Ben Wan
- Nov 22, 2021
- 3 min read

The Unmade Batmobiles on Film & TV

Updated: Dec 3, 2021

We dive into ALL the Batmobiles you never saw onscreen. Did you know the 1966 Batmobile originally didn’t have red? Or that Bob Kane designed a Batmobile for the 1989 movie? Learn about HR Giger's insane Batman Forever Batmobile, the Lincoln Continental Batmobile for Darren Aronofsky's unmade Batman: Year One, and all the concept art for the Batmobile in Titans!

CHAPTERS

0:00 Introduction

3:18 The ALL BLACK 1966 Batmobile

For a look at George Barris telling the story of the original black and white Batmobile, check out this Batmobile documentary.

6:30 The Batmobile from Tom Mankiewicz's The Batman script...With a Cigarette Lighter??

We covered Tom Mankiewicz's The Batman script (1982-1984) in our most popular episode- The Batman Script...From 1982?!

You can read it here.

11:58 Bob Kane's Movie Batmobile Concept Art

We covered Bob Kane's hilarious The Return of Batman treatment here.

The art and notes on this came from Batmobile History.com

This concept was created by Bob Kane as a possible vehicle for the 1989 Batman movie. Though the car is a combination of features throughout the history of the car (including the bubble dome canopy, searchlights, and battering ram), the nose and general shape of the car appear to be from an oversized Corvette. http://www.batmobilehistory.com/art/bobkane.php

16:58 The 1989 Batmobile Concept Art

The concept art for the Batman 89 Batmobiles came from these sources:

https://weirdlandtv.tumblr.com/post/181230210302/concept-art-by-david-russell-for-batman-1989

https://entertainment.ha.com/itm/entertainment-and-music/batman-batmobile-batcave-and-bat-plane-original-concept-art-group-of-3-warner-brothers-c-1989-/a/7226-89037.s?ic4=GalleryView-Thumbnail-071515

https://batman.fandom.com/wiki/Julian_Caldow

31:06 The Batmobile in the Batman 3 Script

We covered the Batman Forever script here:

You can read the Batchler draft here.

37:30 The HR Giger Batman 3 Batmobile

A fan, Keva R., sent us a more conventional Batmobile concept art from Giger, featured in the 2003 re-issue of Giger's Alien book:

45:55 Barbara Ling's Original Batman Forever Batmobiles

The concept art for the Batman Forever Batmobiles comes from 1995 Batman:

https://www.1995batman.com/2018/06/concept-art-batmobile-designs.html

1:00:27 The Original Batman & Robin Batmobile

This concept art by Harald Belker comes from Batmobile History:

http://www.batmobilehistory.com/art/haraldbelker.php

1:03:57 BREAK

Check out our link for Barkbox here.

1:04:43 The Unmade Batman: Year One Batmobile

Here's some of the concept art for Batman: Year One here:

http://www.batmobilehistory.com/art/draxhalljumpstudio.php

Darren Aronofsky's tweet denying the concept art is here

1:14:44 The Early Concepts of The Tumbler

Images courtesy of Batmobile History

http://www.batmobilehistory.com/art/nolancrowley.php

1:21:43 The MANY Batmobile Concepts for Titans

These concepts come from designer John Gallagher:

https://batman-news.com/2018/11/20/batmobile-titans-concept-art/

One point of clarification is that Ben dismissed the red stripe and the silver hydraulics, when both are present in toys for the Dick Sprang Batmobile. While the Dick Sprang Batmobile DID have red stripes, the Titans concept art only had one. Also the original Dick Sprang Batmobile's hydraulics were blue that blended with the rest of the car while they were silver in the toy and in the Titans concept art.

For comparison:

The Dick Sprang Batmobile

Toy of Dick Sprang's Batmobile

The Titans Dick Sprang Batmobile

2:01:15 The Batfleck Justice League Knightmare Batmobile

We covered Zack Snyder's proposed Justice League 2 and Justice League 3 (or Justice League 2A) here.

2:05:21 Closing: Fan Comments & Social Media Promotion

Big Thanks to Our Research Assistant Dan Yamat for doing QC and providing the chapter time codes.

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