What Could Have Been: Batgirl
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- Опубликовано: 1 июн 2024
- Taking a look at the plot of the unreleased Batgirl film and reasons behind its cancellation.
⏱️TIMESTAMPS⏱️
0:00 Intro
0:15 Joss Whedon
2:01 HBO Max
2:55 Cast
3:20 The Plot
4:25 Firefly
7:59 Test Screening Reviews
9:20 What Went Wrong?
Shoutout to Neb for piecing together the plot!
rb.gy/vhtzex
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I was cast in this film. They shot this in my hometown Glasgow & I applied to be an extra but ended up getting picked for a featre role (basically meaning you'll get paid more for speaking on camera). I do stage acting but extra work is just a side job but this was a good step up. The scene I was in had me & 2 other criminals (dressed as prostitutes so greasy hair & fish net leggings, not too revealing but you'd only know what we were suppose to be if you were an adult viewer) were handcuffed & dragged into the police station by a cop as Barbra Gordon in her police uniform walks past us, the camera then pans to the 3 of us arguing as we are placed in a waiting bench. In between takes Leslie Grace herself gave us a thumbs up and was gigling telling us "great job guys". The crowed director (not Bilall & Adil, directors dont inteact during large crowded scenes) told us to ham it up as it was suppose to be quite a silly moment & she instructed me to be the one Batgirl walks past and to make sure I was blocking the doorway. Overall it was a fun day of filming, a couple of my freinds who worked on other scenes said that Brendan Fraser is really nice in real life & would make small talk with everyone including the extras. Its ashame it didnt get released but hey, I still got paid & it was a fun day to spend at Gotham.
That sounds like an awesome experience. Thanks for sharing!
this movie reeks of Batman and Robin level quality
really , sounds like a awesome experience and thank u for sharing
What year did filming take place ?
Don't worry. This show will be edited and still get released. They're not going to dump it as there's still good parts already filmed. Brendan Fraser gave an interview saying it was a really great experience and he thought it was good and can still get released.
I refuse to believe this was any worse than 2016 suicide squad or even WW84
...or The Flash, Black Adam & Shazam 2
@@timom3755 didn’t see Shazam 2 but yeah the flash was horrible
Fortunately we'll never have to find out.
I doubt it will ever leak or be released, but with Michael Keaton’s Batman, JK Simmons as Commissioner Gordon, and Brendan Fraser as Firefly, I’d be super interested to check it out
With an all star cast how bad can it be? If Brendan Fraser and Michael Keaton is in it then you know it's gotta be good.
@@jonfreeman9682Well the flash had Keaton and was terrible so…
@@saji.2874Exactly!
@@jonfreeman9682 Oh it can be quite quite bad, as a certain movie with George Clooney and Arnold Schwarzenegger has proved long ago.
@@saji.2874i liked it
As a huge Brendan Fraser fan, he would’ve been incredible imo, but I still have hope he can play a Batman villian someday
O' connel
He could be a very convincing clay face I feel like, or even Mr. Freeze
I think it doesnt matter how good he is if the script an direction undermine that.
He doesn't play a Batman villain in it, but in the DC show *Doom Patrol* (last episode of season 4 aired like 3 weeks ago), Brendan Fraser plays one of the main character, Cliff Steele aka Robotman.
100% recommended, it's one of my favorite live action DC shows ever!
@@jonnyleeconway Clayface, yes. 100%
I doubt it was as bad as they said. I feel like it was just Zaslav wanting to save money anyway he could. I think it definitely will be released some day. All kinds of things have turned up eventually. It just bums me out how excited Leslie Grace was in interviews when she she was cast. I hope she gets another shot.
well its really hard to judge how bad or good it was, as the same folks said Flash was a master piece... (it was not). So do they have terrible taste.. or was Batgirl truly one of the worst movies ever (if they thought Flash was great)....
Broooo. This movie being shelved is straight up tax fraud.
Warner Brothers inflated the production numbers while overflowing the "critical" response.
It was all fraud.
Damn, this was extensive! So impressed with how much more info you seem to compile compared to others. The definitive 'what could have been' channel!
Thank you!!! Glad you enjoyed it
Remember when one of the Toy Story films accidentally got deleted, and was saved because one of the editors had a copy? *Someone* has a copy of Batgirl.
