Producer James Tucker Discusses Final “Batman: The Brave And The Bold” Episode
The World’s Finest caught up with Batman: The Brave and The Bold Producer James Tucker to discuss the final episode of the acclaimed animated series, “Mitefall!” The all-new episode debuts tonight, Friday, November 18th, 2011 at 7:00pm (ET) on Cartoon Network. The episode features Bat-Mite trying to cancel Batman: The Brave and The Bold after he tires of the cartoon. Continue below for the all-new exclusive Batman: The Brave and The Bold Q & A with Tucker.
The World’s Finest: As always, let’s start with the teaser. Batman, President Lincoln, and a crazy robotic John Wilkes Booth. Please, walk us through how this teaser came to be! Any significance to the ‘Parallel Universe 5501’ mention?
James Tucker: All the credit for this teaser has to go to the shows co-producer/story editor, Michael Jelenic. He was pitching this idea of Batman teaming up with Lincoln probably as early as the end of season one. It always sounded too over the top for me, particularly at that stage of the show. I felt the audience that we were building just wasnt ready for something that radical. By the third season, I guess Michael had worn me down and our audience had come to expect the crazy stuff wed been doing, so I finally said lets do it. Mind you, when he was describing it to me at first, it wasnt fully fleshed out. When it was finally pitched to me in its entirety, I loved it. It was cool, poignant and brilliant and was such a nice intro for our series finale.
WF: Moving on to the episode itself, this is…it, isn’t it? The final episode. Where did the inspiration for this episode come about? Why bring back Bat-Mite?
JT: At first I was torn with the idea of actually doing a series finale. I think, and still do, that a lot of the well-remembered shows that live on in peoples hearts are shows that were left open ended. So that whatever the show was, its just on a continuous loop in the minds of the audiences. But when you actually have a series finale, youre kind of closing the door on the show. Do people really want to relive a series that has a locked down ending? But given how we ultimately ended the show, that concern seems irrelevant now. Plus, Batmans forever, pun intended…there is no ending really. Using Bat-Mite as this episodes ‘villain’ made sense because in a way, the first episode he appeared in (“Legends of the Dark Mite”) was the one that really clued our audience into what this show was all about, the idea that we were celebrating Batman as a pop culture icon, and pulling elements from the entirety of his long history and trying to give nods to every era in his development as one of the most famous heroes ever created. Using Bat-mite as the ultimate Batman fan boy, we were able to literally have him deliver the shows manifesto in that speech he gives in the scene at comic convention. Once we did that, I think the part of the audience that was nervous about whether they could trust us or not just exhaled and were able to really embrace the show. The haters crawled back under their rocks (Just jokin). So it seemed to make sense to have Bat-mite be part of our ‘ending’ since he was responsible in a way for giving the show life.
WF: One can only assume there were many ideas left on the cutting room floor with Bat-Mite’s plans to cancel Batman. Any canned ideas that you can fill us in on? And what about the many, many meta jabs? How far did this episode go with them? Also, Batman…shooting a gun. How did you get that by censors?
JT: By the time wed gotten to this episode, we had discussed it so much, throwing ideas around, all season long that when the time came to do it, it seemed like it was fairly fully formed. I dont recall any ideas that had to be discarded. As far as Batman shooting the gun, I have to say Cartoon Networks standards department has always been good with understanding the context of any given scene in the series that might be questionable. Clearly, this episode was very meta from the first scene, so it was pretty obvious that we werent advocating Batman really shooting a gun. I think at the most we may have cut any scenes where Batmans directly shooting at someone. The few scenes where hes firing the gun, hes shooting off screen. I think.
WF: Did you find it approach that Henry Winkler voices Ambush Bug in an episode where Bat-Mite thinks Batman has jumped the shark? Was this intentional casting?
JT: Oh sure, its almost mandatory that you have to cast Henry Winkler in an episode thats about a series jumping the shark and we were lucky enough to get Ted McGinley as well. Im sure the younger viewers wont get the connection, not that they read whos in the credits anyway. But of course, we were referring to the infamous Happy Days episode where Fonzie jumps the shark. Both were great sports about it actually and were really cool to work with.
WF: Do you think this episode sums up Batman: The Brave and The Bold? How do you think fans will react to the final moments of this episode? How did you react to it?
JT: As I always say, the mandate we strive for on most of our episodes was to always have heart, humor and heroism. Those three things when you have them in the right proportion leave the audience with a good feeling (we hope). So I knew that even though this was the series finale, we should leave on an upbeat yet poignant note if possible. There are sad parts because, frankly, those of us who made the show were a bit sad that it was ending. I wanted Batman to directly address the audience, and I specifically wanted him to call them “boys and girls” because we always tried to have this show appeal to that inner little boy or girl that first saw Batman, whether it was the comic books, the 1940s movie serials, the 66 TV series, Batman: The Animated Series, The Batman, Burton, Schumacher, Nolan, or whatever version. Id like to think the fans that ‘got’ us still had that little boy or girl inside of them that went ‘wow!’ when they first laid eyes on Batman like I did when I was a kid. Also, I literally wanted Batman to address the actual kids for whom this was their first exposure to Batman. Im hearing some folks get misty eyed when they see the ending and I know I did!
WF: Do you have any final words you’d like to say to those who stuck by this show from beginning to end?
JT: I just want to thank the fans that stuck with the show supported and defended it. It made my job easier because they always had our back on the forums, in the media, and I assume on the playgrounds, water coolers and comic books shops. It was very liberating to know that we were appealing to a fan base that had been shouted down and shamed whenever they wondered why cant there be a fun superhero show that doesnt just come from an angle of pessimism and negativity? I think these fans understood that we were making the show for the kids they used to be and for the kids some of them have now and they gave us their unconditional support. That was very cool and gratifying.
WF: And now to our standard final question! Now, we all know fans are going to tune in to check this out, so let’s try something a shade different. Can you drop us a tease for one surprise that fans can expect for this final episode (that is, unless ‘The Mask of Matches Malone’ airs…)?
JT: Are than any real surprises in this age of omnipresent media and YouTube? I guess I can tease that there will be a sneak peek at the series that will be replacing us (in Bat-mites universe anyway!). But I cant imagine anyone who reads these boards doesnt already know about that. But there ya go!
The Batman: The Brave and The Bold series finale episode “Mitefall!” debuts tonight, Friday, November 18th, 2011 at 7:00pm (ET) on Cartoon Network. Continue to the Batman: The Brave and The Bold subsite for further details on this episode, including video clips and images.
Batman: The Brave and The Bold airs on Cartoon Network every Friday at 7:00pm (ET).
Additonally, The World’s Finest recently conducted three interviews with members of the Batman: The Brave and The Bold creative team. Click here for an interview with Batman: The Brave and The Bold director Ben Jones, click here for an interview with Batman: The Brave and The Bold producer James Tucker, and click here for an interview with Batman: The Brave and The Bold story editor Michael Jelenic. All interviews look back at the acclaimed series and provide a closer look at the “Mitefall!” finale episode.
Further details on the Batman: The Brave and The Bold animated series are available here. Stay tuned for more Batman: The Brave and The Bold content right here at The World’s Finest.
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