This year marks the 75th anniversary of everyone’s favorite traumatized-youth-turned-costume-wearing-vigilante, Batman. While we don’t normally cover much in the way of comic books here—unless they have an overtly science fiction bend—there is one part of the Dark Knight universe that is right up our alley: Batman Beyond. Just the other day we saw the first clip from Darwyn Cooke’s new short that he whipped up for the occasion. The film debuted at WonderCon this weekend, and has already made its way onto the Internet for your enjoyment.

Set in a dystopian future Gotham City of 2039, Batman Beyond introduces viewers to an aged Bruce Wayne, who, though he still gets around pretty well for an old guy, has seen better days. Lucky for him there he’s found a sidekick, and kindred spirit, in the form of troubled 17-year-old Terry McGinnis. The show ran for 52 episodes—over three seasons—from 1999 through 2001, but was cancelled to make way for Justice League.

We don’t talk a whole lot about traditional superheroes here at GFR. That doesn’t mean we’re not fans, there’s just a bunch of other folks out there covering that beat. Sure, we’re giving Guardians of the Galaxy a lot of love, but that shit takes place in deep space and has a talking raccoon, so how can we not? Batman Beyond enters into our purview due to the futuristic nature of the show, and though there haven’t been any new episodes in well over a decade, that’s about to change when a new animated short debuts this weekend at Wondercon. It sounds like a good time, and if you’re not lucky enough to be there, check out this sneak peek at Darwyn Cooke’s addition to the cannon.

Warning: the clip below contains some salty language, so consider it NSFW.

We’re now in a time between Batmen, with Christopher Nolan and Christian Bale having wrapped up their massively successful trilogy and the mantle now being handed off to director Zack Snyder, actor Ben Affleck, and the burgeoning DC Comics Cinematic Universe. In fact, Nolan’s Bat flicks made such a massive impact that’s it’s easy to forget that, before Batman Begins came together, Warner Bros. spent years floundering around and trying to figure out what to do with the Batman franchise after Joel Schumacher, George Clooney, and Arnold Schwarzenegger killed it stone dead with 1997’s Batman & Robin. One of the more out-there ideas for a franchise resurrection was a live-action Batman Beyond movie, based on the future-set animated series that premiered in 1999. With the future of the Bat in flux, Voices From Krypton points us toward the above clip, where host Kevin Smith discusses the Batman Beyond movie that never happened with DC animation legend Paul Dini.

I can remember the days before the Internet, when the rumor mill was a Mom & Pop affair. When magazines and certain dailies were responsible for all our entertainment news, and sources tended to confirm things before they were reported. Of course, that meant not as many people were able to get rabid over ridiculously exciting rumors like this one: the eventual Batman reboot/megaprequelsequel could be a Batman Beyond movie, based on the stellar animated series that ran on the WB (now CW) from 1999-2001. This isn’t exactly the most expected or likely direction that Warner Bros. might take the Dark Knight’s legacy, but it would be pretty remarkable.

I’m not knocking this website or anything, but Batman on Film is the source of this news, claiming they’ve “heard some whispers” that the adaptation is “on the table.” This probably means that either the editor was listening to the whispers of a few Batman Beyond fans discussing how cool a movie would be, or Warner is actually taking into account every single Batman project that’s ever existed before deciding where to go with the franchise.