Ben Wan
- Mar 28, 2022
- 4 min read

The UNMADE Batcaves

We dive into the unmade Batcaves that we never got to see. Learn about the deleted lines from Batman 1989 indicating that Bruce discovered the cave as a boy, the original entrance to the Burton Batcave, how the Batman Forever Batcave almost had the giant penny, how Darren Aronofsky’s unmade Year One script foreshadowed Robert Pattinson’s Batcave, and the Batcave designs for George Miller’s Justice League Mortal (courtesy Ryan Unicomb).

CHAPTERS

0:00 Introduction

We ranked the Batcaves in our previous episode here:

1:43 The Batman 66 Screen Tests Batcave

You can check out our live reaction to the Batman 1966 screen tests with Adam West, Burt Ward, and the other Batman and Robin contenders, Lyle Waggoner and Peter Dyell, here as part of our $10 Patreon tier: https://www.patreon.com/posts/64283969

3:27 The Batcave in Michael Uslan's Return of The Batman

6:59 The Batcave in Tom Mankiewicz's The Batman (1982-1984)

We dove into this script here:

If you want to read the Tom Mankiewicz script for The Batman, check out the first draft from June 1983 here.

The second draft of Mankiewicz's script (January 1984) cuts Penguin, features a different fate for Joe Chill, and has a different ending for Bruce and Silver St. Cloud. (Ben references this script later in the ep with Englehart having a similar beat of young Bruce climbing up the chimney). You can read it here.

15:18 The Batcave in Tim Burton & Julie Hickson's Batman Treatment (1985)

We previously discussed the origin aspects of this treatment here:

Here's Julie Hickson and Tim Burton's Batman treatment dated October 21, 1985 (available if you have a Scribd subscription).

18:56 The Batcave in Steve Englehart's The Batman

We previously discussed the Steve Englehart Batman treatments here:

25:20 The Batcave in Bob Kane's The Return of Batman

We previously discussed Bob Kane's treatment here:

This script treatment is included in every copy of Batman: The Definitive History of The Dark Knight in Comics, Film, and Beyond by Andrew Farago and Gina McIntyre, which you can purchase here. We also interviewed Andrew Farago on our podcast shortly after our dive into the Kane treatment.

This is also where our jokes about Bob Kane wanting "10+ broads" come from, based off of his request to WB to cast a "10+ actress" for Catwoman in the treatment (and we don't think he was referring to 10+ acting ability...).

27:21 The Original Batcave of Batman 1989 After Kane's attempt comes Sam Hamm's October 20, 1986 draft, which more closely resembles the final film, but with a ton of differences: https://imsdb.com/scripts/Batman.html

The script went through many rewrites, but a copy of the script with revisions by Warren Skaaren is online from October 6, 1988. This also differs significantly from the final film: http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/batman_production.html

The concept art for the Batcave was also featured in our concept art episode here:

42:36 Break- Barkbox & ManScaped Promo

Check out our link for Barkbox here.

Get 20% OFF @manscaped + Free Shipping with promo code JOHNSONSBALLSACK at MANSCAPED.com! #ad#manscapedpod

48:13 The Batcave of Sam Hamm's Batman 2

You can read it yourself here: https://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/batman-returns_unproduced.html

To represent the finale of Hamm's script, we showed fan art from our fan Logan Wood:

Check out his Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/shanehelms121/

57:11 The Batcave in Batman Returns

We previously showed this Batcave in our Batman Returns concept art episode, though this time we have better scans:

You can find this concept art in Batman: The Definitive History of The Dark Knight in Comics, Film, and Beyond by Andrew Farago and Gina McIntyre, which you can purchase here.

58:20 The Batman Forever Batcave

The tidbit about the giant penny in the Batman Forever Batcave comes from this interview with the Batchlers:

Check out the original script by the Batchlers: https://ia800107.us.archive.org/21/items/Batman3ScriptProductionDraftAkivaGoldsman/Batman%203%20script%20Early%20Draft%20The%20Batchlers.pdf

As well as the Akiva Goldsman revision: http://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/batman_forever.html

You can also check out some of the Batman Forever Batcave concept art here:

https://twitter.com/BatmanAnthology/status/1452455040359157760/photo/1 https://www.instagram.com/p/CXmO7wJM9tx/?utm_medium=copy_link

1:09:28 The Batman & Robin Batcave

We discussed more about the Batman & Robin script here:

You can check out the Batman & Robin script by Akiva Goldsman here: https://sfy.ru/?script=batman_and_robin

1:12:01 The Darren Aronofsky Batman: Year One Batcave

We dove into the script for the Aronofsky project here:

You can read it here:

https://thescriptlab.com/wp-content/uploads/scripts/BatmanYearOne.pdf

1:17:25 The Unmade Bruce Wayne TV Show Batcave

We dove into the pilot script for this unmade show here:

You can read KryptonSite's breakdown of the rest of the series pitch:

http://www.kryptonsite.com/brucewayne/outline.htm

1:20:43 The Unmade Batman Vs Superman Batcave

We dove into the unmade Batman Vs Superman script from 2002 here:

You can read the Akiva Goldsman rewrite of Andrew Kevin Walker's draft here:

https://www.dailyscript.com/scripts/asylum.pdf

1:25:55 The Nolan Trilogy Batcaves

1:29:35 The Snyderverse Batcave and The Batman (2022) Batcave

We dove into the plans for Justice League 2 and 3 here:

You can read them here:

https://bleedingcool.com/movies/zack-snyder-justice-league-sequel-jim-lee/

1:33:19 The Justice League Mortal Batcave

We covered the Justice League Mortal script years ago here:

You can read the Justice League Mortal script here: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B4tilNmOgu5TRk9VMHU2QVdsaWc/edit?resourcekey=0-uOk-Po3La_rVj_6jgG5y6w

The specific Batcave concept art images come from Ryan Unicomb here:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CEVZvrbFhN-/?utm_medium=copy_link https://twitter.com/getfandom/status/1240777925844066306

1:40:55 Fan Comments

2:01:32 Closing: Fan Shoutouts and Social Media Promotion

Big thanks to our research assistant Dan Yamat for providing the visuals for this YouTube presentation, as well as the thumbnails, QC, and chapter time codes.

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