DC Animation is bringing us Batman: Soul of the Dragon, a truly unique and original Batman feature that is set in the 1970s, that seems inspired by Bruce Lee’s classic martial arts movie, Enter The Dragon. Today the voice cast of Batman: Soul of the Dragon has been revealed, and it is a fan-favorite lineup of actors taking on some key DC character roles. Batman will be voiced by David Giuntoli (Grimm); Michael Jai White will reprise his Arrow role as Ben Turner/Bronze Tiger; Kelly Hu (X-Men 2) will voice Lady Shiva, and Mark Dacascos (John Wick 3, Mortal Kombat: Legacy) is voicing Richard Dragon. There’s always the debate about Batman voice actors, but all in all, this is a pretty solid cast.
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Batman: Soul of the Dragon is set to be released in “early 2021”. The feature will be executive produced by Bruce Timm (Batman: The Animated Series) and directed by Sam Liu. Liu’s directorial work in the DC Animated Universe has had some definite hits (Superman/Batman: Public Enemies, Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths, All-Star Superman, The Death of Superman), but also some definite misses (Batman: The Killing Joke, Batman and Harley Quinn). However, with Bruce Timm as a guiding hand, a lot of DC fans will probably give this strange take on Batman a look.
Here’s the premise of Batman: Soul of the Dragon, and a first-look image of the animated feature, via THR:
“The film is an original tale, rather than based on a specific comic book storyline. It sees Bruce Wayne face a deadly menace from his past, with the help of three former classmates: world-renowned martial artists Richard Dragon, Ben Turner, and Lady Shiva.”
We haven’t seen a lot of Batman lore being mashed up with martial arts movie tropes – although Bruce Timm definitely has been a pioneer in that regard. Batman: The Animated Series had a famous episode called Night of the Ninja, which saw Bruce Wayne/Batman battling an assassin who turned out to be an old rival from his martial arts training days, Kyodai Ken. That feud played out in a Kurosawa-style duel between Batman and Kyodai, and the episode was popular enough to spawn a sequel, “Day of the Samurai”, which again used tropes of martial arts/samurai cinema in a similarly effective way.
That’s all to say: Batman: Soul of the Dragon could actually be a pretty cool (and novel) departure from the usual Batman animated features Warner Bros. has been pumping out the last few years.
Batman: Soul of the Dragon is set to debut in early 2021.
