Comics pros can do fanboy speculation too

Well that was a long hiatus. I had intended to do more writing here, but life just kind of overtook things. I'm going to try to get into the habit of posting at least once a week, if only to save my poor friends from the deluge of e-mail about random thoughts that they've been getting from me lately...

Anyway, over here at MTV's splashpage, we see evidence that comic book creators are fanboys too. Various DC comics folks are asked to suggest villains for the next Batman movie. There are a few interesting ideas in there. If Tim Sale's art weren't already enough to get me to buy his books, this quote alone probably would be making me reconsider:

“[Catwoman]’s such a powerful and sexual and strong woman, and I like that. But god, I hope not as Frank Miller’s version of her as a prostitute. That’s the worst part of ‘Year One.’ That’s just Frank trying to be outrageous. It didn’t ring remotely true to me.”

Personally, I have a few ideas about who shouldn't be in the next movie, but they involve some spoilers for "The Dark Knight"...

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There seems to be a lot of support for Catwoman in the next movie. I'm not so sure that's a great idea. The Catwoman/Batman dynamic is at its core a love story. Introducing a new love interest so soon after the death of Rachel Dawes in "The Dark Knight" just doesn't seem right - to have him move on so soon would make the events of "The Dark Knight" seem kind of shallow.

What's more, the current Batman incarnation seems to almost be as much about Gotham as it is about Batman or his villains. Gotham is a major character here - moreso than in any of the previous films. Catwoman isn't the kind of villain that would really make an impact on Gotham, so either the focus would have to change away from Gotham to a much more personal story, or she'd have to be paired with another villain and we'd end up with two different stories working simultaneously. This could work and it could be wonderful. It could also fall flat on its face and become a confusing mess.

Logically, the end of "The Dark Knight" leaves a power vacuum in Gotham among the criminals. It would make sense if the next movie had someone moving in to fill that vacuum. Unfortunately, among the list of flashy Batman villains, few of them are actually credible mob bosses. They either need to be sane, or at least insane in a way that doesn't impair their ability to organize and control a mob racket. Penguin fits the bill, but he's a bit of a joke character. I could see it working pretty well, but you definitely have to write him differently than he has been written in the comics or the animated series. Scarface and the Ventriloquist would work quite nicely - he's not sane, but his particular insanity makes for a good mob boss. Again, though, you have to worry about threading that needle to make sure he doesn't come across as a joke.

I think Poison Ivy could work in this context fairly well - again, given a rewrite to make her fit the setting a bit better. You'd need to eliminate her superpowers and make her more of a poisoner than a supervillain, but it could work.

One character that I don't see mentioned much is Talia - the daughter of Ra's al Ghul. I think she could be a great character to bring in to close out a "trilogy". She's a great character, you can easily make the story not one of romance but of revenge, and you can continue the story of the redemption of Gotham with her pretty easily. You'd definitely want to include another character with her, but unlike with Catwoman it would be relatively easy to have just about anyone working as her underling (the way Scarecrow was working for Ra's in the first movie).

Overall, I think there's a lot of potential for this franchise right now. I'd just be very leery of them introducing Catwoman into the story at this point - no matter what the other fans are saying right now.