Batman: The Long Halloween Part 2 is now available digitally and on Blu-ray, concluding DC’s animated adaptation of the cult Batman Story. The films were written by Tim Sheridan and directed by Chris Palmer.
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“Inspired by the iconic DC story from the mid-1990s by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale, Batman: The Long Halloween Part 2 continues while the Holiday Killer is still at large and with Bruce Wayne under the spell of the poisonous Poison Ivy, Batman is nowhere to be found, ”the official summary reads. “Freed from an unlikely ally, Bruce quickly finds the real culprit: Carmine Falcone, Poison Ivy’s employer. The Roman, whose ranks were decimated by Holiday and his business spiraled out of control, was forced to attract less desirable partners – Gotham City’s villain gallery … Ultimately, the Dark Knight has to piece together the tragic pieces that were brought together to create Two-Face, the Holiday Killer, Batman and Gotham City itself. “
ComingSoon editor-in-chief Tyler Treese spoke to Troy Baker, who speaks to The Joker about what the role meant to him, his past as an anime voice, and what the future holds for his career.
Tyler Treese: The Long Halloween is such an iconic Batman story. As a Batman fan, how excited were you to be part of this movie and play such an important role?
Troy Baker: Man, I just said that to a colleague. I sit here and look and I got the stacked deck right here Murder joke, I look at all of my different graphic novels that I have. Batman, in particular, is a very unique character to me. And this is by no means a disparagement of any other superhero, either in the field of cinema, in the field of graphic novel or in the field of video games. But Batman is something to me that I can still learn about him after almost a century. When someone says, “We’re going to do an origin story,” we say yes, yes, yes, Crime Alley. You can never get tired of hearing this story, but in Long Halloween it really is, as we have learned, the first year. Let’s find out what happens when Bruce decides to become Batman. not when he’s supposed to be Batman, but when he’s going to be Batman. And what i love Long Halloween bring it up this story and say he’s Batman now, then what?
You think you have it under control. And one of my favorite lines here was honestly not mine. And it was one that I really struggled with at first. And it’s a real honor for Jensen and his performance because he made me wrestle with it. And then he made me realize that it was true. And it’s not a spoiler for anyone who hasn’t seen what you should absolutely do. But when he says, “I never knew I had to be a detective.” And I was like, “Wait a minute!” As if I literally hit pause and said, “Wait a second. It’s Batman, the greatest detective in the world. As if he were Sherlock Holmes in black. That’s the way he’s supposed to be. “And I realized in that that he had to be. And that makes it even more of a compelling story for me.
So to be able to observe the development, not the origin, but the development of this character and how that is then distributed to all the other characters he meets here. And we cover a lot of ground. That’s one of the reasons we had to do two parts. It’s because there is so much story to tell, because there is so much character packed into that story. You have Harvey Dent, you have Calendar Man. You understand how the Joker contributes to this. And the Joker fits into this story in a very special way, because usually it’s always the ticking time bomb that goes down on the Joker, isn’t it? And that way he’s on the sidelines, parallel to Batman, and says, “Isn’t that strange? Is not that funny? It’s different. “For me this is a really, really fun position to play from.
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Joker is such a versatile character too. You have played many incarnations of him. How would you compare this Joker to the one you played in Arkham Origins or Batman Unlimited?
Hopefully, if I’m doing my job right, every iteration – which is a great word – of this character should feel in some ways new, fresh, original, insightful, unique, but never feel like they’re not the same character, right ? Like even looking at Geoff Johns in Earth One.
So they went: “Let’s completely turn the script on canonical characters and truths. How far can we bend this before it breaks? ”And I have a feeling if we don’t do this to each of them, what’s the point of adjusting it? Like Long Halloween is a graphic novel and doesn’t need our help to become a great story. It doesn’t take our help to paint a beautiful, artistic representation of these characters in the story. So we naturally have to do something different. So I think that if you are adapting something from one medium to another, it should go through an iterative process, but should still lead you back to the source material. I think we all did a really, really good job like Titus Welliver, when you hear him it’s like, “Of course he’s going to play Falcone. Of course you get that. ”But then you look at Billy Burke and say,“ This is the last person I would think of playing Gordon. ” And he knocks it out of the park. Jensen Ackles is the same. I wouldn’t consider hiring Jensen Ackles as Batman. But the second time you hear it, especially where we find the character in this story, it makes perfect sense.
