Who would have been Alfred Beyond in Batman Beyond?

[coldglynx]

Been thinking a lot of Batman Beyond revival lately. Keep hoping it happens on HBO Max someday.

I keep imagining how the show would have continued. Mostly I’ve been mulling over the possibility of Terry having his own Bat Family. The show itself kind built one spontaneously with Max, Matt, etc. Even though the creators always seem to want Terry to be a lone wolf guy like Bruce. That never made sense since Terry was inexperienced and needed all the help he can get. He had Bruce but the show was building to his eventual death and Terry completely taking over as Batman. The comics kind of went that route by making Matt Robin in the comics.

What has intrigue me more is who could have been Terrys Alfred. It was joked about it being Maxx on the show. But she was more Oracle than Alfred. Then it hit me. The show had already made an Alfred candidate for Terry and they didn’t even realize it.

Thats right Zeta would have been a perfect Alfred Beyond. It would have been a perfect way for the character to come full circle. Ending up fighting along side Batman.

 

[b.t.]

Been thinking a lot of Batman Beyond revival lately. Keep hoping it happens on HBO Max someday.

I keep imagining how the show would have continued. Mostly I’ve been mulling over the possibility of Terry having his own Bat Family. The show itself kind built one spontaneously with Max, Matt, etc. Even though the creators always seem to want Terry to be a lone wolf guy like Bruce. That never made sense since Terry was inexperienced and needed all the help he can get. He had Bruce but the show was building to his eventual death and Terry completely taking over as Batman. The comics kind of went that route by making Matt Robin in the comics.

What has intrigue me more is who could have been Terrys Alfred. It was joked about it being Maxx on the show. But she was more Oracle than Alfred. Then it hit me. The show had already made an Alfred candidate for Terry and they didn’t even realize it.

View attachment 283286
Thats right Zeta would have been a perfect Alfred Beyond. It would have been a perfect way for the character to come full circle. Ending up fighting along side Batman.

Well — at one point early in the development process, we did briefly toy with the idea of of giving Old Bruce a robot or ‘Alexa’-like cyber-assistant/ companion. And then someone got the bright idea that it would be a digitized mega-file of Alfred’s own memories and thought patterns, would actually speak with his voice, etc. And then someone said, ‘Yeah, we can call him Alpha Red!‘ We all laughed for like a full minute and then agreed , ‘TERRIBLE IDEA, we are NOT doing that’. Rightly so — we all instantly recognised that it would be much more poignant and effective to keep Bruce alone in that big old house with just his faithful dog to keep him company. (And of course, in the JLU episode ‘Epilogue’ we reveal that Bruce himself has become a cranky but doting ‘Alfred’ in his declining years, which I still think is an absolutely LOVELY Final Chapter for Bruce Wayne’s story.)

Few years later, when Glen Murakami, Adam Warren and I were developing our intentionally cheesy ‘BATMANIME’ project, Glen and I realized that that series would be EXACTLY the right fit for such a crazytown concept. Alas...

Is it public knowledge that Peter Girardi and I were planning to do a third ‘Batman 75th‘ short, and that it was actually going to be set in the ‘BATMANIME’ world? It was originally supposed to be a trilogy — my retro b/w short (the past), then Darwyn’s BATMAN BEYOND short (near future) and then BATMANIME (far, FAR future). But we ran out of time and bandwidth. Alas...

Didn’t they end up doing Digitized Alfred in BATMAN AND ROBIN? I’ve never actually seen it all the way through.

Hang on — and didn’t James Tucker put Alpha Red in one of his BATMAN B AND B episodes, or did I just dream that?

 

[RoyalRubble]

Alpha-Red was in the Batman of Zur-En-Arrh episode from The Brave & the Bold.

 

[Otaku-sempai]

Well — at one point early in the development process, we did briefly toy with the idea of of giving Old Bruce a robot or ‘Alexa’-like cyber-assistant/ companion. And then someone got the bright idea that it would be a digitized mega-file of Alfred’s own memories and thought patterns, would actually speak with his voice, etc. And then someone said, ‘Yeah, we can call him Alpha Red!‘ We all laughed for like a full minute and then agreed , ‘TERRIBLE IDEA, we are NOT doing that’. Rightly so — we all instantly recognised that it would be much more poignant and effective to keep Bruce alone in that big old house with just his faithful dog to keep him company. (And of course, in the JLU episode ‘Epilogue’ we reveal that Bruce himself has become a cranky but doting ‘Alfred’ in his declining years, which I still think is an absolutely LOVELY Final Chapter for Bruce Wayne’s story.)

