I have read online that Bruce/Batman's age is supposed to be around 45 in the movie. That sounds fine for this film and for the Justice League movie but it makes me wonder about the character in the long term. At some point, it will be a little unbelievable that the Justice League would still need Batman considering he will be a 50 years old human in 5 years after BvS, when the others in the team are younger, superpowered heroes no matter how good he still looks. I would hate it if Batman is reduced to only becoming a tactician for the team. I think it might have made more sense to start with Bruce in his late 30's. About the same age as in TDKR. That would be old enough to have a Batman who has been operating for a while, but it also allows the character more time to be a physical force on the JL. I think this problem could cause problems for DC in the future. I am intrigued by the idea of an older Batman, but I think the interest in an older Batman is one off. I doubt people will be clamoring to see a series of films with Batman past his physical prime.

Yeah, Michael Uslan confirmed it. I don't have a problem with him being 45 but wish he was around Superman's age, 33-35 is perfect IMO.

Mid 40's

I agree with a number of your points. In my opinion, though there are a few exceptions, characters younger than maybe 30 years old are unappealing. I've always been a really big fan of the old, grizzled character rather than the young guy with a mouth; older men are just more badass in every way, to be honest.

As far as his pushing 50 is concerned, I LOVE the idea. As I said before, 99 times out of 100 I will always choose the old badass over the young guy, but I also think it allows them to explore a Batman we've never seen on the big screen (I ignore that the Nolan trilogy exists). He'll most likely come off very much like the Dark Knight Returns version of the character, though he obviously hasn't flat out retired yet, assuming that the rumors are true. He's tired, the only thing keeping him going is the knowledge that his city is still a horrible place, but then along comes this alien in bright colors who, to the people of that world, might have very well been responsible for the destruction in metropolis. It gives him a new reason to keep going since Batman would outright fight anyone (even New Gods...) who he considers to be a threat to his mission. Then, as we all know, they'll somehow manage to put all that aside and form the JLA.

I think that if he does age to the point that he's physically incapable of doing what he does now (honestly, I've seen 60 year olds who can move and fight just as well as their 30 year old counterparts), they could possibly be setting up their version of Kingdom Come. I get the feeling that they're not going to directly adapt any story, what with BvS essentially being The Dark Knight Returns, but not, so a Kingdom Come-esque film could certainly be in the works for an end game kinda scenario.

@fattytravy: But a 50-60 year old Batman cannot seriously be expected to keep up with what will then be a 40 year old Superman at that point and a perpetually young Wonder Woman along with other superheroes who will be presumably younger than Bruce no matter how badass he might seem. The issue is longterm longevity. A TDKR and a Kingdom Come storyline is something that would be more appropriate just before you are going to reboot the universe. There's a reason why comics like TDKR and Kingdom Come are out of canon. Its because, while its interesting to watch these characters at a different age, its not possible to hold audience interest in these characters at that age for more than a couple of occurrences. Also if you make Bruce completely physically capable at 50+, then you take away what was appealing about an older Bruce in the first place which is the fact that he is past his physical prime and still fighting. This makes the issue difficult to solve. One one hand, making him older makes him a unique version of Batman that would be interesting to watch, but it also makes the character difficult to be sustainable in the long term. At some point, the audience is going to look at the 50+ year old Batman and wonder how the guy is not dead yet or what use he has in the Justice League out in the field. Making Bruce 45 right now just makes the point where the audience will ask these questions a lot closer. Given that they are just starting the DC cinematic universe, I think its a little strange that they have started with Bruce at this age.

@ndixit: Well, I'm not saying that he would be able to duke it out with Darkseid at 60, so much as he could still operate as Batman dealing with thugs and such at that age. I should have been clearer on that point.

You must also take into account that being 45 at the start of the series doesn't mean that the character will age in real time. If they somehow manage to keep these movies going for nearly 10 years, there's no reason to think that he'll now be 55 at the end. What is, in their world, a couple of months could just be 2 years in our world.

