They could include both original and familar villains. One of the highlights of this new series is seeing how the old villains are re-imagined, or trying to figure out how they'll be done if they haven't shown up yet. I wouldn't want to see these movies do away with that.
One thing that occurs to me is that Nolan tends to cast his villains quite young. I don't think anyone would have anticipated 20-something actors like Cillian Murphy or Heath Ledger - each of them younger than Bale - as Scarecrow or Joker. Even Liam Neeson was relatively young for the role of Ras, while Aaron Eckhart was younger than Tommy Lee Jones or Billy Dee Williams (though Harvey in the comics is usually a near contemporary of Bruce age-wise). When Empire recently discussed casting prospects for the next Batmovie, they suggested Casey Affleck for The Riddler. Given the acclaim he received for ... Jesse James (an Oscar nod for the latter, IIRC) and Gone, Baby Gone, he might be in with a chance.
I would argue that nothing terribly radical has been done with most of the villains. Joker was simply translated straight from Killing Joke and Arkham Asylum - if anything it was enjoyable to finally see him come to screen as he is in the best comic stories. Scarecrow was barely even in Begins, and there were more tantalizing hints to his character in that movie than any real development or new interpretations. The closest thing to real change was in merging Ra's and Ducard, and taking away the supernatural elements of the character, which, granted, was a vast improvement. I honestly couldn't care less about seeing further familiar villains show up as I don't think that including them in any way automatically improves the quality of the stories. If anything it threatens them as the creative team has to try to shoehorn them in, instead of having the freedom to go where the story leads. Keep in mind some of the best characters in Batman's world were first invented in other media - Barbara Gordon, Renee Montoya, and Harley Quinn all came from the various television series. Wouldn't it be fitting for Nolan and Co. to be able to contribute someone permanent to the Batman canon before they're done?
Hey, who knows, maybe The Chechen will be a villain utilized later on in the comics or television shows! You can't beat that accent. I'd like to see a less colorful villain used next time. We had The Joker and Two-Face...what about Hugo Strange? He doesn't even wear a costume, a part from the faux Batman one he dons after he assumes Batman's identity. It would be interesting to see the Nolan's create a new villain/character entirely to foil Batman, but I'd much rather see their take on an established character first. We'll be lucky if Nolan will do the next film, and if he does, likely that will be it. He won't have the energy to do more. Quite frankly, there's so much potential in existing Batman characters that I'm more interested in seeing them adapted, in Nolan's vision, for the first time. I also wouldn't be adverse to Nolan's interpretations of The Riddler, Catwoman and The Penguin. I think Deadshot under Nolan would be very interesting.
Oy, talk about a weird choice to have vital story exposition established by someone the audience can barely understand... First? Haven't we seen their take on several established characters already?
What I meant to say is that I'd rather see them adapt an established character BEFORE they make an original one. There are just some characters in Batman's lexicon that I would absolutely love to see adapted by Nolan (Strange, Deadshot, Black Mask, and to lesser extents Riddler, Catwoman, Penguin).
I would like to see John Malkovich play a cool, hating, hurting, calculating Mr. Freeze. Make it so, WB!
I still want to see them. I want to see the entire world of Batman, or at least as much of it as possible, not just its central character. Now would they have to be shoehorned in? I don't think so. If Nolan and his team are thinking about the whole mythos and not just the direction of Batman himself, then including some familiar villains shouldn't be a problem. A good story or at least some side story that flows naturally should come together if these villains are seen as a part of Batman instead of extras that have to be forced in. It's not something I feel strongly enough about to push for, but I wouldn't mind seeing that happen.
So just because Mr. Freeze was used in the 60's series and Batman & Robin, the latest crew in charge shouldn't use him? Not that they'd use him, but how silly is that?
One of the things I love most about the Nolanverse is how Gotham City is a richly populated city full of different characters and villains. There is no one central villain, there is a population of them. I think having the Scarecrow re-appear for a cameo in The Dark Knight was important and integral to the plot because it showed the vastness of the world that Batman inhabits; just because a character/villain appears, and disappears, does not mean that is the end of him or her. Both Batman Begins and The Dark Knight succeed at dealing with multiple villains. You have Ra's al Ghul, the Scarecrow and Carmine Falcone, and then The Joker, Two-Face and Sal Maroni (who represented the mob element, which I liked, verses just Falcone as the mob head and that's it, we had Maroni, the Chechen, Gambol...). All of these characters flow effortlessly and seamlessly into the plot of each film and serve a purpose, not only plot-wise but thematically as well. Ra's al Ghul was central to Bruce's story, the Scarecrow was central to the theme of fear, and Joker & Two-Face both encapsulated that film's themes of the thin line between anarchy and order and the triumph of evil over good.