Few years later, when Glen Murakami, Adam Warren and I were developing our intentionally cheesy ‘BATMANIME’ project, Glen and I realized that that series would be EXACTLY the right fit for such a crazytown concept. Alas...

Is it public knowledge that Peter Girardi and I were planning to do a third ‘Batman 75th‘ short, and that it was actually going to be set in the ‘BATMANIME’ world? It was originally supposed to be a trilogy — my retro b/w short (the past), then Darwyn’s BATMAN BEYOND short (near future) and then BATMANIME (far, FAR future). But we ran out of time and bandwidth. Alas...

Didn’t they end up doing Digitized Alfred in BATMAN AND ROBIN? I’ve never actually seen it all the way through.

Hang on — and didn’t James Tucker put Alpha Red in one of his BATMAN B AND B episodes, or did I just dream that?

It's always a pleasure to hear from you Bruce. Thanx for the insights!

 

[Yojimbo]

Well — at one point early in the development process, we did briefly toy with the idea of of giving Old Bruce a robot or ‘Alexa’-like cyber-assistant/ companion. And then someone got the bright idea that it would be a digitized mega-file of Alfred’s own memories and thought patterns, would actually speak with his voice, etc. And then someone said, ‘Yeah, we can call him Alpha Red!‘ We all laughed for like a full minute and then agreed , ‘TERRIBLE IDEA, we are NOT doing that’. Rightly so — we all instantly recognised that it would be much more poignant and effective to keep Bruce alone in that big old house with just his faithful dog to keep him company. (And of course, in the JLU episode ‘Epilogue’ we reveal that Bruce himself has become a cranky but doting ‘Alfred’ in his declining years, which I still think is an absolutely LOVELY Final Chapter for Bruce Wayne’s story.)

Few years later, when Glen Murakami, Adam Warren and I were developing our intentionally cheesy ‘BATMANIME’ project, Glen and I realized that that series would be EXACTLY the right fit for such a crazytown concept. Alas...

Is it public knowledge that Peter Girardi and I were planning to do a third ‘Batman 75th‘ short, and that it was actually going to be set in the ‘BATMANIME’ world? It was originally supposed to be a trilogy — my retro b/w short (the past), then Darwyn’s BATMAN BEYOND short (near future) and then BATMANIME (far, FAR future). But we ran out of time and bandwidth. Alas...

Didn’t they end up doing Digitized Alfred in BATMAN AND ROBIN? I’ve never actually seen it all the way through.

Hang on — and didn’t James Tucker put Alpha Red in one of his BATMAN B AND B episodes, or did I just dream that?

No, we had no clue about the planned third Batman 75 short. But thanks for mentioning that and going into more detail about the Alpha Red idea.

 

[b.t.]

No, we had no clue about the planned third Batman 75 short. But thanks for mentioning that and going into more detail about the Alpha Red idea.

Did I ever publicly mention that Hugo Strange was going to be the recurring villain in all 3 shorts? Unfortunately, I don’t remember what Strange’s deal in the BATMAN BEYOND short was originally going to be. It was all pretty vague — it’s possible we didn’t have ANY firm idea what the main storyline was going to be before we brought Darwyn on board to write, storyboard and direct it.

For the BATMANIME short, the idea was that Strange had become some kind of Cyber-god, kinda like Thanos after he’d absorbed the Cosmic Cube in Jim Starlin’s early Captain Marvel run, and visualized as an enormous “solarized” face in the heavens like Rama Kushna in the JLU episode “Dead Reckoning”. Don’t think we ever got much further than that thumbnail idea.

But then I got swamped boarding and art-directing the b/w short, realized the BATMANIME was going to a bear to do without a full-time dedicated crew, and as Darwyn and I started hashing out the BBEYOND storyline, we felt that it would work just fine without forcing Hugo Strange into it, and at that point I talked Peter Girardi into just focusing our energies on the first two shirts and abandoning the third (it wasn’t hard). We’ve talked about doing the BATMANIME thing a few times since then, possibly as a Showcase short, but the stars never seem to align.

