Will this madness never end?

Batgone

Alicia Silverstone as Batgirl Leslie Grace as Batgirl
Time has not been kind. Batgirl, then and now: 1997 (L), and 2022 (R).

Batgirl, Warner Bros' upcoming small-screen outing for Commissioner Gordon's race-swapped daughter, Barbara, is no longer upcoming. Instead, it's been shitcanned, despite itself being in the can already.

The reasons why the studio has decided to take a hit on the $90M production costs are open to speculation, but some sources suggest that it just wasn't very good. Brand damaging, even. And this is a brand that includes Batman and Robin;* Birds of Prey; Catwoman; Green Lantern;** and Wonder Woman 1984, among others on its roster!

Admittedly, the film was intended to be released directly to streaming, rather than the big screen. Nevertheless, the titular character's costume looks like something her mother made, or bought cheap on Amazon. Even The CW did better for Batwahmxn.

I have no interest in tokenised character swaps written in crayon at the service of mo' rep, so I was never going to watch Batgirl anyway. Besides, my limited experience of HBO Max, via Sky Show, was underwhelming; consequently, anything showing exclusively on the Bros' streaming service might as well be showing exclusively on the moon. From that perspective, the news isn't much more than whatevahz!

But I would be interested in Batgirl being brought to the big screen in a film that was respectful of her origins and story arc, and of those characters around her. If these events bring that closer to a reality, then that's a good thing. (thumbup)

Batgirl at night over the city DC FanDome

* I took my girlfriend to see Batman and Robin when it was showing at the picture playhouse. She fell asleep halfway through. After it was released on VHS, I picked up a copy from the remainder bin and we sat down to watch it one evening. She fell asleep halfway through.

** Even mocked by its star, Ryan Reynolds, in Deadpool 2.

Speaking to Yahoo Entertainment, one of the directors of Batgirl, Adil El Arbi said: the movie didn't have a high budget, and I think that that's a big part of it. We had to keep the budget low. As if that weren't already obvious from the make-do-and-mend costume design.

Keeping the budget low seems to be a matter of perspective though. At the time the project was shitcanned, the budget was reported to have been $90M.