I’m still highly skeptical of this being “so bad” since “The Flash” was apparently “great” by the same executives’ estimation. Plus the idea of a superhero movie that’s small scale, personal, and doesn’t hinge itself around a thousand ideas is a key part of why Blue Beetle was so much fun.
I live in Glasgow and it was so cool getting to see whole sections of town turned into Gotham. The old architecture and grimy atmosphere really lent itself to a natural Batman-style look.
Though a woman who works in a vintage shop told me the directors came in and asked to take a neon "Girls Girls Girls" sign she had for them to use in the film, but didn't wanna pay for it. She said no.
Like a $90 million budget and they couldn't pay for a little prop.
Speaking of Brendan Fraser because he was in Batgirl, are you open to doing a What Could Have Been for The Mummy 3? I know The Mummy 3 exists, but there’s an earlier draft of the script which had differences from the final film
I can look into it
Cool, thanks
@@Bulletsandblockbustersmummies😂
I still wish they would've had Rachel Weisz's Evie die (naturally) offscreen, rather than have Maria Bello just take over the part. Having Evie die and Rick trying to move on with a new girlfriend (Bello) would've provided all the conflict you could need between him and his son throughout the movie.
Oh, and *not* casting a dude that looks maybe six years younger than Brendan as his son would've been a good move too.
@@ThisICommand666Yeah, that 3rd movie was hot garbage! 🗑
I can understand that the movie potentially might not be good, but i'd still like to see it. the characters seemed cool but the plot seemed a little light.
9:25 “turn chicken shit into chicken salad” is such a classic quote
I LOVE that you added Yvonne Craig’s Barbara Gordon and her revolving wall.😃 I always found that wall that lead to the brick interior room and circular door to the freight elevator fascinating as a kid!😃
Me too
It's amazing how you get all the behind the scenes stories! I'm extremely glad that you do have the stories and are sharing it in an engaging way! Love what you do! Keep going! All the best! ❤️ 💯
Thanks for the kind words! Glad you enjoy the content
That firetruck drift was pretty impressive!
I LOVE firefly and I’m so annoyed that he still hasn’t been in a movie yet, I know he’s a C tier Batman villain but I grew up watching him in The Batman tv show and reading some of the comics he was in… I’m just pissed he was so close to appearing and yet it didn’t happen
Same here & even I loved his appearance in Batman Arkham Origins game.
to be fair i feel like some batman villains like firely should be transferred to more less known heroes like green arrow since he has only a few good villains
I still wanna see this. Heck, actually having a cape on a motorcycle is a good sign just for the practicality of it.
I want to believe the test screeners but part of me wonders if because of the world-ending stakes of almost every big budget superhero movie these days if they just couldn't be bothered watching a movie with a smaller scope
Honestly if they wanted to do a movie where Michael Keaton’s Batman trains someone to be a crime fighter, they should’ve done a Batman Beyond movie with him. I hear DC was actually planning that before the reboot, so maybe you could do a video on that in the future.
Yes!!
Yeah, a Batman Beyond but with Batgirl in modern day would be pretty cool. Actually, that sounds too different to be Batman Beyond, but still.
This is the first time I've ever heard the plot for Batgirl, and it sounds like it could have been pretty awesome if it was done right. I think that Warner Bros ultimately made the right decision, hearing that it was more like a CW series makes me think that this would have been something like the Batman and Robin movie. And that would have really hurt the DC reputation further.
They already damaged DC (and Warner Brothers) reputation by shelving a finished movie and having the flash bomb at the box office.not to mention making stupid decisions like selling off their Batman cartoon to Amazon. Filmmakers are pulling out of deals with them and their basically sending a message to everyone that they aren't a good company to work with. Also it's moronic desicions by the higher ups that gave us movies like Batman and Robin.
People also said the same thing about the blue beetle, but that movie turned out to be good
Idk the test screening are pretty unreliable sources, ie aquaman 1 had terrible first screen testing but made a billion and is considered one of the better ones.
every movie would be pretty awesome if done right.....
@@mttylerdurden9 Just curious, why do you believe that Warner Bros having "Batman: Caped Crusader" air on Amazon is a stupid decision? From what I understood back then, It was either that, or cancelling the show...