 

[AdrenalineRush1996]

View attachment 283286
Thats right Zeta would have been a perfect Alfred Beyond. It would have been a perfect way for the character to come full circle. Ending up fighting along side Batman.

Not sure I would've wanted Zeta ending up being an Alfred-type character.

 

[Yojimbo]

Not sure I would've wanted Zeta ending up being an Alfred-type character.

I think I would have been game for an Alfred-type like J.A.R.V.I.S. in the MCU movies but ultimately, it was the right move that Bruce ended up alone for several decades and eventually adopts Ace then meets Terry. The rule of thumb the crew seemed to have went by was to resist doing insert-BTAS-character and "Beyond" it and focus more on the new characters.

Did I ever publicly mention that Hugo Strange was going to be the recurring villain in all 3 shorts?

No, I only remember 2 interviews but they only got into your 1939 inspirations for Strange Days and going to Batman's roots in the early comics.

Unfortunately, I don’t remember what Strange’s deal in the BATMAN BEYOND short was originally going to be. It was all pretty vague — it’s possible we didn’t have ANY firm idea what the main storyline was going to be before we brought Darwyn on board to write, storyboard and direct it.

I guess he was responsible for making those Batmen robots and invading the Batcave but I always wondered if you and Darwyn worked out who the real antagonist was OR if it was left open ended on purpose.

That would have been pretty cool if it was revealed Strange cheated death by transferring his mind into one of those Batmen robots to continue his plans a la Arnim Zola and all those robot designs were explained in-universe as his psychosis and obsession with Batman rather than some knowledge of the multiverse and all the different versions of Batman out there.

For the BATMANIME short, the idea was that Strange had become some kind of Cyber-god, kinda like Thanos after he’d absorbed the Cosmic Cube in Jim Starlin’s early Captain Marvel run, and visualized as an enormous “solarized” face in the heavens like Rama Kushna in the JLU episode “Dead Reckoning”. Don’t think we ever got much further than that thumbnail idea.

Neat.

We’ve talked about doing the BATMANIME thing a few times since then, possibly as a Showcase short, but the stars never seem to align.

Someday. Before the Batman 100th anniversary, right?

 

[b.t.]

I only remember 2 interviews but they only got into your 1939 inspirations for Strange Days and going to Batman's roots in the early comics.

......

I guess he was responsible for making those Batmen robots and invading the Batcave but I always wondered if you and Darwyn worked out who the real antagonist was OR if it was left open ended on purpose.

‘Strange Days’ was meant to be an umbrella title for the entire trilogy (makes sense now, right?). I NEVER would have picked a 1969 Doors reference for such a retro-looking short, would have called it something that leaned more more ‘Pulp / Serial Chapter‘ like ‘Night of the Monster’ or somesuch. You’ll notice that it doesn’t actually HAVE an on-screen title. But somehow ‘Strange Days’ got attached to it as a working title and stuck. Shrug.

Y’know, now that you mention it, I think the original idea WAS that Strange’s voice was going to start coming out of the TNBA Robot’s mouth during the fight — ‘We meet again, old foe, bwahahahaha’, etc. He was still alive, just old and kinda decrepit like Bruce, controlling the robot from a remote location like J.J.J. and one of the Spider Slayers. But as I said, once we realized that there wasn’t going to be a third chapter where the character ascended to Digital Godhood, it felt weird and almost anti-climactic to have him in the second short.

So that stream-lined the story a lot, but left us without a punchy ending. Darwyn had been excited about the idea of Classic Batman fighting Terry Batman the minute we pitched it to him, so he and I started riffing off of that. I came up with the twist of all the Alternate Batmans showing up at the end (honestly, I nicked it from Warren Ellis and John Cassaday) and Darwyn instantly said ’Hell yeah, baby, we are TOTALLY doing that’. I accidentally plagiarized my own work by suggesting Terry and Bruce’s last exchange, but I said it out loud only as a placeholder, as words to that effect. Darwyn said ‘Why don’t we just use that?‘ and I said because it’s a direct quote from one of our JUSTICE LEAGUE episodes and he said ‘i don’t give a s***, it’s f****** badass coming from Old Bruce, we should just use it’ and so we did. He added that great touch of Bruce buckling on the robot‘s utility belt like an aged gunslinger strapping on his six-guns.