Jensen is fantastic in the role. What was it like playing the foil for him and working with him? He’s such a big name to pop up in Hollywood and you’re right with him here in this movie.
First of all, you are using the exact word I used before. The Joker always plays an antagonist of Batman. But for him playing foil is a flip. So if we talk about your earlier point, as far as there is another iteration, this is a perfect example of this. That’s what I love about Jensen: he has proven himself as an actor in the dressing room and it’s not that he can only do one thing. This is someone who is clearly versatile. You used this word for wild cards earlier. And I would apply the same word to Jensen; that he’s a versatile actor. Second, you get him out of the cubicle and he’s just a guy. And it’s a great hangar. Like he’s just a guy.
It’s so obvious that he has an affinity with this character. And that he was approaching his character, not as a job, but as an opportunity. And he really has every experience that he has, his talent and passion, which he also has, thrown into this role. Jack Quaid was the same. Jack freaked out that he was into something like that. Anyone who approached this above, below, from left to right, did so as a passion project.
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Seeing your career was so amazing because I heard you do a lot of anime. You voiced gin on the Case Closed dub and Detective Conan is my favorite series. I would love to hear if you have any memories about it.
Oh man. Necessarily. So Chris Sabat brings me in and says, “Hey man, I’m going to let you play the main villain on this new show. Detective Conan. That guy gets shrunk to a kid and you’re the type to do it. ”I thought,“ Oh, that’s great. I get to play the main villain. “Right here you see my ancestor of me as an actor who says,” I love playing bad guys. As maybe at some point, this will suggest that I am playing the wild card. Who knows, right? ”Because that’s always been a goal of mine, and he says I have three lines in this episode. I say,“ Sweet dreams, Detective, ”and you’ll never see me again. So this thing has a number Made for me. I thought, “Wait a minute. It’s not supposed to work that way.” And then I remembered Dr. Claw. I say, “Oh, of course. The villain gets the least amount of screen time ever. “
So you always want to be the good guy, but what I still enjoy most is playing the bad guys. And again we are all heroes of our own story and I firmly believe that Joker has the feeling that he himself is really trying to help in this story. Of course, he loves chaos, but only because he believes that this is the way to freedom. It’s not that he’s twirling his mustache and being purposely nasty. He wants to help Batman understand early on by saying, “You don’t know how this is going to work. You can already see the chaos. Let me help you.”
You’re such a talented actor, but in Middle-earth: Shadow of War you were also the director of the performance capture. Is it something that appeals to you to work more behind the scenes?
Absolutely, I’m a storyteller at my core. It’s all I wanna do I believe we are genetically predisposed to be storytellers. That’s why we drew on cave walls and that’s why we created language. That’s why we created art. Because we’re trying to tell our story. Because of this, Bob Kane sat down and even created this character. He wanted to show a new version of a hero who is fragile and vulnerable and broken and how to rise from tragedy to triumph. For the same reason, we created the gods to tell the same stories. I am a storyteller. Whenever someone gives me the opportunity to tell a story, I want to see how best to tell that particular story. Is it me as an actor? Or maybe as a director, am I saying that I feel like I have a unique perspective and what I want to do is help other people tell their story? So yeah, directing is 100% something I have a thing for. I enjoy it. I have already had the opportunity to do so several times and am looking for further possibilities for the future.
It was so exciting for anime fans to watch you speak Baki, and another Baki anime is coming to Netflix soon. Are you involved in it?
Baki’s story, I understand, could go on. I can tell you It’s always great to find my roots again. Again, it all started as a 13-year-old rushing home every day to watch Batman: The Animated Series and falling in love with Kevin Conroy’s Batman and Mark Hamill’s Joker. And from there I said, “Maybe I can do that.” So whenever I go back to my roots, and anime is definitely my way of cutting my teeth in this business, whenever I get the chance to go back, it’s like slipping into that familiarity, like it’s Joker in this movie.