I never bought the "the movie is so bad it's unreleasable" argument. But now over a year later we can see things differently. For one things it's really ridiculous hearing WB Discovery at the time saying Batgirl would "damage" the DC brand, now knowing that every DC movie released this year bombed, so exactly how could've Batgirl been more damaging then all the movies released this year? Also recently we've seen WB Discovery canceled the finished Wile Coyote v. Acme for a tax write off. So now over a year later the whole argument that it was so bad and it would've ruined the great DC brand feels laughable
Exactly. Very well put. The Flash, Shazam, Black Adam, Blue Beetle did all those movies hurt the WB brand?
Not for a second did I buy DC excuse.
@@babytoshiro7014 thanks
Even if it didn't end up hurting the brand purposely releasing a movie knowing full well that it would be terrible seems like a bad move. Remember that the movie was supposed to bring in new HBO Max subscribers, it wouldn't be played in theatres. Then add on how the movie was already over budget and it makes a lot more sense.
What you stated make no sense since they release Blue Beetle which was supposed to be an HBO Max. Then they release all the Flash knowing how the public felt. Then of course Shazam, and Black Adam. And now Aquaman 2 is tracking bad. @@milliondollarmistake
@@babytoshiro7014 They released Blue Beetle after the covid restrictions lifted, same with Flash. Blue Beetle was also released after big changes were made at the studio. The Flash had to be released too, that movie was in production hell for years. It wasn't just some small little movie they could shelve for a small tax write off. They also didn't expect Shazam 2 to fail, nor did they think Black Adam would. The latter of which was also released during covid with heavy influence by dwayne johnson so there'd be no way he'd let them throw out his movie.
Your explanation was so good it felt like i really watched the movie.
Thnx!
You know, jk Simmons and Michael Keaton in this movie would kinda make sense
Because different decisions could be the results of different universes being created
So the Michael Keaton batman in this movie wouldn't be the same Keaton in the 89 movie
That’s my headcanon
@@Bulletsandblockbusters same here, God bless you ✝️ 🙏 ❤️
Well done as always. I don’t know. This sounds kind of refreshing. I mean if the movies bad the movies bad. But the small scale story isn’t a bad way to go for a batgirl movie. I guess we’ll never know.
I wish we could get to see this movie one day, 'cause Brendan Fraiser playing a Batman villian is something i'd love to see.
We will never actually know whether it was "releasable" or not. I do find it interesting that test audiences thought the $75M superhero movie looked "cheap" without any finished FX. I really don't see how it couldn't. Sony's Madam Webb movie is thought to be around $75 Million and just about everyone who's seen the trailer thinks it looks "cheap" and like "The CW". Despite the claim that we are tired of "CGI-Fest", I don't know if modern audience's are going to be into low-budget superhero movies that feature a lot of practical FX.
Based on the behind the scenes footage, this film did look absolutely dogshit to be fair.
You must realise that the film had to be truly beyond awful for WB to write it off because they released The Flash and considered it to be, and I quote, "one of the greatest superhero films of all time"
What did we see here that appeared to be 'absolute dogshit'? I saw actors engaged in physical stunts and some dramatic real pyrotechnic effects. Nothing screamed, "Terrible!" to me. To put that into context, the classic Adam West & Burt Ward 1966 Batman film was made for the equivalent of $13,100,000 in today's money. It famously relies upon cheesy plots and ludicrously tacky stunts, and it's an absolute joy to watch. Then again, perhaps it's what inspired the Warner Brothers executives to shelve this film so quickly. "Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb!"
If the description of the plot is accurate, it appears to have the advantage of making sense and sticking to something fairly grounded, which already puts it at an advantage compared to some recent underperforming superhero films such as Black Adam, The Flash, Thor: Love and Thunder, or Wakanda Forever. Those films suffered from expanding expectations based upon ballooning budgets, and an overreliance upon grandiose plots, gratuitous cameos, and overblown CGI sequences to try to meet those expectations. It sounds like the directors of Batgirl knew exactly what sort of story they could tell for the budget, and stuck to that. Unfortunately, COVID measures seem to have put them unexpectedly over that budget by $20 million - something that might pale into insignificance on a bigger production, but which looks huge in comparison to the overall budget they were given, and attracted the attention of executives who tried to predict the future earnings and relate them to the costs.
