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Batgirl: Director Kevin Smith calls cancellation of Latina-led film ‘an incredibly bad look’

Leslie Grace was set to star as the DC comic-book character until the film was scrapped last week

Nicole Vassell
Monday 08 August 2022 07:37 BST
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The future of Batman

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Kevin Smith has condemned Warner Bros’s cancellation of the Batgirl film, calling the decision “an incredibly bad look”.

Despite the fact that the film’s its $90m (£73.7m) shoot had been completed earlier this year, the film studio announced that there were no longer plans for the film to be released in any format.

Explaining the reason behind cutting Batgirl, company CEO David Zaslav said: “We’re not going to launch a movie until it’s ready.”

This news sparked significant discussion among film fans, with many criticising Warner Bros for the shock decision.

In a recent edition of his YouTube series, Hollywood Babble-On, filmmaker Kevin Smith commented on news of Batgirl’s scrapping. He pinpointed the fact that since Leslie Grace, a Latina actor, was due to take on the role of Barbara Gordon in the film, Batgirl’s cancellation felt particularly disappointing.

“It’s an incredibly bad look to cancel the Latina Batgirl movie,” Smith said in the video.

“I don’t give a s*** if the movie was absolute f***ing dog**** – I guarantee you that it wasn’t.”

He then mentioned the directors of the film, Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, as proof that the film would have been a quality product.

“The two directors who directed that movie did a couple of episodes of Ms Marvel, and it was a wonderful f***ing show and they had more money to do Batgirl than they had to do an episode of Ms Marvel and stuff.”

El Arbi and Bilall Fallah released separate statements expressing their shock at their film being scrapped, while Leslie Grace said that she felt “blessed to have worked among absolute greats and forged relationships for a lifetime in the process”.

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