Ben Affleck’s cancelled Batman movie apparently put a new twist on 80 years of the Dark Knight.
During an interview with Inverse, DC storyboard artist Jay Oliva revealed he was involved with Affleck’s Batman movie, and even teased what the film was about.
“I’ve worked on a lot of Batman things and what was really cool about it was, it was tying together a lot of really cool Batman storylines that had never been really explored,” he said.
“Ben’s story was gonna cover something that had never really been covered in comics,” he said. “But was building off of storylines in the Batman mythos over the last 80 years and approaching it from a new kind of perspective.”
Oliva was involved with Zack Snyder’s DCEU from the very beginning – he storyboarded Man of Steel as well as Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice. Now, it sounds as though he was involved in Affleck’s own Batman movie, too.
“It was very clever and there were a lot of things about it that I really loved that I wish had come to fruition,” he added. “It was a really great project in the beginning. Ben had to step away for personal reasons, and I totally understood, but the time that I spent with Ben working on the project was fantastic.”
Affleck is a renowned Batman fan, and clearly invested in creating his own take on the Dark Knight that would have been deeply rooted in the comic book mythos. Unfortunately, Oliva didn’t offer up any further details about what might have been. “I can’t really say too much other than it was fucking awesome,” said Oliva. “It was the best. It was amazing.”
“From my understanding, there were a couple of drafts of it,” he recalled. “When I was brought on, I don’t know whether it was the second draft or something, but it was what Geoff Johns and Ben [Affleck] had shown me.”
Affleck originally planned to write and direct the movie before stepping down as director. The film was eventually canned, making way for Matt Reves’ version of The Batman, which starred Robert Pattinson as the Caped Crusader instead.
Want to read more about DC’s upcoming movies? Check out Gal Gadot’s recent comments on Wonder Woman 3 as well as why fans are more confused than ever by James Gunn’s DCU.
Ryan Leston is an entertainment journalist and film critic for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter.