During a podcast interview, Kevin Conroy spoke out about fans' reactions to his appearance in Batwoman as an elderly, murderous Bruce Wayne. While he's well aware that a lot of viewers didn't like seeing a dark alternate Batman, Conroy is now on record as saying he had a lot of fun with the role.

Conroy is best known as the voice of Batman in the landmark show Batman: The Animated Series. For many fans, he simply is Batman. Conroy's opportunity to take the role out of the recording booth and onto the set came in Batwoman's midseason finale in December, which was also the second part of the Crisis on Infinite Earths mega-crossover that condensed many of the "Arrowverse" TV shows into a single universe. In Batwoman, Conroy plays a Bruce Wayne who's from both a dark future and an alternate timeline, where he broke his vow to never take a life, and was subsequently crippled in a fight where he killed his Earth's Superman.

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"The fans were not happy about that. They didn't like seeing that version of Bruce Wayne," Conroy said on a recent episode of Michael Rosenbaum's podcast Inside of You. "But for me... it was a lot of fun to stretch my acting chops a little bit." Rosenbaum, of course, has a long DC Universe history of his own, having played Lex Luthor on Smallville for its first seven seasons; this episode of his podcast should really have been called "Lex vs. Batman" for the sake of the views.

Conroy wasn't told anything other than the bare minimum about the Batwoman role before he accepted it, only knowing that he would play an older Bruce Wayne, due to the showrunners' secrecy. "I got the script basically when I was about to get on a plane to fly to Vancouver to do the show," Conroy said. "I hadn't seen anything... So it was full of surprises. I didn't know I was going to try and kill Supergirl. He was dark."

Batwoman's take on a fallen, nihilistic Batman draws heavily on seminal works from throughout the character's history. Bruce's exoskeleton resembles the one worn by an older Batman in Mark Waid and Alex Ross's 1996 Kingdom Come miniseries, while his dialogue with Ruby Rose's Kate Kane paraphrases similar lines from Frank Miller's 1986 miniseries The Dark Knight Returns. Conroy's Batman, officially designated the Batman of Earth-99 in series continuity, even has the Batmobile from the 1989 Tim Burton movie under a tarp in his cave.

Batwoman is scheduled to return for a second season in January of 2021, with Javicia Leslie's Ryan Wilder taking on the title character's mantle following the departure of Ruby Rose's Kate Kane.

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Source: Digital Spy