In 2020, the nascent HBO Max streaming service announced it was developing a Batman spinoff series set within the Gotham City Police Department as part of Matt Reeves’ Batman Epic Crime Saga. Described as an “examination of the anatomy of corruption in Gotham City” through the eyes of a corrupt cop, the Gotham PD series was to be produced by The Batman‘s Reeves and Dylan Clark with Boardwalk Empire creator Terence Winter — whose credits include the gangster dramas The Sopranos and Tulsa King — set to serve as writer and showrunner. Later that year, Winter exited the Warner Bros. Television series, citing creative differences.
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“The idea was that we were going to do a 1970s cop show— something that felt like [Sidney Lumet’s 1981 crime and police drama] Prince of the City,but in the Gotham City Police Department,” Winter said on the Bingeworthy podcast. “It wasgoing to have that [’70s] feel. It was going to be a present-day cop whois like a third-generation Gotham City cop — you know, his grandfather,his dad, and Gotham City was largely corrupt. And this isthe guy we meet in the present day who’s realizing that he’s kind of onthe wrong side.”
In the series — which was to take place one year before the events of The Batman movie that introduced a younger caped crusader (Robert Pattinson) in his second year as a costumed crime-fighter — Batman “was somebody that lived in that world, but you never really saw him,” Winter added. “And it was really all about the policedepartment and [this corrupt cop].”
After a shift from HBO Max to HBO, and HBO chairman and CEO Casey Bloys’ mandate that The Batman spinoffs should focus on “marquee characters” like Ozz Cobb (Colin Farrell) in The Penguin, Gotham PD was shelved at the network.
“I worked on it for a while. And ultimately, Mattwasn’t feeling it, and I left,” Winter said, adding that HBO Max’s Tokyo Vice creator J.T. Rogers was brought in and “worked for a while on it, but that didn’t go anywhere.” (Winter appeared to confuse Rogers for Giri/Haji creator Joe Barton, who took over showrunning duties in 2021, according to reports at the time.) “I have no idea what he did. And then I read about The Penguin.”
Where the untitled Gotham PD series pulled from the acclaimed police procedural comic book series Gotham Central by Eisner Award-winning writer Ed Brubaker, Greg Rucka, and artist Michael Lark, The Penguin is a Sopranos-flavored crime drama about the Batman villain’s rise to power. Winter went on to explain that Gotham PD might have been compared to the five-season Batman prequel series Gotham, which followed GCPD cop Jim Gordon’s (Ben McKenzie) evolution from rookie detective to Police Commissioner as he battled crime and corruption — and proto-versions of future rogues like Catwoman, Penguin, the Riddler, Two-Face, and the Joker.
“[Gotham PD] was Matt’s idea originally, and, you know, more power to[him]. Sometimes, you’re in sync creatively; sometimes, you’re not,” Winter said. “Oryou get off on the wrong foot thinking, ‘Oh, we should do this and go,Oh, you know what, this is just not really working.’ Also, because therewas Gotham, the show Gotham certainly took place in [Gotham City], inthe Gotham City Police Department, rather.” The Fox drama “kind of stepped on the toes of our idea a little bit, even though ours was going to be totally very different,” Winter added. “I think Penguin is great.”
New episodes of The Penguin premiere Sundays on HBO and Max.
