With a new ongoing series launched as part of DC Comics' post-New 52 plans, the "Batman Beyond" franchise is experiencing a resurgence in popularity following its initial run as an animated series from 1998 to 2001. Thanks to a new interview with director Boaz Yakin, we now know even more about the franchise's brush with a live-action adaptation. While talking with IGN, "Remember the Titans" director Boaz Yakin recalled his experience developing the "Batman Beyond" film adaptation.

"I had just made 'Remember the Titans' and my inclination is to always go off a trend: make an independent film after I make a studio film," Yakin told IGN. "I spoke to my agent, and he said, 'I think you need to do another studio movie before you do that.' I was just basically like, 'Well, if I'm going to do a studio movie, like, I want it to be Batman' -- which at the time I just meant, if I'm going to do a studio movie, I want it to be a big ol' thing."

Yakin's agent took that offhand comment quite literally and, the director said, "came back to me and said, 'I have a meeting set up for you at Warner Bros. about Batman.' I was like, 'What!? [Laughs] Okay.' I guess at the time I think Darren Aronofsky was developing a 'Batman: Year One' type of thing. So I said, 'Okay, let me see what I can do,' and I came up with this pitch on Batman Beyond."

According to Yakin, the film he pitched was "almost like Sam Raimi's 'Spider-Man' but a little bit darker -- a teenage, kind of futuristic, cyberpunk Batman thing." A draft of the film was written by Yakin as well as "Beyond" creators Paul Dini and Alan Burnett, but that one draft ended up being all the Batman that Yakin had in him. "[I] very quickly got the feeling that I would be in the zone, the madness, and I didn't really have the heart for it at the time and I basically bailed after one draft," he said. "I just went, 'I can't do this.'"

While a feature film never came to be, "Batman Beyond" remained a fan favorite iteration of the Dark Knight mythology, leading to the recent digital-first "Batman Beyond Unlimited" series and the new ongoing series starring ex-Robin Tim Drake in the title role.