The award-winning co-writers and producers Paul Dini and Alan Burnett made unforgettable contributions to the Dark Knight's legacy in Batman The Animated Series, Batman: Mask of the Phantasm, and more animated adventures. Their impact on the Caped Crusader's mythology is undeniable, and now they're returning to continue the tales that began with the late and great Kevin Conroy's Batman in 1992.
The appropriately titled series Batman: The Adventures Continue has begun its third volume with the action-packed return of the new mercenary Oscar Delgado, a.k.a. Muscle, and the surprise appearance of Amanda Waller. The iconic DC character pulled Oscar into the latest incarnation of Task Force X. But what comes next in the third volume after that cliffhanger? CBR had an exclusive, spoiler-filled chat with Dini and Burnett about this new issue and Harley Quinn's appearance in Batman: The Adventures Continue #2. The duo also addressed the cliffhanger with Deathstroke, Red Hood, and Sunny from volume one and talked about what Kevin Conroy meant to them.
CBR: Before we delve into the comic itself, I feel it's important for us to talk about Kevin. When you read this comic as a fan, you hear Kevin's voice in your head. I'm sure when you're writing, you're also hearing him. So, first and foremost, I would love to know about the impact Kevin's life and legacy have played on the creative process of this new volume.
Alan Burnett: Well, he's one of the few people who never... There was never a problem with him about anything. He was game to try anything we threw at them. I think that's one of the things I loved about him. And his voice, which I described as uncommonly powerful and warm at the same time. He could layer dialogue you weren't expecting to be layered like that. He found a way of doing it. You know, he was on the stage for a long time. I actually saw him. Oh, what was this play? It was the murder play. I saw him on stage about 10 years before I met him, and I was thinking to myself at the time that this guy has a tremendous voice. That didn't click until like three years after working with him. He said, "I was in that play," and I said, "Oh my God, I saw you!"
Paul Dini: I was never lucky enough to see him on stage. But I loved the thought process he brought to Batman and Bruce Wayne. It was very interesting to watch him discover and teach himself things about the characters. He knew that Batman was a character and had been in comic books, but his only exposure to him was in the Adam West series. So through reading the scripts, going back and reading some of the comic book material, and then living with a character for so long -- he found ways to tap into his personal experience as a person and an actor to bring a richness to both roles. I think the roles that he really loved [were] the ones that had as much emphasis on Bruce as Batman. So something like Mask of the Phantasm or the episode "Perchance to Dream," where he was able to do multiple levels on the characters... He always found something extraordinary in his performances.
We've definitely seen that difference between Batman and Bruce in seasons one and two of The Adventures Continue, especially with the political story. When you've been developing these new adventures, do you find yourself asking, "What would Kevin think about this?" Does that play any role in the creative process when crafting new adventures for the legacy of this character?
Dini: Well, sure. I think the greatest gift Kevin gave us as creators, or myself and Alan, is that whenever we write the character now, at least for me, his voice reverberates in my head. You brought up the political story. I could actually hear him talking, you know, first as Batman. "I don't trust this Mayfield guy." And then, when he is talking to him, the brief indecision in his voice, like, "What does this guy mean?" When he's at the political rally, it's one of the rare times both he and Bruce are flustered by this. He's not in total control of what he's saying, and that really makes him mad. It really puts him in the palm of the villain's hand in a completely different way. So when we were writing that, I thought, "Oh, yeah, I can definitely hear Kevin having a lot of fun with us."
Now that season three has begun, I'd love to hear more about that surprise cliffhanger with Muscle joining Amanda Waller's Task Force X.
Dini: Well, we will say that does pay off. That's a big part of season three that is a recurrent theme. It's a lot like when we were writing the animated series. Occasionally we would do an episode with a new character, and something would spark and go like, "Hey, there's an entry into telling a different type of story." Certainly, it worked that way with Harley Quinn and some of the other characters we would introduce and then say, "Okay, this opens up more story potential." So with Muscle, it just seemed like, "What if there is a reverse Batman?" This is the guy that the criminals call in when there's trouble they can't handle, the same way the cops would call in Batman. He has the same level of expertise and mystery to him. Alan, do you have anything to add?
