WI: Tim Burton doesn't make Batman Returns

*Red eye post that I may need to bump*

In the OTL, Tim Burton stayed on as producer for Batman Forever. That came from the Studio not wanting him as director. I don't know how hands on he was at that for Batman Forever, but in this ATL, would he stay on as a producer for the film? And if so, what power would he have in directing the production and the series overall?
 
*Red eye post that I may need to bump*

In the OTL, Tim Burton stayed on as producer for Batman Forever. That came from the Studio not wanting him as director. I don't know how hands on he was at that for Batman Forever, but in this ATL, would he stay on as a producer for the film? And if so, what power would he have in directing the production and the series overall?

I do not know if the offer would be made for him to be a producer on the second film, but since the Forever producer credit amounted to a credit for the name attachment and almost nothing else, there'd be no reason for Burton to reject such an offer-it's money for nothing. I think by the time Burton's decision to depart would have been made Burton would have been enough of a name that the studio would contemplate keeping the Burton name attached anyway, but they might not.

I think Burton might have significant influence over the tenor of Batman II for one simple reason, he's probably going to have a lot more veto power over who directs the film than he did over Batman Forever. The studio wants Burton, Burton doesn't want to direct, and so Burton may be more able to influence who's hired in his place, at least to a slight degree. That is, Burton might be naming off directors to Warner Brothers in order to get them to cease their pressure on him. At the very least, he's going to be making some sort of recommendation on the matter. It's not totally out of the question that Burton hand picks the director, which raises the question of who that might be.

Once that's over, the Burton influence will be minimal. Unfortunately, this almost certainly means a new score.
 
I have an amendment to my previous Michael Keaton comment. I ran across something recently where it said Keaton dropped out of Batman 3 because he didn't like the story and it's tone (which was notably more campy). I believe I previously said I didn't think Keaton would return without Burton directing, but in light of that information, I'm not so hardline on that idea. So perhaps there is a good chance that Michael Keaton does reprise his role in Batman Returns, and continues onward in Batman 3 and so on; at least so long as the franchise has a consistent tone of maturity and doesn't take on the camp carelessness of the Schumacher era.
 
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