MTV Splash Page reported some news this morning that almost had me doing a face plant in my Frosted Lucky Charms. Apparently not only is the fact that Christopher Nolan will back to direct the third Batman movie not a done deal, it could even be a long shot. Now I’m not getting too worked up yet. Their main source is Batman-on-film and my experience has been that websites that openly discuss how solid their secret inside source is are usually a little less than credible. However their logic is rock solid so I think it’s worth repeating the highlights of what they said.

The site is reporting that the death of Heath Ledger in January 08 hit Nolan so hard that he vowed The Dark Knight would be it for him and Batman. That combined with the fact that Nolan’s plan for a third film was to bring back the Joker have basically put the series back to it’s starting point. As of right now there is no Batman 3, no story, no villain, not even a love interest. Now, according to the site Nolan, along with his brother Jonathan and David Goyer are working on coming up with some ideas on how the franchise could be extended to a third installment. But they are saying that 2012 is the earliest we’ll be seeing The Caped Crusader on the big screen, with 2013 being the most likely scenario.

If you can’t wait until 2013 to see the bat, you have a ton of options. With the apparent death of Bruce Wayne (Not really though, he’s trapped in a cave somewhere in the past with Cool Terry) DC is sort of rebooting Batman with Dick Grayson as the Dark Knight, and Wayne’s son Damien as Robin, issue one is on shelves now. The book is written by Grant Morrison and what I’ve seen has impressed me, be warned though it’s different. Judd Winick takes over writing duties on Batman starting with #687, and while I’ve always thought that Winick wasn’t a good enough writer to be on Batman his first issue impressed me, so good that I would say I enjoyed it as much as Grant Morrison’s effort on Batman and Robin , well worth the read. I’m surprised to hear myself say this but I will continue reading Batman for now. Finally with Damien Wayne taking over Robin duties Tim Drake (actually it’s Tim Wayne, Damien found that out the hard way) has some time on his hands. Enter Red Robin, Drake is convinced that Bruce is still alive and will set out to find him in a new costume. Red Robin is written by Christopher Yost, who I think will be the next big thing in comics so check out Red Robin, issue #1 is on shelves now. So after I swore I was done with Batman thanks to RIP things are looking up for the bat family if you read comics. If not head over to a comic store and pick them up, it might help with the cravings, 2013 is a long way off.