Even before being released, Batman: Caped Crusader is making waves for what promises to be a mature take on the DC icon, and it has already broken five rules that the best Batman show to date had to adhere to. Batman: Caped Crusader is the latest animated Batman show, set to premiere August 1 on Prime Video. Executive producers for the show include Bruce Timm, J.J. Abrams, and The Batman director, Matt Reeves. Despite not yet being released, Batman: Caped Crusader has already been renewed for a second season, which is likely to premiere in 2025.

Anticipation for the show that built up after five years of development hell is now at a fever pitch as Abrams’ first DC offering rounds the corner. Batman: Caped Crusader depicts Batman in his earliest days embracing vigilante justice in the 1940s. As such, the story is a slightly darker and more complex rendition of the Caped Crusader than other animated DC shows, which is in keeping with Reeves’ live-action version. Batman: Caped Crusader is, however, still kid-friendly – though perhaps not as much as its iconic predecessor.

Batman: The Animated Series Had 9 Unbreakable Rules

Batman: The Animated Series is perhaps the paradigmatic depiction of Batman in animation, with characters from this show starring in the shared DC Animated Universe for which Bruce Timm was also a showrunner. Mark Hamill starred as the iconic Joker, and back in 2018, divulged all nine of the “Censor’s [Batman] no-no’s” on Twitter/X.

The nine things Hamill revealed could never be depicted in Batman: The Animated Series included:

• Extreme Violence
• Drugs
• Booze
• Nudity
• Handguns
• Religion
• Child Endangerment
• Crashing Through Plate-Glass
• Face-Punching

Hamill shared this with a picture, drawn by Timm himself, that shows Batman, Joker, and an imperiled child breaking every one of these rules at once. Obviously, throughout its three-year run from 1992 to 1995 (and the 11 years that followed for the DC Animated Universe as a whole), these rules were adhered to by Batman: The Animated Series. The same, however, cannot be said for its thematically more mature spiritual successor, which has wasted no time in capitalizing on the fact that these rules no longer apply.

Batman: Caped Crusader Has Already Broken 5 BTAS Rules

Of the nine rules laid out by Hamill in his post, Batman: Caped Crusader has broken five in its trailer alone. These include:

• Extreme violence
• Drugs
• Hand guns
• Crashing Through Plate-Glass
• Face-punching

For the most part, these are broken in Batman’s myriad no-holds-barred altercations with Gotham’s criminals, as he, like his live-action counterparts, doesn’t shy away from aiming his punches at their faces. Handguns are also seen being wielded by Two-Face, other criminals, and Barbara Gordon, and Batman can be seen crashing through a plate-glass window at least twice. There is also a line in the trailer that references “dope-pushers,” thereby drawing a line beneath the no-drugs rule.

As it stands, Batman: Caped Crusader has laid out its stall as a far more mature addition to Timm’s legacy. Fans are already excited to see fresh takes on myriad Batman villains, many of which make appearances throughout the trailer with decidedly terrifying visages. Whether Batman: Caped Crusader will break the remaining rules remains to be seen, but all should be revealed when the first episodes drop this August.

Source: Mark Hamill/Twitter/X