First developed by The Batman director Matt Reeves as a Gotham City Police Department series under the name Gotham Central, the project evolved into a series about the inner workings of Gotham’s iconic Arkham Asylum. In late 2022, Antonio Campos joined the project as showrunner.
The GCDP thing, that story has story has kinda evolved. We’ve actually now [moved] more into the realm of exactly what would happen in the world of Arkham as it relates coming off of our movie, and some of the characters… almost leaning into the idea of… it’s like a horror movie or a haunted house that is Arkham.
–Matt Reeves on the evolution of his Arkham project
Originally believed to be an Elseworlds project set in Reeves’ Batman universe, DC co-chair James Gunn revealed that Arkham was developed to be set within the main DCU continuity. “Right now Matt is producing Arkham as a DCU series,” said Gunn on Threads in January 2024, adding that”It was one of the first pitches we bought when Peter [Safran] and I came onboard.” Gunn went on to clarify Reeves’ status with DC Studios, saying “We love Matt as a director and producer so he’ll be producing stories both within his The Batman universe and within the DCU.“
Cast
