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The sparkly season of sleigh bells might not be immediately associated with the brooding shadow of the Dark Knight. Yet, avid comic-book fans know that there’s long been a traditional relationship and unique juxtaposition between Batman and Christmas.
To further entrench that fusion of heroes and holidays, Amazon’s Prime Video is wrapping up and delivering Merry Little Batman, a festive animated family film directed by Mike Roth (Regular Show) and based on a charming screenplay written by Morgan Evans (Teen Titans Go!) and Jase Ricci (Batman: The Doom That Came to Gotham).
This storyline finds Damian Wayne, Bruce’s young son, left by himself in the stately Wayne Manor on Christmas Eve, where he transforms into “Little Batman” to defend his domicile and the rest of Gotham City from invasive supervillains attempting to ruin all yuletide revelries.
Produced by Warner Bros. Animation, Merry Little Batman features a top-notch voice cast that includes Yonas Kibreab (Pupstruction, Sweet Tooth) as Damian, with Luke Wilson (Fired on Mars, Stargirl) as Bruce, James Cromwell (Star Trek: First Contact, Succession) as Alfred and David Hornsby (DC Super Hero Girls) as the Joker.
The project’s move from a cozy nest at DC’s parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery (and its Max streaming service), to Amazon is part of CEO David Zaslav’s plan to license content out to other prominent platforms. With stylized character designs exhibiting a retro storybook look and a whimsical tone that encourages family viewing, Merry Little Batman hopes to become an annual Christmastime classic akin to 1990’s Home Alone.
“I came to Warner Bros. on an overall deal,” Roth tells Animation Magazine. “Sammy Perlmutter brought me on, and I was working on a couple different movie projects at the time when Sammy called me to ask if I liked Batman and artist Ron Searle. I told him I love Batman and Ron Searle. So, he said, ‘What if we do a Batman movie with a Ron Searle design and a Christmas theme?’ They teamed me up with Morgan Evans and we started developing this new world.”
Roth was well aware of Batman’s 85-year legacy and how essential it would be to stay true to canon and create a script that honors Batman history, but also still make it a Christmas movie.
“That informed a lot of design decisions and what we were trying to do. We wanted something that felt like a Christmas storybook, so that informed our color palette. We went with a sketchier line for the characters and the backgrounds.”
Merry Little Batman has a distinctive design and shape language influenced by seminal British illustrator and satirical cartoonist Searle and his award-winning sketches and drawings. Fans might be unaccustomed to seeing Batman and his rogues’ gallery portrayed in this extreme fashion, but it’s all part of the mercurial aspect of the Dark Knight’s enduring popularity.
“We needed it to have this Christmassy theme, and there’s something about Ron Searle’s drawings that make you think of old-timey Christmas material,” Roth adds. “It’s a very different look and a different approach. We wanted something that was very four-quadrant. Something that was fun for kids and fun for grandparents. We also have head nods to a wide range of Batman through the ages. It includes some Batman stuff from the ‘30s, a couple of Easter eggs from Batman ’66 and the Bruce Timm era. So, I think there’s a lot of fun stuff in there for everybody. We even have [comic-book artist and editor] Carmine Infantino in it. We have his actual voice. I’m friends with his nephew and he gave me some of his interviews. So, I sifted through them and found a line that would work for a scene and then we did a design of Carmine. That’s his real voice, post-mortem, in the movie.”
The creative team’s world-building process for this spirited Batman tale was constantly driven by the fact that this wasn’t just about Batman’s usual crime-fighting activities, since he’s now a busy single dad trying to raise his son.
“For the first time in his history, Batman is a helicopter dad,” says Roth. “He’s got a young eight-year-old son and he’s taking all his Batman energy and he’s put it into raising his child. So those Ron Searle designs service that and, also, the kind of humor we wanted to pull in. Because those drawings are sort of rough and raw. They bring an element of grit to it, which I think is really important for the Batman universe. When you think of Gotham you think of this gritty, visceral place and that loose Searle-like style got us there. It was a really great blending of the two worlds. Plus, it’s just interesting to see Batman in a different way. This design sensibility is the hook of this world and this project. Those designs are enticing, and you want to see more.”
‘We have a very unique Joker. The whole world is seen through the lens of Damian, who’s a child. We designed the movie so it’s like a little kid in this really big world.’
— Director Mike Roth
Art director Guillaume Fesquet was responsible for most of Merry Little Batman’s preliminary sketches, aided by Daby Zainab Faidhi, who worked alongside Fesquet to distill down the final style.
“As a former architect, Daby came in with a lot of design principles,” Roth notes. “She was instrumental in finding the kind of look and feel and colors of the backgrounds. The movie is really beautiful to look at. We used two overseas animated studios for the 2D animation. One was Gigglebug, and they’re located in Helsinki, Finland. The other one is Doghead Animation in Florence, Italy. They’re both amazing studios.”
“In so many ways, this was a passion project for everybody,” he adds. “It was so much fun to live in this world and draw these characters. It’s very rare that you get to work with a Searle-type of design sensibility in the States; it’s more of a European style. Gigglebug and Doghead went above and beyond and put their souls into the animation, and it shows when you see the finished product.”
Roth hoped to make something that was a true Christmas story — something that could be perennial and touches all generations with a snowstorm of superhero magic and mayhem.
“Ideally, you hope that children watching it today will one day show it to their kids and [that] the project lives that long,” he says. “I think people will be pumped, but you never know with these things. I grew up with the ’66 Batman and I was a teenager when the Tim Burton Batman came out. Batman has 85 years of history, and we get to add a page to that, which is an important thing. We also had an incredible vocal cast and a great composer with Patrick Stump from Fall Out Boy.”
When asked about his favorite part of the movie, Roth says it’s the Joker. “We have a very unique Joker,” he notes. “The whole world is seen through the lens of Damian, who’s a child. We designed the movie so it’s like a little kid in this really big world. We wanted a Joker that felt dangerous and scary, but also like a child. He’s all over the place. I’ve been a fan of all the Batman iterations, so for me to be asked to do a Batman project is a pinch-yourself-and-wake-up moment. It’s been a really special experience.”
Merry Little Batman premieres exclusively on Prime Video on Friday, December 8.
