Exclusive: Nightwing Animated Movie In The Works
Giant Freakin Robot has a new exclusive that the proposed Nightwing movie is now an animated feature that is in development
This article is more than 2 years old
Nightwing fans have been eagerly awaiting some kind of update for what a solo movie would like for the character. It has been a long time coming with the rumors out there for a while, even from the director himself, that a script is good to go and everyone is just waiting for it to be greenlit. Well, now Giant Freakin Robot has an exclusive scoop from a trusted and proven source, that the Nightwing movie is going to look a little different than anticipated. The new word is that it is going to be an animated film instead. This would mark a major change in the plan, though there is no reason the original script doesn’t play in this fashion as well.
This new exclusive word about a Nightwing animated movie in development didn’t have much else in the way of details. But there is some reason to suspect this is just an altered version of the planned Chris McKay live-action film fans have been jonesing for. McKay has long talked about the plans around a Nightwing movie, saying he had a script polished and was just waiting on higher-ups for the approval. Could we now see that pivot into an animated feature instead? It makes a lot of sense considering the character and the director as well.
Since 2017, Chris McKay has been trying to get a Nightwing movie made with the script apparently finished all the way back in 2018. But with the DC Extended Universe really ramping up production around a number of other projects on both the big and small screen, Nightwing was pushed back in favor of some of those other titles. It just didn’t lead the list of priorities for the studio and while not fully canceled or shuttered, clearly wasn’t at the top of anyone’s priority list (except McKay’s).
And while this new word of an animated Nightwing movie doesn’t put the Chris McKay version in that slot directly, the overlap would make a lot of sense. After all, McKay is probably best known for his animated work when first entering the industry. He got his start mostly on Robot Chicken and then went on to make the hilarious and wildly successful The Lego Batman Movie. Most recently, this summer in fact, he transitioned into the live-action space with The Tomorrow War, a big-budget affair that had Chris Pratt and others heading to the future to fight off a destructive alien force. McKay clearly has chops in both departments. Meaning this Nightwing film could take a number of different shapes.
Nightwing is, of course, the alter adopted by Dick Grayson after he moves out from under the wing of Bruce Waynes Batman. The character is a darker version of Robin, leaning much more vigilante and violent (at times) with a darker look to boot. In the HBO series Titans, we have seen Brenton Thwaites’ Dick Grayson make the full transition to the character. It wasn’t expected that this version of Nightwing would be who took over the live-action role at all. As far as this latest update on a Nightwing animated movie, we are sure to hear official word soon if this is the direction the studio wants to go.
