Is a New Justice League TV Series in the Works at WB Animation?

Back when Cartoon canceled Green Lantern Young Justice, I read an interview with Bruce Timm, the executive producer of Green Lantern (and producer of Justice League), in which he said that Cartoon Network canceled the show because their audiences were skewed to old and as a result the shows didn't have enough "toyization"--meaning they didn't sell enough toys. I'm in my 50s, so even if they'd licensed some company to make action figures from Timm's GL, the ship, etc., I wouldn't have bought any of them. While I'm a lot older than the average audience even for those shows, the average viewer was too old to buy many toys too.

Cartoon actually went with Beware the Batman as a replacement. Beware the Batman featured many alumni of Timm's DC Animated universe, including producer Glenn Murakami, director Curt Geda, casting director Andrea Romano, and even writer Adam Beechen, known on the earlier series as someone who would storyboard a fight scene with literally hundreds of pages of excellent drawings that they couldn't possibly put into a series. 

I'm not sure what the executives at Cartoon were smoking, because Beware the Batman was much, much more adult than GL or YJ. I showed my best friend a still shot of BtB's Magpie, he took one look and said, "I'm not letting my daughter watch [i][that/i]. I don't want her getting any ideas about how to dress. http://img3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20140131020459/villains/images/7/71/Beware_the_batman_s_magpie_by_iurypadilha-d6d56ee.jpg

I've never heard anything from Cartoon's side. I do know from the commentaries on the DCAU series (I have Batman: The Animated Series, Superman: The Animated Series, Batman Beyond, Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, and all four animated film spin-offs, but not Static Shock or The Zeta Project) That Bruce and company started out doing kids shows and slowly over the course of making the DCAU pushed the envelope to get darker and more adult. They had some serious constraints at Kids' WB, which got substantially expanded when they went to Cartoon. At KWB they had to submit scripts for approval, but at CN the executives weren't even used to reading scripts before production. So Timm and company went reasonably far toward darker, more adult animation, and you can tell from the commentaries that they preferred that to the old constraints for kids' shows.

I suspect that much of the old Timm team feels that way, so whether it's Timm making GL or Murakami making BtB, they probably always wanted to go more adult and darker. I wouldn't be surprised if from the perspective of CN, they keep getting pitched new cartoons that will bring in children, and thus sell toys, bringing in ad revenue from toy companies, only to get shows that actually appeal, if not primarily to old geezers like me, then at least to teens who's gotten too old to buy toys for the most part. I'm not sure if there's anything still on CN done by any of the old Timm crew now.

I do watch Teen Titans Go! It started out as shorts during commercial breaks,and clearly targets little kids. I found the early episodes extremely funny, but the show's worn a bit thin for me now, and got to the potty for humor far too often for my taste. It's only a soft 15 minutes long, so since I have the DVR set to record it, I still watch it. It's often a pleasant diversion from my lying weasel department chair who cares only about currying favor with his bosses and not at all about our students. Where's The Question when you need him?! 

I'm not sure to whom they'll try to market the new Justice League. CN, like Warner, seems too taken with product revenue nowadays to want anything that might appeal to adults, so it might not be good. Keep in mind though that Timm and company managed to make high-quality animated series in the 1990s despite having to work under the Kids' WB constraints. So someone might be able to do make something that sells toys but that adults can really like too.

Warner, by the way, but Timm in charge of it' DC Universe Animated Original Movies, and he's been cranking them out for years now. They range from decent to great. I think they're all based on graphic novels or long comic book story arcs. They've made at least two from the first volume of Batman/Superman, the outstanding comic series that ran from 2003 to 2011, "Batman/Superman: Public Enemies," and "Batman/Superman: Apocalypse," the former of which is the first animated appearance of Powergirl, the old Earth-Two equivalent of Supergirl. I have 16 of the first 19 (having deliberately skipped 1 of them), but I've fallen behind in purchasing them (I never know when the lying weasel will finally find an excuse to get rid of me so I'm more careful with what I spent now) and there are now 24.

One of the movies I don't have it Justice League: Gods and Monsters, and they spun off a web series from it, the three episodes of the first season of which aired Machinima this year. They're going to release a 10-episode second season in 2016. It looks like you can watch the first season (comprised of three shorts) at http://www.theverge.com/2015/6/13/8776007/justice-league-gods-and-monsters-chronicles-machinima-online-series

EDIT: If you haven't seen the three Gods and Monsters shorts, don't read the spoiler text before watching the videos. The first two videos are dark and disturbing, and not suitable for children.

Now that I've seen the three Gods and Monsters shorts, I'm thinking I might rent the movie on Amazon Instant Video for $5 and see how I like it. I think most of the 17 I have already I've watched only once (I think I watched Crisis on Two Earths twice), plus I have Justice League: Gods and Monsters in DVD format on my Amazon.com Wish List, so I might get it later this year anyway. 