20 facts you might not know about 'The Lego Batman Movie'

The Lego cinematic universe started with The Lego Movie. That’s not a superhero film, but it did feature Will Arnett as the voice of Lego Batman. After the success of that movie, more Lego films were greenlit, starting with The Lego Batman Movie.

A specific set of skills is needed to direct a movie like Lego Batman. Chris McKay had those skills. He had cut his teeth directing TV shows like Moral Orel and Robot Chicken. They are more stop animation than computer animation, but the vibe is the same. This was McKay’s first feature film as a director.

Hey, getting a chance to direct your first feature is great. However, that doesn’t mean McKay had nothing but good feelings about the process of directing the film. He called it a “very mixed blessing” during an interview with Den of Geek in 2017, "because I'm a huge comic but fan ... but it’s also very ambitious to even try to do a movie in about two and a half years." Animated films can take a while, and McKay wasn’t sure he could get everything he wanted in the film in that timeframe.

When pitching himself to direct Lego Batman, McKay had an interesting take on the project. He described his vision as “’Jerry Maguire’ directed by Michael Mann” in that same Den of Geek interview, and McKay also cited Airplane! and The Naked Gun as influences elsewhere.

McKay honed in on Robin when it came to his idea for Lego Batman. He said he wanted to take the Burt Ward in Batman ‘66-style Robin and combine him with a Frank Miller-style Batman. Basically, a sweet, innocent Robin combined with a dark, brooding Batman.

We’re guessing the actors who played Batman and Robin already had some chemistry. Arnett played Batman, while Michael Cera played Robin. Those two costarred as uncle and nephew in the iconic sitcom Arrested Development.

Batman’s rogues gallery is out in full force in the film, and some notable names are in the mix. Also, a musical comedy duo. Both members of Garfunkel & Oates provide voices to Batman villains. Riki Rindhome voices Poison Ivy, while Kate Micucci plays Clayface.

Billy Dee Williams voices Two-Face. Had things gone as originally planned, it wouldn’t have been the first time. Williams played Harvey Dent in Batman, and the plan was for him to become Two-Face in a sequel. That never happened, though, and Williams didn’t get to play Two-Face…until Lego Batman came around.

Zoe Kravitz was cast as Catwoman in Lego Batman. Maybe that influenced future casting decisions? In the 2022 reboot of Batman — The Batman, this time with Robert Pattinson in the role — Kravitz is indeed playing a live-action Catwoman.

There’s a twist in The Lego Movie where it turns out that everything happening is in the imagination of a kid named Finn. They even step outside the Lego action into the real world and everything. That doesn’t happen in The Lego Batman Movie, but the premise is the same. Producer Chris Miller — who co-directed The Lego Movie — confirmed to IGN that The Lego Batman Movie is also from Finn’s imagination.

The very first trailer debuted before Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. On the one hand, they are both DC movies. On the other hand, Batman v. Superman is a dark, moody Zack Snyder film — the kind that Lego Batman is effectively parodying. The energy of these two films is quite different.

In order to help promote the film, Lego put together quite the project. At the 2017 North American International Auto Show in Detroit, there was a life-size replication of the Batmobile made out of Lego. It was made out of roughly 350,000 pieces and presumably took forever to put together.

While it seems like we get a Batman movie every year, they are almost all live action. In fact, The Lego Batman Movie was the first animated film featuring the Dark Knight since 1993, when Batman: Mask of the Phantasm came out.

At the beginning of the film, there is an airplane called the “McGuffin 1138.” A McGuffin is a film term for an object that drives the plot of a film without really impacting the story much, a la the falcon statue in The Maltese Falcon. The “1138,” meanwhile, is a reference to George Lucas’ first film, THX 1138.

McKay had wanted to include some villains from R-rated movies in the film, but he was shot down by executives who wanted to keep things family friendly. Apparently the Space Jam: A New Legacy folks felt differently. Anyway, McKay did get a reference to one decidedly R-rated movie. Batman suggests the name “Fox Force Five” for the new team, which is the name of the failed pilot Mia Wallace starred in from Pulp Fiction.

When Batman hits the horn on the Batmobile, it plays the theme song from the ‘60s Batman show. Meanwhile, when Batman rings the doorbell at the Fortress of Solitude, it plays the theme from Superman.

Arnett has said that doing Batman’s raspy voice is rough on his vocal cords, but he was able to get a little respite. McKay did the big, crazy laugh for Batman, and it was originally supposed to just serve as a placeholder. In the end, it stayed in the film.

Lego Batman topped the box office in its first two weeks. It was huge in the United States and Canada, making $175.8 million. Add in $136.2 million in the rest of the world, and the movie made $312 million off an $80 million budget.

Due to the success of the movie, a sequel was greenlit in 2018, with plans for it to be released in 2022. McKay was attached to return as director. However, in 2020, Universal bought the rights to the Lego Movie franchise. Warner Bros., meanwhile, owns the rights to DC Comics. This led to the cancellation of the movie.

What did we lose out on? Well, McKay has said that Dan Harmon and Michael Waldron were working on the script for the film when it was cancelled. It was going to be about Batman’s relationship with the Justice League, with a focus on Superman. Superman has a cameo in Lego Batman played by Channing Tatum. Waldron has said the movie was to be called Lego Superfriends.