When it comes to Batman storylines, they don’t get much bigger than Knightfall. The comic book saga, which ran in 1993-1994, is infamous as the storyline in which Batman finally broke. Knightfall also set the template for Batman comic crossovers going forward, and every storyline that has come since has built on the foundation that Knightfall laid down.

Now the storyline is being adapted into animation for the first time. How do you fit Knightfall, Knightquest and Knightsend into one movie? Simple—you don’t! The folks at DC Studios and Warner Bros. Animation are splitting the storyline up into three feature-length movies, beginning with Batman: Knightfall Part 1: Knightfall, which is now available on 4K UHD, Blu-ray and DVD.

If you’re a fan of the original storyline, one of the first things you’ll notice is how the animators made the film look like a ’90s comic with Kelley Jones-inspired artwork.

“It was kind of an interesting thing from a design perspective,” producer Rick Morales says. “The first thing that I drew when I was pitching this idea was a Kelley Jones version of Batman and Azrael. I was like, ‘There's no need to change these characters. I want to see a faithful representation of them on screen myself.’ And there were a lot of designers that I worked with that were like, ‘So, we're really going to give them the Nightwing ponytail?’”

Using Tim Drake was also important to Morales. Not only is he a huge Tim Drake fan, but the Boy Wonder is one of the key parts of the original comic book storyline.

“Tim Drake is one of my favorite characters, period,” Morales admits. “Even going back to [when I was] working on Justice League, I snuck him in. There was an episode we had that was [inspired by] “The Death of Superman,” and I snuck him and Dick into the funeral scene. That's the only chance I got to draw him. I'd not been able to work on the Tim Drake Robin throughout the rest of my career.”

Producer Jim Krieg agreed that it had to be Tim Drake, as using Damian Wayne would have fundamentally changed the story.

“Can you imagine this piece with Damian?” he jokes. “Everybody in the movie would be grim, brutal and dark. Everybody.”

“I wanted Tim to just be what he was in the comics at that time,” Morales adds. “We've had a lot of conversations about that, how he would react in the situation and what he should do.”

While Krieg and Morales tried to make it as authentic to the original comics as possible, some pieces of lore were scrapped if they didn’t serve the story or age particularly well. For example, Batman’s hunchback mechanic Harold.

“He didn't make it,” Morales notes with a laugh. “We talked about it and were like, how do we explain this?”

Krieg and Morales also felt it was important to get Bane right. Although the behemoth has appeared in numerous Batman projects, both in animation and live action, he’s never been portrayed as the mastermind he was in the original Knightfall comics.

“I think, to me, that the depth of his intelligence is sometimes misunderstood,” Bane voice actor Michael Mando says. “We were both interested from my end and from [Rick Morales’s] end to find the psychological layers, the vulnerability of the character, and the intelligence of the character. What I loved about it the most was that we both agreed that he needed moral ammunition to rival Batman and Bruce Wayne, and then maybe have a point that Bruce Wayne couldn't deny, and I love that we took that approach.”

As Mando prepared for his role as Bane, the man who broke the Bat, he was surprised to see just how similar the villain was to the Dark Knight.

“I love the parallels between Bane and Batman,” he shares. “They both are orphans, and the parallels are so antithetical from one another. Bane grows up as a prisoner of misery, and Batman grows up a prisoner of privilege. Bane grows up with nothing. Batman grows up with everything. Both lose their parents. Their perception of reality is antithetical to each other, and I think those are two interesting protagonist and antagonist positions.”

At the end of the day, Knightfall is a story about death and rebirth, and Krieg hopes that message resonates with viewers.

“I hope that the viewers watch all three movies and they're able to understand the theme that sometimes to find yourself, you have to lose yourself,” he says. “You have to let yourself be healed. You can't do everything alone, but you are good enough. You can't change everything in the world, but you can change yourself and you may need to lean into something higher than yourself to be able to do it.”

For Rick Morales, the most important thing was honoring the original storyline.

“I hope the fans that know the story and that read it see that the people that made [the movie] love it as much as they do and wanted to honor and respect it and bring the best version forward that we were capable of,” he shares. “And for the fans that don't know the story, I hope that it's an exciting thing that will lead them back to the comics.
 

Batman: Knightfall Part 1: Knightfall is now available on 4K UHD, Blu-ray, DVD and Digital.

Joshua Lapin-Bertone writes about TV, movies and comics for DC.com, is a regular contributor to the Couch Club and writes our monthly Batman column, "Gotham Gazette." Follow him on Bluesky at @joshualapinbertone and on X at @TBUJosh.