Creating a New Batman Volume II: Developing a New Villain

Villains are what make the hero, and Batman sure has a plethora of them. That being said, Batman hasn’t had a groundbreaking villain since Hush (fifteen years ago). I feel that Batman has been missing new, challenging threats, while the same, popular villains are continually being rehashed. The last twenty-five years have been “The Joker Show”, thanks to the comics, movies, TV shows, and video games. While Arkham is one of my favorite game series, it’s about the battle between Joker and Batman. He is the main villain in the first two (which was great), but even after death he finds a way to be the main villain in subsequent games (which became stale)! As a fan of Batman, and as the director of Batman: Master of Fear, I wanted to delve into Batman with an all-new direction; enter Nightmare.
As with the universe of BMOF, Nightmare’s character inspiration (the mask, the persona, and the martial arts abilities) is Japanese culture. Scarecrow is also a core influence, in that Nightmare uses fear as his weapon. A former student of the late Scarecrow, Nightmare is the evolution of fear and Scarecrow’s contingency plan to destroy Batman once and for all. I would talk more about his origin story and where he came from, but that will remain a mystery for now. But, I can talk about the design.
At first, Nightmare was very similar to H.P. Lovecraft characters (or any other Gothic Horror iconic figure you could think of). He wore an animated mask that looks like what people would see when hit with the fear toxin, but then we decided the concept would translate better in animation than live-action (and was too ambitious for our budget, anyway). We then took a route that was reminiscent of The Animated Series, which resulted in a knockoff of The Joker.
After six months of trying to get down the look of Nightmare, we finally figured it out. I always liked the design of the character Hannya from Ruroni Kenshin. Drawing from that design, along with that of Lock from Nightmare Before Christmas, Nightmare’s current form was born.
With both the mask and the power behind the actor (Raw Leiba) playing Nightmare, the character poses the most foreboding threat to the Caped Crusader yet.
I’ve been obsessed with the Animated Series all of my life, and one of my several inspirations from this show was seeing all of those villains with a dress-suit that accentuates their theme. I figured that it only makes sense to dress Nightmare in a suit to complement his mask (his most defining detail). To juxtapose his appearance, Nightmare is written and portrayed as calm and collected, calculating every movement for the perfect time to strike.
We wanted Nightmare driven by fear, not because he is afraid, but because he does everything to cause it. At first, when we created the character, Nightmare was once an ally of Batman who then came to be when he was hit by Scarecrow’s toxin. Instead, the character transformed into an independent force of nature who took orders from nobody, and pledged allegiance to no one, regardless of any familiar, formidable villains he encountered.
Check back on Friday to learn about another new character we created specifically for the show—Professor Raven (to be portrayed by Tess Kielhamer).