DC has been releasing original animated movies on DVD and Blu-Ray for years now.  Some, like ‘Teen Titans: Trouble In Tokyo’ tied into existing continuities.  Others stood alone and some adapted actual comic book storylines, such as ‘Batman: Year One‘ just to name one of many.  However most of those could be said to exist within their own continuities.

Yesterday”s release of ‘Justice League: War’ is notable for a couple of reasons.  One, it’s the first movie to fit within DC’s current New 52 continuity.  (Which was teased with the earlier ‘Flashpoint Paradox‘ movie.)  What some may not realize, however, is that this marks a transition in upcoming releases.  Future movies will follow this one and exist within the same universe.

Producer James Tucker stated:

“This will definitely be the first salvo in doing new movies that are in continuity with each other.  Our next movie is going to be ‘Son of Batman‘, and that Batman will be the same Batman that you see in Justice League: War’. Basically, we’ll have two concurrent series of Justice League movies and Batman movies, and they’ll be in continuity with each other. So it’s kind of world-building.”

This reflects, in some ways, the way Marvel has tied its movies together in one universe.  DC has even borrowed the post-credits scene to tease the next movie, which hints at a major role for Aquaman.

Not every movie will be set in the same continuity.  Warner Brothers/DC plans to release three new animated movies every year with two building upon the ‘Justice League: War’/New 52-inspired universe and one stand-alone.  This year’s stand-alone will be ‘Batman: Arkham Asylum’ based on the popular video game series.

And it sounds like even the New 52 stuff won’t necessarily all be adaptations of existing comic book stories.  ‘JL:W’ director Jay Olivia expressed “We can do original content, we can do New 52 stuff.”

With fans still smarting after the loss of ‘Young Justice’ and ‘Green Lantern’ , could this be a spiritual replacement?  The two shows were replaced by ‘Teen Titans Go!’ which is doing well in the ratings with its comedic tone but ‘Beware The Batman’ hasn’t made many waves.  Could this be a suitable solution for more mature fans of DC animation?

Have you seen ‘Justice League: War’ yet?  Do you think it suitably sets the foundation for an entire franchise of animated movies?

Source: THR