All the way back in 2020, it was announced that Matt Reeves was working on a spinoff for the then-yet-to-be-released The Batman for HBO Max. At the time, the show was meant to focus on the Gotham City Police Department. That concept eventually appeared to evolve into an Arkham Asylum series (though Variety later explained the GCPD and Arkham shows were separate projects). Then, once James Gunn and Peter Safran became CEOs of DC Studios, the project was reworked to fit into the continuity of the then-nascent DCU.
However, in July of 2024, it was revealed the show had been canceled. At the time of the announcement, Variety reported it was possible for a new project set in Arkham Asylum to come up down the line. Now, though, James Gunn has addressed the project, confirming it's dead. Speaking to the BobaTalks YouTube channel, Gunn was asked if there were any hopes for the Arkham series to materialize. The Superman director replied:
"Hope? Sure. But that isn't something that's being developed by anyone right now. You know? Just didn't work."
The DC Studios co-CEO had previously discussed the project in late 2023. Upon being asked on Threads whether or not Matt Reeves would be working on other DCU-set projects aside from the Arkham series, Gunn stated: "Right now Matt is producing 'Arkham' as a DCU series, so there's just the two for now."
Another user then asked the director if the Arkham project had always been planned as a DCU entry, to which Gunn replied: "Yes. It was one of the first pitches we bought when Peter and I came onboard. I don't know the permutations it went through before that time."
Canceling the show was a surprise, given its high-profile nature, having Matt Reeves as a producer, and even finding a showrunner in Antonio Campos, writer and director of HBO Max's The Staircase, which starred Colin Firth and Toni Collette. In 2022, during an interview with The Cyber Nerds, Matt Reeves was asked about the aforementioned GCPD show, and he explained the project had shifted to become the Arkham series:
"Yeah, you know, the 'GCPD' thing, that story's kind of evolved. We've actually now [moved] more into the realm of exactly what would happen in the world of Arkham as it relates coming off of our movie, and some of the characters and their origins [...] Almost leaning into the idea of… it's like a horror movie, or like a haunted house that is Arkham. The idea, again, the way that Gotham is a character in the movie, I really want Arkham to exist as a character, so that you'd go into this environment and encounter these characters in a way that feels really fresh. And so, in our work on Gotham, that story started to evolve, and it started feeling [like], 'Wait, we should really lean into this,' and that's kinda where that's gone."
On one hand, it's exciting to think about what could have been for the Arkham series. After all, a project entirely set in a DC location as pivotal as Arkham Asylum could have allowed DC Studios to introduce a lot of different characters from the Batman mythos, as well as the larger DC Universe. On the other, canceling the series may have also been for the better, since that type of project has a better opportunity to succeed when its universe is well established. While audiences are familiar with various Batman villains, it would have been somewhat difficult to suddenly introduce new versions of those same characters for a completely different universe without prior context of who they are.
What do you think about the ultimate fate of the Arkham Asylum series? Were you excited about it? Let me know in the comments!