I get what you're saying. Batman's Rogue's Gallery has always been among the best because they are interestnig characters in their own right. The thing is, a movie trilogy is structured differently than a monthly series of stories. It's great to explore various villains when you have to pump out two stories every month (Batman and Detective Comics), but when you're telling what is essentially a single story, things have to be more focused. Most of the suggestions that have been floated around here seem to be thinking of the movies as if they were episodes when they are really acts in a single story - and that story is about Bruce Wayne, not about the larger world of the entire mythos because there just isn't time to go exploring the depths of other characters, which is why these movies have (wisely) been short of origin stories for the villains. So what does the Riddler do for where Batman was left at the end of TDK? What does Catwoman do for it? I'm not saying these characters absolutely wouldn't work, but I would hate to think that they are beginning the story process with - okay we're going to use the Riddler, instead of - what happens now that Batman is hunted and Gotham is traumatized? A lot of fans seem to really want them to start with the villains and work from there, and I just don't get that. And I really think this is a creative team that could add something lasting to the mythos, which rather needs an infusion of creativity right now since all DC can think to do is recycle the Silver Age. Plus, one of the bad things that happens to superhero stories in the movies is feeling the need to be bound to the established material and thus being left with only second string villians in the later installments.
^ I don't think that fans really want to start with the villain and work from there. It's just that sometimes it's easy to either fall into that trap or look like you have when you're discussing possible villains. I'm guilty of both myself. As for treating these movies like a TV series, I'm guilty of that too, mainly due to wishful thinking. I do wish that Nolan's Batman was a TV show. Imagine everything we'd get to see if it were. Since it's not though, we're left with a set of movies that serve as an introduction as you pointed out. Is there room to include several of the big villains as well as an original bad guy in 3, 4 or maybe 5 movies? I think so. We already got the perfect set-up. We have a lot of bad people who were let out of Arkham in the first movie and this has to be dealt with further. We also have a few colorful characters who are either trying to imitate Batman or trying to become troublemakers with their own signature styles like the Joker. That's another good set-up right there and both work naturally with what we've seen so far. All they have to do is figure out how Batman will deal with all that while he's being hunted. Also, as mentioned many times in the past, the old villains we know don't necessarily have to be front and center. They can get the same treatment that The Scarecrow got and serve as sidestories or even simple nods. That would solve the "crammed in" feel. I wouldn't mind seeing a brief 5 minute scene involving some nut job with a home-made nitrogen blaster that Batman takes down pretty quickly. So there you have it. I think it is possible to give us the old baddies along with some new ones all without ignoring the introduction story or looking like things were forced in. In fact, they've already been doing it, all they have to do in continue on.
Villains don't have to be exactly as they were originally intended. Take Freeze for example. They could just take his theme or Revenge and wanting to save his wife, he doesn't have to turn blue and start using a Freeze gun. He could just be working in cryogenics and be involved with the wrong people in desperation to help his wife.
I also have envisioned Firefly as being an easy villain to do. He could be a simple hired thug by a mobster trying to run an insurance scam. Some nutjob in a fireproof suit with a napalm pack.
I don't think that Mr. Freeze would have to be changed to that degree. Nolan has been very good at giving us a world that looks fairly grounded while keeping the characters true to the source material. Look at how he managed to give us Two-Face with the half-and-half-suit and a face that looked exactly the way it does in the comics, and none of it looked out of place. It wouldn't surprise me if there was a way to do Mr. Freeze along the same lines, cryo suit, freeze gun and all.
I could see the Riddler as sort of a more extreme version of the Zodiac killer. Batman's detective skills in bringing him down might be what gets him back somewhat on Gotham's good side. Sometimes, I feel like Ra's al-Ghul just has to come back. I feel like there's a 2nd chapter to his relationship with Batman that we haven't seen yet. (And I'd like to see more Scarecrow just because Cillian Murphy is cool. 8) )
Hey, Borgified Corpse, I am with ya. I would absolutely love to see a return of Liam Neeson's Ra's al Ghul but I just doubt it will happen. I think Bruce saving him is one thing, but legitimately returning from the dead is another. It just doesn't seem to fit with Nolan's realistic world that he has established, but if he could pull it off, then awesome. I also think that we've seen the last of Cillian Murphy's Scarecrow, even though I would not object to more of him!