Updated

Updated · Variety · Jun 25

DC, Warner Bros. Unveil 3 Animated Series at Annecy, Including First-Ever Joker Anime

Updated

Updated · Variety · Jun 25

DC, Warner Bros. Unveil 3 Animated Series at Annecy, Including First-Ever Joker Anime

Q: With Batman as a working-class hero, is DC finally abandoning the billionaire vigilante trope?

No. DC is not abandoning the billionaire-vigilante model across Batman; it is expanding Batman with a high-profile alternate version. The newly announced *Absolute Batman* series adapts Scott Snyder and Nick Dragotta’s hit comic, which deliberately reimagines Bruce Wayne as a working-class hero fighting corruption. In the “Absolute Universe,” Bruce is not the traditional wealthy industrial heir. That is the point of the line: to strip away familiar advantages and test what Batman means without inherited power and money. But this is an alternate continuity, not a replacement for DC’s core Batman. The mainline character remains the classic billionaire Bruce Wayne, and DC’s broader slate still includes more traditional takes, including *Batman: Caped Crusader*. The Annecy announcement signals that DC sees value in multiple versions of Batman coexisting rather than one definitive overhaul. What has changed is emphasis. *Absolute Batman* has been a major commercial success, with more than six million copies sold since launch, and its popularity suggests strong audience appetite for a Batman framed less as a rich patron of justice and more as a product of the same social conditions he fights. That gives DC room to challenge the trope more openly. So the shift is real, but it is strategic rather than absolute: DC is not discarding billionaire Batman, it is using alternate universes to question him, modernize him, and broaden the character’s appeal.

3 articles · Updated · Variety · Jun 25

Three newly highlighted projects led DC Studios and Warner Bros. Animation’s first joint Annecy presentation: anime series “Joker: Laugh Riot,” adult animated “Absolute Batman,” and a greenlit “Krypto” show.
“Joker: Laugh Riot” marks DC Studios’ first anime series, produced with Sola Entertainment as Warner Bros. pushes deeper into a fast-growing global anime market.
“Absolute Batman” brings Scott Snyder’s hit comic to TV with Snyder as showrunner and executive producer; the book has sold more than 6 million copies and its first issue reached an 11th edition.
“Krypto,” developed by C.H. Greenblatt, broadens the slate beyond adult animation, while executives also updated Annecy audiences on “Batman: Caped Crusader,” “Mister Miracle,” “Get Jiro” and a 10th season of “Teen Titans Go.”