David Goyer talks Batman, Flash & Scanners

We had a chance to sit down with writer/director David Goyer, the mastermind behind Blade Trinity and Batman Begins, who was kind enough to give us the latest on Supermax, Dark Knight, the Blade franchise, The Flash, Thor, and Scanners:

MoviesOnline: I asked Jonathan Nolan recently if in the Dark Knight we are going to see more of the detective side of Batman…

DAVID GOYER: Dude, I’m not going to say anything about that. Did he say anything? I doubt it.

MoviesOnline:  He said he was hoping to see more of the detective side and that you guys had to take a crack at the script afterwards.

DAVID GOYER: I won’t say anything largely out of respect for Chris. On the first film, Chris just wanted to keep everything under lock and key and I think at the end of the day we all really respect Chris as a filmmaker. He doesn’t want anything said to the fans, so we won’t say anything.

MoviesOnline:  Are you now directing Supermax?

DAVID GOYER: Not directing. Producing.

MoviesOnline:  Writing and producing?

DAVID GOYER: Not writing. Producing.

DAVID GOYER: A young writer named Justin Marks who I’d read a spec screenplay of his. He’s very young. He’s 22. I thought it was great and he just started writing a week ago.

MoviesOnline:  Is it going to be kind of dark like Batman?

DAVID GOYER: Oh yeah, he goes to prison.

MoviesOnline:  What other heroes or villains are we going to see?

DAVID GOYER: I can’t say. I can’t say. But we’re culling not just from the Green Arrow mythology. We’re culling from the whole DC universe so anybody could show up. That’ll be part of the fun.

MoviesOnline:  By anybody you mean either heroes or villains could show up?

DAVID GOYER: Yes, that’s all I can say.

MoviesOnline:  Blade, are we done with that franchise? I was disappointed with the TV series not continuing because it was good.

DAVID GOYER: I was too because we kind of got on a roll. I know people were surprised that it was good. But that’s okay, people were surprised that the first movie was good. We’re done for now. The idea of doing another vampire thing right now … You know between the movies and the show, I did 20 hours of vampire stuff. Now obviously Joss Whedon did more, but I don’t know how he was able to do that many of them.

MoviesOnline:  What about The Flash?   

DAVID GOYER: It’s coming out on DVD.

MoviesOnline:  Shawn Levy is now doing The Flash after you put so much time and effort into it. Do you know if they’re keeping with any of the stuff that you were hoping to do?

DAVID GOYER: I have no idea. It’s funny I ended up having lunch with Joss a couple weeks after that, and it was complete coincidence that that happened on the same day. We had lunch and we were talking about it. My relationship with Warner Bros. is great. A month later we did this Supermax Green Arrow thing.

 

Fortunately, I’m in a position where I no longer have to... If I don’t want to do something, I don’t have to do it. If I don’t like the approach creatively or if there’s a disagreement, then I’d just rather not do it. It takes too long to make the movies. Truly, it became apparent that there was a divergence of opinion as to what the movie should be, so I just said let me do something else and that’s what happened. I have no idea what they’re going to do and I’m not BS’ing you. I just said whatever. I’ll do something else.

MoviesOnline:  For the longest time, Avi Arad has said that you were going to be doing Thor. Is that still going to happen?

DAVID GOYER: I’ve never been involved in Thor. I had one conversation with them. I’m friends with all those guys, and I’m friends with Avi and Ari and Kevin Feige, and we get together socially. I think we were having dinner up in Vancouver one night and we were just crossing paths and we had a conversation. Part of the problem, if you will, is that I love all those characters and I like spitballing about them, so I end up in spite of myself sort of saying, ‘What if you did X, Y and Z?’ but then I don’t have the time to do it. Sometimes I end up consulting on various superhero franchises that you haven’t seen my name on. That’s what I do. I come in for a couple days and I say, ‘What about this or that?’ because I don’t have the time to write it.

MoviesOnline:  Are you still writing Scanners?

DAVID GOYER: Yes, it allows us to work with Mr. Chapman. [Laughs]