“He’s the most useless character in the world”: Why was this character removed from the Batman script, a challenge when the actor was hired?

If you love The Dark Knight and grew up with Tim Burton’s Batman movies, then you’ll enjoy this amazing (and touching) anecdote! After the phenomenal success of his first opus released in 1989, the director returned 3 years later with Batman, The Challenge.

This time, the vigilante of Gotham City has to face several villains, such as Penguin, Catwoman or Max Shrek, played by the dark Christopher Walken. Sam Hamm, the writer of the first episode, returns to write the script, which is then supported by Daniel Waters.

Robin comes out of the forest

At the time, early versions of the script had Robin helping Batman fight crime. The character was actually supposed to be a mechanic wearing worn overalls with a faded “R” on the chest.

We are then in September 1991. The writing is going on and filming is imminent. So Tim Burton needs to find an interpreter for Robin as soon as possible. Then she sees a young 19-year-old rising star, Marlon Wayans. The latter notably appeared in the comedy series he created with his brothers, soberly titled: The Wayan Brothers.

The Batman team, the challenge builds the sets, designs the costumes, and the Robin figure is made for merchandising. Everything was designed to show the famous side of Batman. But then why was the character eventually kicked out?

A sacrificed character

During the rewrites, Tim Burton and his screenwriters realized that the plot was becoming too dense and confusing with Robin. The story already deals with the strong personalities of Penguin, Catwoman and Max Shrek. In the midst of this, there must clearly be room for the development of Bruce Wayne (Michael Keaton). Burton, Waters, and Hamm realize that they won’t be able to best manage different narrative arcs.

The latter then makes a radical decision to remove Robin from the script, pure and simple. Only, there’s a “catch”, Marlon Wayans has already been hired and even paid $100,000 in a 2-film deal (according to CinemaBlend)! At the time, there was talk that Tim Burton would make a trilogy, and the villain of the third part would be Harvey Dent, aka Two-Face.

“Actually, about 15 years ago, I was supposed to play Robin in Batman: The Challenge. But there were too many characters. I got the part, I got the salary and everything. I get the checks every now and then.” .

“Tim Burton finally dropped the 3rd movie and that’s it Joel Schumacher who did it; He had a different view of what Robin was. That’s why he hired me Chris O’Donnell“– Marlon Wayans confided The Louis Howe Show on YouTube.

Marlon Wayans’ Regret

Marlon Wayans, visibly shaken, bitterly recalls this anecdote and expresses regret: “With Billy Dee Williams I could have been the first black actor in one of these huge productions. Finally I got a call from Tim Burton and Denise Dinov I was informed that I will not do the film. Do you realize what my career could have been?”asks the 52-year-old actor.

“But it didn’t happen and I was very sad. However, I quickly came back and told myself that I could do something on my own, I had already created my own series and doing Robin would definitely lead my career to other paths, but we never know.Marlon Wayans emphasized.

Tim Burton and I hate Robin. He is the most useless character in the world.

Later, screenwriter Daniel Waters even made a rather important admission about the character. Tim Burton and I hate Robin. He’s the most useless character in the world, especially considering that Tim Batman was conceived as a lonely loner; And here we have to have this funny guy around the hero, it made us both a little sick. .”he confided.

Subsequently, Marlon continued with The Wayans Brothers until 1998, before exploding into the public eye with the absolutely insane role of Shorty in the horror movie saga. He also shone as a drug addict opposite Jared Leto in Requiem For a Dream. Additionally, in 2017, he signed on for 2 seasons of his own comedy show called Marlon.