If you are an executive who's experience of making a superhero movie succeed revolves around every increasing amounts of expensive CGI action to bolster any flaws, you might not relish that layout for a small-budget film. Ironically, this was probably exactly the sort of film which neither relied upon nor required excessive amounts of that to succeed. But it seems that both executives and test audiences are now addicted to high-budget, CGI fests - mistaking them for storytelling - and can't even sit still through a crime procedural with physical stunts long enough to pay attention to the narrative.
@MinesAGuinness batgirl was raceswapped so the movie was gonna fail
@@audaciousjones The 1966 Adam West TV show "race-swapped" Catwoman...A black actress named Eartha Kitt played Selina Kyle for a time, a character who was never black in the comics. Keaton's first film had a "race-swapped" Harvey Dent (played by Billy Dee Williams). Also, Zoe Kravitz (Catwoman in the 2022 "The Batman") is darker-skinned (Kravitz being of mixed ancestry), while comic Selina was always usually white. Commisioner Gordon in 2022's "The Batman" was "race-swapped" as a black man, which Gordon never was. The MCU "race-swapped" Nick Fury...A character who was always white in the OG comics. Where were the pitchforks then?
@@Mechasonicrocks do you think people would accept lupita nyongo as supergirl?
@@audaciousjones I'm of the opinion that if the actor/actress gives a performance that is good, then race is a non-issue. None of the prior instances of "race-swapping" I listed faced any sort of public backlash-before or since-so it must be a recent thing to hate, a "Twitter-flavor-of-the-month" type issue.
What Could Have Been: Kingdom of the Sun (the original version of The Emperor's New Groove)
Funny that Batgirl was deemed unreleaseable but the absolute unmitigated disaster that was The Flash wasn't.
Another BANGER! Thank you for existing. I’m loving this channel!
Glad you enjoy it!
Sorry to say, this is a super heavy handed sounding script. Not everyone needs such a heavy, tragic origin. Also, weird that elder Bats is still active in his 70’s.
I just binged all your videos this is groundbreaking journalism!!! Keep up the great work ❤
Thank you! Will do!
Let’s see if someone ever leaks this movie. We can then look for ourselves to see if it’s as bad as everyone said
I just finished the brendon fraser interview about this movie right as I got the notification about your video.
I love one little detail, Jim Gordon is totally ginger here 3:16 , in the comics he is always grey but sometimes his hair is brown or kinda red , also Barbara was originally his niece but later is his daughter and her wife the ginger one, i'm being picky but this is a great move to have Leslie Grace as Barbara and being ginger, about the story maaaan sounds awesome, maybe was a bad movie but sounds fun very Batgirl/Gotham at his core
* btw i would totally love if they make Leslie Grace batgirl but with Batfleck post BvS and this batgirl being a kinda of Carrie Kelley, where she finds a broken batman and "save him" from his pain creating a new hero and helping bruce to go and fight for his redemption in ZSJL
Nice video my dude! Was always curious about this films production ever since I heard it was cancelled.
They even included the Akira slide too! 0:09
Whether or not WB had no faith in Batgirl due to bad test screenings, I still would love to see it
It wasn't really the screen testing that was the problem. Let's seriously remember Flash had an apparently good test screening, and that was not exactly great. 😂
Considering that I think one of the worst things about modern superhero movies is that they try to be too large-scale even when they're dealing with characters who work better at a small scale, this premise sounds fine to me. I think it's telling that the best of Nolan's Batman trilogy is the one with the smallest stakes. As long as the personal stakes are high, that's what matters. (Of course, you don't want to end up with a film like Steel, where the audience doesn't care about the stakes either way, but surely no one in this film was as bad as Shaq, right?)
It's funny how black Adam had the same audience score and yet Zaslav release that.
It's funny how Zaslav was about to shelve Coyote vs Acme with a 90% audience score until backlash made Zaslav change his mind.
Very interesting
This was a great one. I was looking forward to this.
Thanks for this video. It gives so much more information than I would have thought available.
I do have trouble believing this movie was so bad, but maybe just not the direction they wanted to go with a DC property especially while they were changing so many other DC projects and overall plans on a constant basis. I think the directors did too good of a job on Bad Boys 3 (yes for real, if you haven’t seen it) and the Miss Marvel show to believe this was so unsalvageable.
