Matt Reeves sets 'The Batman' spinoff series focusing on Gotham Police at HBO Max

The Batman isn't even out yet, but writer/director Matt Reeves is already cultivating the next phase of his version of Gotham City. HBO Max announced Friday that it has given Reeves a commitment for a new streaming series focused on the Gotham City Police Department, set in the same universe as the upcoming film starring Robert Pattinson in the title role. 

The series will be written by Terence Winter, a veteran of HBO crime dramas The Sopranos and Boardwalk Empire, and will "build upon the motion picture’s examination of the anatomy of corruption in Gotham City, ultimately launching a new Batman universe across multiple platforms." 

“This is an amazing opportunity, not only to expand the vision of the world I am creating in the film, but to explore it in the kind of depth and detail that only a longform format can afford — and getting to work with the incredibly talented Terence Winter, who has written so insightfully and powerfully about worlds of crime and corruption, is an absolute dream," Reeves said in a statement. 

Reeves and Winter are partnering for the new series with The Batman producer Dylan Clark and Warner Bros. Television. While the show does not yet have an official title, The Hollywood Reporter notes that it's being referred to internally as both Gotham Central (a name fans of one of the most acclaimed Batman spinoff stories ever written will certainly recognize) and GCPD. No casting information has been announced yet, so we don't know if the series will feature any appearance from Pattinson or from Reeves' new Commissioner Gordon, Jeffrey Wright. 

We also don't know exactly what tone and approach the series will take at this point, because we haven't actually had a chance to see The Batman yet. That film isn't set to arrive until October of 2021, and it's hard to read exactly what Reeves' version of Gotham City will look like in its wake. That said, stories of Gotham City cops battling supervillains on their own terms without much direct help from the Caped Crusader while also struggling with their own internal darkness and even outright police villainy have proven to be fertile ground in DC Comics before. And with a writer like Terrence Winter in the show's corner, we can expect something that won't shy away from any of it.