "Memento" and the edgy (for a studio) "Insomnia."