WB also showed they’ll shelve a good movie just as well, as they tried with the Wile E. Coyote movie that actually had *positive* test screenings (and is hopefully now being sold to another distributor instead after outcry).
Thanks for the amazing video ❤
Excellent overview. Thank you for the info on the story. You have a terrific channel, love the content. 👍
Much appreciated! Thank you!
Love this channel! I was always wondering what happened and how the story was (with a ton of “credible” Reddit plots out there). Sounds like DC made the right decision as even Batman’s suit looks cheap.
Thnx!
So far the closest thing we have to a live action batgirl is the Arkham version , and I really wanted to see this film .
Hopefully Gunn s universe will succeed and give us a great version of batgirl.
Great work once again! Keep on keepin' on, brother. I look forward to your content!
Thanks! Will do!
I use to live in Glasgow, where this was being filmed. Over the last few years, theres been a bunch of films being made there for some reason.
Before I say this, I should point out that I don’t work in the industry, so can’t speak with any form of knowledge or expertise. But the sets for Batgirl were REALLY bad.
They looked cheap AF to the point where I (and others) were laughing. The sets took up the majority of the Merchant City area, so they had to open it all up when they weren’t shooting. This meant that everyone could see it all up close.
It definitely had CW vibes about it
Wow! Great video man! Love the detail that goes into your videos. Do you think you can do a video in the future about zack snyders JL2 and 3?
Thank you and definitely!
This was so well put together thank you for sharing. I would have really liked to have seen the movie.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Awesome! Thanks for covering this! Idk if many people would be interested, but maybe you can look into what a Van Helsing sequel would've looked like?
I'll check it out!
Poor Brendon looks like the Penguin sitting in that chair.
Why isn't this channel bigger. It has Top-tier content
Thanks! We’re new but growing quickly!
Great video dude 😊 If your reconstruction of the story is accurate, then could be a perfectly nice addition to the (soon to be deceased) DCEU.
Thanks!
I wanna see Brandon’s firefly in the Matt Reeves universe
We didn't miss anything 😂
It's a shame this will never come out it sounded like it would be a fun movie
Could you please look into what could’ve been: the lost clone wars arcs planned before the show was cancelled?
This movie was a victim of a regime change at HBO, much like the beloved Westworld, and the lesser known Raises By Wolves. I was disappoint, but not shocked. Sadly, those projects were more valuable as net loses, than functioning works. It's one of the parts of Show Business, or business in general actually, which most people don't think about or are ignorant towards. Either way, the studios can bank on losing completed works, because we are so media saturated, that most people wouldn't notice or end up forgetting. It just sucks so much talent, time and money was wasted in an industry brimming with wasted money, time & talent. That being said, everyone who worked on it got paid, as if it were released. So there's always that...
Thanks for sharing, but I still want to see Batgirl,🤩🤩🤩🍿🎥
Great video. Personally bummed we couldn't see the movie, the summary sounds great
LETS GOOOOOOOOOO HAPPY THANKSGIVING BOSSMAN
You too!
Been waiting for this one
"Firefly kills him with fire" 6:55 Beautiful, absolutely beautiful xD
Nice video - if Gunn's planning on incorporating the Batgirl character into his new DCU, it's still possible that she could attract enough interest for them to release this in some form, even as part of some package -
Dude the fact that we missed out on a live action Killer Moth alone is heartbreaking
Your best video yet!
Wow, thanks!
The plot actually sounds pretty damn good imo…. Idk if I fully believe that it was really that bad. I mean there’s no way it could have been any worse than the theatrical version on Justice League or Suicide Squad
This is why it’s important to have a clear view of what they want before making films.
I used to work in a post production house and at the time the Batgirl team were downstaira from us.. they cleared their offices out the same week news broke about it getting canned lol, so so crazy
great video. Thanks!
I remembering reading a Reddit leak around the same time the film got cancelled and it so different from this plot; Although, this does read more legit. Fucking Killer Moth?!? I would say the final Firefly fight doesn't seem as grand but that's what reshoots are for...
Imagine being the one at WB to realize this film would've been released while Brendan Fraser was on an Awards spree for The Whale.
