Batman Beyond Season Opener
Rembrandt
Tuesday, August 8, 2000 8:15

Tuesday's Comics Continnum has news on the "Batman Beyond" season opener.  This is what the article had to say:

"Batman Beyond producer Paul Dini said that "Ace in the Hole," an episode featuring Bruce Wayne's dog Ace, will likely be the first episode of third season of the Kids' WB! series.

Dini previewed the episode, written by Hilary J. Bader and directed by James Tucker, at the Wizard World convention last weekend.

The episode shows that Ace was originally trained to fight other dogs by a ruthless owner, Ronnie Boxer, before he escaped. One day while Terry is walking Ace, he sees his previous owner and takes off after him, setting up the story as Terry and Bruce try to find him.

Dini said that he and producer Bruce Timm wanted to get Ace the Bathound in Batman ever since the original series on Fox.

"We always thought introducing him in a dog-fight arena, that's where Bruce would get him," Dini said. "We never did anything with the idea, but then we pitched it to Hilary and she and Alan (Burnett, a producer) kind of came up with the story based on the take we used on it." 

Dini said it was difficult to portray the abuses Ace went through without going too far Saturday morning television.

"Some of the more intense scenes were trimmed down a little bit," Dini said. "Everything is pretty much in there, but a couple shots of blood were taken out, and I think he actually did get shocked by the (trainer's) glove or he did get shocked in shadows.

"Those are cuts you make when the film comes in, and you don't really like making them, but I think the episode still holds up pretty well and you get an idea of what the dog went through.

"If we get notes like that, we prefer getting them in the script form, because then we're able to go back in and change things and come up with better ideas. We don't want to just sit there and take notes and say, 'Cut this sequence' or 'Do not show this action.' We'll come up with alternatives. We work very hard to come up with things that preserve the integrity of the show."

Look for more on the Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker movie soon here in The Continuum. "