 

[Yojimbo]

‘Strange Days’ was meant to be an umbrella title for the entire trilogy (makes sense now, right?). I NEVER would have picked a 1969 Doors reference for such a retro-looking short, would have called it something that leaned more more ‘Pulp / Serial Chapter‘ like ‘Night of the Monster’ or somesuch. You’ll notice that it doesn’t actually HAVE an on-screen title. But somehow ‘Strange Days’ got attached to it as a working title and stuck. Shrug.

I figured someone was being cute with a Hugo Strange/Doors reference in the title. Odd how that became the title without your say so.

Y’know, now that you mention it, I think the original idea WAS that Strange’s voice was going to start coming out of the TNBA Robot’s mouth during the fight — ‘We meet again, old foe, bwahahahaha’, etc. He was still alive, just old and kinda decrepit like Bruce, controlling the robot from a remote location like J.J.J. and one of the Spider Slayers. But as I said, once we realized that there wasn’t going to be a third chapter where the character ascended to Digital Godhood, it felt weird and almost anti-climactic to have him in the second short.

Ohhh, but yeah, we probably would have been confused why Strange was in both shorts.

So that stream-lined the story a lot, but left us without a punchy ending. Darwyn had been excited about the idea of Classic Batman fighting Terry Batman the minute we pitched it to him, so he and I started riffing off of that. I came up with the twist of all the Alternate Batmans showing up at the end (honestly, I nicked it from Warren Ellis and John Cassaday) and Darwyn instantly said ’Hell yeah, baby, we are TOTALLY doing that’. I accidentally plagiarized my own work by suggesting Terry and Bruce’s last exchange, but I said it out loud only as a placeholder, as words to that effect. Darwyn said ‘Why don’t we just use that?‘ and I said because it’s a direct quote from one of our JUSTICE LEAGUE episodes and he said ‘i don’t give a s***, it’s f****** badass coming from Old Bruce, we should just use it’ and so we did. He added that great touch of Bruce buckling on the robot‘s utility belt like an aged gunslinger strapping on his six-guns.

Right! That Planetary one shot!

Ha ha, and here I thought the last exchange was just a clever callback.

 

[coldglynx]

Well — at one point early in the development process, we did briefly toy with the idea of of giving Old Bruce a robot or ‘Alexa’-like cyber-assistant/ companion. And then someone got the bright idea that it would be a digitized mega-file of Alfred’s own memories and thought patterns, would actually speak with his voice, etc. And then someone said, ‘Yeah, we can call him Alpha Red!‘ We all laughed for like a full minute and then agreed , ‘TERRIBLE IDEA, we are NOT doing that’. Rightly so — we all instantly recognised that it would be much more poignant and effective to keep Bruce alone in that big old house with just his faithful dog to keep him company. (And of course, in the JLU episode ‘Epilogue’ we reveal that Bruce himself has become a cranky but doting ‘Alfred’ in his declining years, which I still think is an absolutely LOVELY Final Chapter for Bruce Wayne’s story.)

Few years later, when Glen Murakami, Adam Warren and I were developing our intentionally cheesy ‘BATMANIME’ project, Glen and I realized that that series would be EXACTLY the right fit for such a crazytown concept. Alas...

Is it public knowledge that Peter Girardi and I were planning to do a third ‘Batman 75th‘ short, and that it was actually going to be set in the ‘BATMANIME’ world? It was originally supposed to be a trilogy — my retro b/w short (the past), then Darwyn’s BATMAN BEYOND short (near future) and then BATMANIME (far, FAR future). But we ran out of time and bandwidth. Alas...

Didn’t they end up doing Digitized Alfred in BATMAN AND ROBIN? I’ve never actually seen it all the way through.

Hang on — and didn’t James Tucker put Alpha Red in one of his BATMAN B AND B episodes, or did I just dream that?

Thats very interesting Mr Timm.

I'm quite honored you responded to my post. Been a huge fan of yours since of course BTAS. Never thought my little thought bubble would reach you lol.

Your idea for Alfred is almost the same to the frighteningly similar show "Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century". In that show the memories of Watson was transplanted to a Robot as well. Were you sharing similar writers? That show was on the same time as BB.

To answer your question yes. Batman and Robin did do a digitized Alfred in the movie. It was one of the most random bizarre moments of the film that I painfully remember aside from the Buttshots of course.