I have a funny feeling this will get released on streaming in a few years, just as the Snyder cut did. They might just be cash strapped right now and don't want to drop another $10 mil fixing this right now.
Love ur content!!!!!
Nice video!
I wish to see this Batgirl movie.
Yeah honestly that sounds pretty bad as it has nothing really meaty to sink your teeth into.
They set up a group of big baddies who are going good and the worst they do is like kill their crazy murders, which could be seen as pretty good and results in them literally resolving the plot on their own.
Batgirl does essentially nothing this movie and while she does begin her love for crime fighting, that is essentially nothing and usually takes most superhero movies like 20 minutes to get to. She feels like she’s being dragged around to learn about what everyone else is doing rather than pushing to an objective.
There are also so many loose tangents such as the friends that exist to only make Barbra seem normal rather than add to any development or plot.
The sad thing is that this did have some real passion behind a lot of aspects and silencing that because someone can’t stop making poor financial decisions is really sad.
this channel is so bloody brilliant
I'd love to see a video on joss Whedon's Wonder Woman
It's difficult to take anything they say seriously since to a person they all said 'The Flash' was one of the best comic book movies ever and it was absolute garbage. For a movie that cost more than twice what 'Batgirl' did it sure as hell looked cheap. You can't tell me that 'Batgirl' had a small scale ending when 'The Flash' finale takes place in a small section of desert with nothing else around. Batgirl was supposed to be a more small scale story. Flash was supposed to be a multiverse story yet it never felt like it had those kind of stakes.
Where did you get the plot breakdown?
A few places but I link it in the description to one source
@@Bulletsandblockbusters nice I’d just never heard that much detail before. It’s not a film I’m bothered to see but it’s a shame for those that wanted too. I don’t know why they don’t just finish it and release it on home video.
This movie sounds like it would have been really good. We need more down to earth superhero movies.
Also, if they spent all this money on the movie - why not at least give the fans what they would like / and release it on a streaming service / like MAX ?
that half baked cake line is sick lmaooo
I would watch it, just to see Michael Keaton one more time as Batman.
Watching all this footage / it’s so sad that we will never get to see it happen
I figured Fraser would be playing his doom patrol character so I really wanted to see him as firefly
This movie sounds pretty good to me , it can’t be that bad. This sounds way better than Shazam 2 and Aquaman 2 put together so why does this movie go and others like the ones I mentioned get to stay
"Crusade" from Paul Verhoeven.
"Houdini" from Robert Zemeckis.
It’s crazy to me that we were closer to getting a batgirl movie than a Ben Affleck batman movie
It still shocks me to no end that WArners Bros was apparently fine with releasing the garbage fires that were Suicide Squad (2016) and Joss Whedon's Justice League, but thought Batgirl was "unreleaseable." Fuck that noise, Zaslav did it for the tax write-off.
Zaslav wasn't even in charge of WB when suicide squad and Joostice League were released. Zaslav took charge of WB recently in 2022.
From that plot description, I think it could've been good after some reshoots and whatnot but it's all in the past now I guess
I liked her depiction in the animated 'Killing Joke' movie, where Batman is warning her about talking to villians as eventually he knows she'll come across her version of the Joker, a villian who thinks they have some kind of duality or 'relationship', and wants it to be personal. It was inventive, as it echoed Batmans early mistakes.
I'm still in the camp of, it included Keaton's Batman and since we know the final ending of Flash, this whole thing is up in smoke, but like most of these, i'd still wanna see it as test screenings to me mean very little. I'd long waited for a Batgirl film and i find her story into Oracle empowering and excellent in the books, maybe next time. This whole DC lack of structure or planning needs to stop.
"Dino" from Martin Scorsese.
So until someone else is cast.all we have is Yvonne Craig as Bathirl
Honestly I don’t care what those high ups in WB and directors are saying I would have loved to see this movie, test screening only showed small pieces of the movie. Now how are people supposed to really judge the movie if they don’t see everything. So yeah I really hope that they release this someday in the future because this is really a movie I would enjoy specially with all the well know people that appear in it
I would like to see a video on Mrs Doubtfire 2
Like I know why it was canceled (RIP😢) and I know why we would never Get it but what was going to happen in it is there a strip has anyone read it?
any plot synopsis?