Burnett: You said it all! In fact, you're bringing back memories of when we first talked about the character. We like to gravitate toward characters that are sort of earthbound. So the idea of doing a negative Batman seemed perfect for us.
You guys are obviously no strangers to Batman's world. He has so many memorable villains. So what is it like creatively adding something to this rich rogues' gallery?
Dini: It's also looking at how that character will fit in not only in Gotham City and going against Batman but with other elements of his world. Muscle was a really good character to bring in as a test to Batman and to Detective Montoya because that is a villain [who is] a nightmare for a cop. She's not going to back down against him, and one of my favorite things is in the follow-up issue where she's talking to Delgado and says, "Look, you know, I have no reason to do this, but I want the people paying you more than I want you. [If] you play ball with me, maybe there's a chance of leniency here."
I like it because Delgado is a test for Batman,[and] a test for Montoya. It's like, "How far can she be pushed to either fight this guy or accommodate him in order to get what she wants?" When you introduce a character like that in the world that also resonates with the supporting characters, that's a character you want to go back to.
Burnett: I liked the idea that he's such a mercenary that he has a perfect opportunity of shooting Batman in the head. There's a scene where he's got the back of Batman set in his sights, and he says, "Too bad they're not paying me for this," and goes after Montoya, which is his big mistake. But I liked the mercenary quality. When we did the original animated series, we didn't create many new villains. There was such a wealth of rogues' gallery villains that I would say 95% of the time we spent with the ones that were in the comics. Even with Batman: The Adventure Continues, we still tend to go back and have fun with those characters we've established before in the series. One of the secrets of [Batman's] success is that his rogues' gallery is spread so wide, and it is so, so colorful.
I would love to know what you guys can tease about that ongoing plot that's been introduced here with Esther Valestra, Rupert Thorne, Black Mask, and the Penguin. Can fans expect to see them send more familiar faces after Muscle? I imagine someone like Deadshot was probably a little jealous of Muscle taking all these gigs.
Dini: He might be. He probably [always] is once a new talent enters the mercenary pool. Maybe, I don't know exactly when we're gonna get back to Deathstroke. Did you say Deathstroke or Deadshot?
Oh no, I said Deadshot. He was at Harley and Ivy's holiday party lurking in the background. I don't think he's appeared outside of that.
Dini: Oh, well, you will see some Deadshot pretty soon! Yeah, I'm very happy to hear that. Deadshot is definitely on the horizon. He's not alone. So we'll put it that way. We like Esther Valestra an awful lot. Alan, you came up with her as sort of a cross between Ma Barker and Liza Minnelli.
Burnett: [laughs]
Dini: Like a very gregarious Italian motherly sort who can make a good braciole just as easily as [she] can put a bullet in your head. We were having a lot of fun with her. And she may show up. Again, that's another character that if you're not going to have what we sometimes call the guys in funny suits, it's fun to have a more extreme personality among the rank-and-file fedora and suit guys who menace Batman -- the regular gangsters. The fact that she's sort of like a den mother to Black Mask, Thorne, Penguin, and a bunch of others makes her even more charming.
That was a lot of really great teasers about what's to come in season three. One thing that I'm curious about is how you've adapted modern stories like Under the Red Hood and Court of Owls into this universe. Are there any other storylines that occurred after Batman The Animated Series that you guys have read and want to work into this series?
Dini: Well, you know, that's what we did all through the creation of the animated series. The books would be creating new characters and situations for Batman that we would gravitate to. When Bane was created, he was a great new character, and we [wondered] how we [could] bring him in and make him fit in the world we've established. We were always looking at that because, you know, the books -- Detective Comics, Batman, and all the others -- are a frequent source of inspiration to us. When there's a great idea you would love, we would love to bring that in because it adds so much to Batman's world. By bringing in the Owls and a few other elements, like Red Hood, and some others, we took the attitude that if we were doing the show, this is what we would be doing.
