DC has canceled its Arkham Asylum series after an extensive development process, but making the show doesn’t have to be so difficult. Arkham Asylum was once joining the likes of Booster Gold and Lanterns as part of the DCU’s unique slate of shows before it was canceled in July 2024. As the name suggests, the show was due to depict the eclectic inmates of Arkham Asylum and Batman’s iconic rogues’ gallery. This would presumably have tied closely to the DCU’s Batman movie, The Brave and the Bold.

Suffice it to say, Arkham Asylum was one of the most exciting projects on the DCU’s release slate. While the DCU looks poised to spotlight some of DC’s more obscure and understated characters in properties like The Authority, this show provided an opportunity for DC Studios to do the same with some of Batman’s more obscure characters, of which plenty have yet to be adapted to live-action. Yet the show was never to materialize thanks to the all-too-familiar realm of development hell.

Arkham Asylum Has Been In Development Hell For 4 Years

Arkham Asylum‘s journey began in 2020 as a spinoff show for The Batman that centered on Gotham PD. Like its cinematic source material, the show has had a tumultuous 4 years since its inception, with the story morphing from being Gotham PD-focused to being a horror-tinged story about Arkham Asylum instead in 2022. At least three showrunners were introduced during that time, with Antonio Campos spearheading the Arkham version of the show when it began materializing in 2022. The following year, it was announced that Arkham Asylum would be part of the DCU instead of a spinoff of The Batman.

Such a seemingly unsteady process is scarcely a good sign for any production, but the change in franchise probably didn’t help. The fact that Matt Reeves’ and the DCU’s versions of Batman might be sharing release windows also necessitates a gulf in tone between the two. This suggests that the grittier tone that Arkham Asylum likely shared with The Batman required a significant rewrite. The complicated dynamic between the two series may also go some way to explain why reports suggested another theoretical show about Arkham could still go forward further down the line for the DCU.

Arkham Asylum Should Be Simple To Make

Batman: Arkham Asylum Is Incredibly Successful

As Rocksteady Studios’ Batman: Arkham Asylum video game helped prove, Arkham is a treasure trove. With Batman’s rogues’ gallery being almost as iconic as he is, this kind of premise doesn’t even require Batman’s presence. Instead, Arkham Asylum could play like a Die Hard pastiche in which an Arkham guard, or even an inmate, could embody the role of protagonist amid the chaos of a legendary Arkham prison break. It is hard to see how such a story wouldn’t land well among fans.

As it stands, there is still no live-action Batman movie or TV show that centers solely around Arkham. This leaves the opportunity wide open for the DCU to have immense success with its own, begging the question of why DC Studios could not stick to the idea of Arkham Asylum considering it had been in development for so long. As it happens, this was something that Ben Affleck intended to capitalize on in the early days of his Batman tenure, which was precisely the solo Batman movie that Zack Snyder’s Justice League‘s Deathstroke tease was setting up.

A Future Arkham Asylum Should Revive Ben Affleck’s Batman Idea

Ben Affleck Never Got His Solo Batman Movie

After being cast as Batman in the DCEU, Ben Affleck was tasked with penning a solo movie alongside DC Comics veteran, Geoff Johns. They submitted the first draft in 2016, which centered on Arkham Asylum and Deathstroke orchestrating an Arkham prison break. Drawing inspiration from Arkham Asylum: A Serious House on Serious Earth, Knightfall, and Rocksteady’s Batman: Arkham Asylum, the intention was to have Batman worn down by his attempts to subdue the inmates before Deathstroke attempts a coup de grâce on the streets of Gotham.

This is an idea with colossal potential for the DCU. Recent Batman movies have made a habit of spotlighting one villain per movie, which has been a successful formula thus far, but warrants a refresh. Affleck’s ill-fated tenure may have fizzled out with the DCEU in general, but his legacy can live on in the continuation of this compelling Arkham Asylum concept in a future DCU installment.