CNN reports the Senior Senator from Vermont has been cast in a cameo in The Dark Knight, the next Batman movie.

Patrick Leahy is professed comic book fan, and this will be his third appearance with Batman. He was an extra in the movie Batman & Robin and was the voice of the Arizona Governor in the Batman: The Animated Series episode “Showdown”

Like the rest of the cast, he isn’t talking about his role, except to say that he did share the scene with Christian Bale and Heath Ledger(Batman and The Joker, respectively).

I was browsing through my feeds this afternoon, specifically the Blogs@Newsarama feed and saw the following preview posted to YouTube. It looks pretty interesting. It will be based off of Darwyn Cooke’s comic that was highly influenced by the silver age of DC comics. This trailer was shown at SDCC and will apparently be released in Spring 2008, though the B@N post says February 2008. Keep your eyes open for more info and feel free to share any thoughts on the trailer in the comments!

Word cycling around the interweb recently is that a new Batman anime movie piece is going to be thrown in as a companion piece to the recent Christian Bale Batman movies. You heard me; a Batman Anime.

The animated film, which will bridge the gap left between Batman Begins and The Dark Knight, will introduce a few new characters, as well as develop some already existing ones. The plot has yet to be fully revealed thus far, but hopes for a PG-13 release not long before the second movie drops into theaters. Batman Begins Screenwriter David Goyer has put his talents into this little piece, as well as comic book writer Brian Azzarello and others.

How this will classify as “anime” has yet to be seen, and will be interesting to keep an eye on.

• Marvel Legends Icons and 2-Packs
• DC Universe/DC Superheroes
• Castlevania

So read on for more details…

[Read the rest of this entry…]

WhySoSerious.com has the trailer. No footage, but there is spoken dialog from Bruce and Alfred followed by another voice…

We also get the full Police Report on the Joker’s Death. Yeah, death. Whats this all mean? Your guess is as good as mine. See you in December.

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Fox News in Chicago apparently has to spy on the set for Batman stuff just like a common blogger. They report, we scrutinize on inter-net.

Clip 1 shows the Tumbler parked with set crew working on it. Enjoy those cargo shorts.
Clip 2 shows the Joker… skateboarding? Hard to tell whats going on there.
Clip 3 begins with Heath Ledger as the Joker standing a bit more and then some more low speed Tumbler driving.

MTV’s Movie Blog recently caught up with Aaron Eckhart and got him to talk a little bit about his role in the next Batman film, The Dark Knight.

“I play Harvet Dent. Harvey Two-Face. They are both in the movie.”

Wait… all they had to do was ask and he confirmed what millions of fans have been wondering? Fair enough.

Now with the stage already set for Heath Ledger’s Joker to be causing trouble, along with gang wars in the wake of Falcone’s defeat, this is quite a lot of stuff to put into one movie. Of course, Batman Begins seemlessly moved from the origin to the action and 3 villains in one movie without feeling burdened.

What do you think? Is Two Face one too many? Leave a comment.

An intrepid fan with a camera captured this footage from the set of The Dark Knight. Late nights in Chicago are inspiring all sorts of snipers with cameras, and when he saw actor Cillian Murphy on set, he knew he had a scoop! At the end of Batman Begins, Murphy as Scarecrow/Jonathan Crane rode off into the sunset on his fire-breathing horse, and now in the sequel it appears he’s still causing trouble. See more at SuperheroHype!

The principal criticism of the older Batman movies was the death and elimination of the villains. Screenwriter David Goyer was careful not to let that happen in Begins, and now we see Scarecrow’s story will continue. Could he again be merely a front for the real threat, this time the Joker? After all, his mind control and fear experiments could be of great interest if adapted to cause manical laughter.