Baysian improbability

Here’s my satirical response to this news.

Michael Bay to reboot Batman

Fans of the Batman film trilogy by director Christopher Nolan may be relieved to know that Nolan’s upcoming finale ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ will not be the last Batman film they will ever see. Producer and director Michael Bay recently announced his plans to produce a new Batman film, tentatively set for a December 2013 release. Speaking at the Nickelodeon Upfront in New York, Bay promised Batman fans that his take on the Caped Crusader will live up to the high standards set by Nolan.

“Chris brought a gritty realism and darkness to the Batman story, and I intend to preserve that,” Bay said.

But then the ‘Transformers’ director dropped a bombshell: he would be changing the Dark Knight’s origins.

“In my film, Batman, that’s Bruce Wayne, is going to be an alien,” he said, “And he’s going to have really cool superpowers that aid him in his crime-fighting.”

"I'm an alien, I'm a legal alien..."

  

Bay will also apply his poetic license to Bruce Wayne’s life-defining moment: witnessing the murder of his parents by a mugger. In Bay’s reboot, the alien Wayne sees his home planet destroyed by an intergalactic criminal organisation of giant transforming robots, leaving him its sole survivor. Bay stated that his version of the Batman mythos “will lend more credibility to Batman’s psychopathic obsession with fighting crime.”

“It’s not just his parents that get killed, but his entire race. Now that kind of loss would be far more traumatic than just having your parents killed. Lots of people have had their parents killed by criminals. But they don’t go running around in batsuits beating up bad guys, do they?”

And Bay’s reason for giving Batman superpowers?

“Because I fucking can.”

Needless to say, fans are not happy with Bay for changing the origins and very nature of DC Comics’ most commercially successful character. The public outcry has prompted Bay to issue this response on his official website:

“Fans need to take a breath, and chill. They have not read the script. Our team is working closely with one of the original creators of Batman to help expand and give a more complex back story. Relax, we are including everything that made you become fans in the first place. We are just building a richer world.”

Considering that both Batman creators Bob Kane and Bill Finger are deceased, Bay may have recruited John Edward to join the production team.

Bay also mentioned plans to make a live-action Care Bears movie, based on the plush toys and animated TV series popular during the 1980s. “It’s still in the conceptual stage, so not a lot is certain just yet,” he said, “but one thing’s for sure – these Care Bears are going to be aliens.”

21.3.12