We would be doing things that have clicked with us. It's hard when you're doing animation because there's as much as an 18-month lead time when we read something in the comics and say, "Oh, let's get that in the show," that'll be a year or year and a half until that shows up in animation, so [they] usually tended to be the big ideas. We knew that Bane was going to stick around for a while, and we knew that other elements were coming in that resonated throughout Batman's world. So we would gravitate towards those. And yet, there was a colorful one-shot building that showed up we'd say, "Hey, maybe we'll work that guy in somewhere."
If DC is happy with the sales and you get more seasons of this series, have you both started planning ideas for additional story arcs?
Dini: We always keep a running file of different ideas. We got about halfway through the third season. [Then] Alan, you sent me a list of ideas of areas we could investigate, and I wrote some ideas back. So there are piles of ideas that we've had for the characters. I don't know when or if we'll ever get around to using all of them. But there were some ideas that have been kicking around for a long time that just took a while to percolate. Once it came up, we'd be talking about a story and would say, "Oh, let's do that one."
The next issue began with a germ of an idea that I had a long time ago. I always thought it would be interesting to do a story about what if Batman and Harley Quinn investigate the disappearance of a woman. As the mystery progresses, it turns out [that] they both had a relationship with her. Harley had a relationship with her, and Bruce Wayne had a relationship with her. How would that impact them working together, and how would that fuel the story? How would that play emotionally with Batman because, you know, it's obvious he can't discuss that with Harley? And that's only something the reader is privy to in his thoughts, his reactions, and everything. I just thought, "That's sort of a fun story." It's also fun to show that Harley had other partners before Joker and Poison Ivy.
Burnett: That is my favorite story we've told. I had a lot of fun on that one. I always like [to[ make Batman a little nervous about the situation personally, and that story fits the bill. I was glad when Paul said that was the idea. I thought, "Oh, my gosh, can we have a good time with that?" And we did.
Dini: Yeah, Batman can't verbalize a lot of what he's thinking. But it's all there. We were blessed to have Kevin Altieri, the great director from the animated series, come back. He poured his heart and soul into that. He draws a terrific Harley. It was wonderful to see him leap back into them.
Fans have been wondering about that Season One cliffhanger with Deasthrstroke, Sunny, and Red Hood. I know you briefly addressed it earlier, but is there anything else you could say about that plot thread?
Dini: We've gone back and forth about how we're going to continue that story. It is a big story, and I think it may be a bit bigger than what we had planned. So I wouldn't mind returning to that story someday -- either as a graphic novel or a one-shot. You never say never to continuing the adventures of these characters. I think that is one of the biggest story potentials -- the idea that the former protege of Batman has been accepted into the family of one of his worst enemies and how that's going to work out. We did keep trying to find ways to go back to it, and then we just felt rather than try and use it as part of another story that was a thing [of[ its own. Maybe someday. That's something we want to get back to at some point.
Burnett: Yeah, Deathstroke's an interesting character in that he came up through Teen Titans, and he's a guy who likes to have students and teach them. We have discussed several ways to go with it. We haven't come down to what to do just yet. But it could be a very big story because there are lots of cross currents of Red hood knowing who Batman is, and does he give this away? If he doesn't give it away, what has Deathstroke done to [keep] him from doing that? We've been discussing it, but as Paul said, it might be a little further in the future before we get back,
Dini: Right. It's such a rich area. The fact that Deathstroke has, in a sense, forged his own version of the Bat-family with Sunny, Red Hood, and God knows who else. I think we [could] return to that as a one-shot story at some point.
Is there anything else you guys want to add to all the Batman fans?
Dini: Mr. Wing is not there right now. But he wasn't in the "Mayor Mayhem" story either. We had to have Harriet do something, and she needed backup, and it's like, "Let's add Mister Wing. Let's have Nightwing and Batgirl beat up a couple of the henchpeople." So in came Mister Wing. Maybe he'll be back. Everybody loves him.
Batman: The Adventures Continue Season Three #1 is on sale now. Issue #2 is currently available for pre-order at comic shops.