Personally, I think people want their comic book films based in reality to the point that it starts taking away from the characters. You need to be able to suspend your disbelief if you're going to be a comic book fan, otherwise you're just going to constantly be pointing out how ridiculous the stories really are. It's absurd to believe that a man could have his spine shattered, thrown off a building and then recover from that to the point that it might as well not have ever happened. That sort of thing exists in comics because these are ongoing series with a central character, and while I'm not saying movies should stick to that same standard, you can't completely rip out everything which might be slightly absurd. Batman stories in particular have managed to be fantastical to a degree in their own way for the last 30 years but still manage to connect with people on an emotional level simply because he IS just normal guy who can be hurt.

I'm more than willing to suspend my disbelief and accept that a man in his early 50s who IS reaching that point where he's simply worn out can fight a superhuman (with the assistance of a mech suit) in a movie where people are shooting lasers out of their eyes.

I'm not sure if my reply went through because it's not showing up, but to put a 3 paragraph response simply...

I don't think that the DCCU Batman will age past perhaps 55 and even if he does, why is that such a problem? These films are clearly taking a more comic book approach rather than that Nolan pseudo realism, and Batman has many times fought at that age with the assistance of various suits. For nearly 30 years we've always seen a Batman who's in his prime, who can leap at a challenge and conquer it with a boot in someones face. Being 45 in these films offers them the opportunity to show us a tired Batman who, because of his age, has to rely on the power of his mind (and technology) rather than his fists. I mean, I'm downright excited by the fact that if they're taking it the route that I think they are, we might finally have a Batman film that is less an action film and more of a detective story with action elements.

I'm more than willing to suspend my disbelief and accept that a man in his early 50s (with the assistance of a mech suit) can take on an alien who shoots laser beams out of his eyes.

EDIT: I guess the other one did post, but I think I made a small point or two here that I didn't in the other, perhaps, so...

Don't like it.

I can't find the article where I read this, but I'm almost certain that I saw a rumor a while ago that said that the Batman reboot series would be prequels to Dawn of Justice, with the first one taking place during his first or second year of crime fighting; if that is true we wouldn't need to worry about an older Bruce Wayne. As for Justice League, he can use the mech suit from Dawn of Justice, or maybe even introduce the Batman Beyond suit (although I hope if they do that they'll give us a movie about Terry McGuiness eventually).

Plus, even if none of this happens, they still could do what @fattytravy said and say that the movies aren't taking place in real time. I'd be OK with that too.

@zearing: That would only be a rumor due to the assumption that WB wouldn't want to do a Batman movie with an older Batman. There's nothing stating they can't do that.

The mech suit will probably be a standard, but even if they never make a Batman Beyond movie or use Terry, I'd love to see the suit somewhere even if it's a small cameo.

I haven't heard anything like that, but it would be extremely intriguing to see an experienced Batman first, then have his first movie being a prequel ala Year One or something like that.

And I would piss my pants if they had the Beyond suit, even just sitting in the Batcave in a case or something and have Bruce mention off handily "I'm developing it for future use". I don't care about Batman Beyond too much, but that costume is EASILY my favorite.

In an case. Affleck might be 40 something, but dude looks like he's in his early 30's so I don't think there will be a hard time making him look the part. They can easily work around the age thing. JLA doesn't have to be "5 years later", it could be "6 months later" or whatever.

Honestly, I'd really rather not have prequels which date back that far. My psyche cannot handle another year of waiting for whether or not they'll choose a guy who looks like a proper man for the role and on top of that, I'm a bit tired of origin stories. Assuming that they give Bats another 3 movies to work with in this universe, I'd really like to see 3 that actually tie together.

Why does people keep with this like being new and fresh.

There was Batman movies before Nolan and before Tim Burton.

Isnt until Batman Begins we see a movie that deals with a younger Batman.

Most of movies deal with a Batman that must be in his late 30s early 40s..

Also i dont think DC plans to keep this going for long, lets be honest the superhero age must come to an end at some point, maybe they just think this isnt going to last for long or plan to change the universe in some point, crisis or 52 style thing.

We know an older Batman cant stay with them for too long and i know this experience thing people try to use, but if Batman has never deal with superhumans, it has zero experience against superhumans, so the experience argument is bullshit.

Or maybe they will kill Batman, so the DC universe has a reason to stop living in his shadow.