UPDATE Sept. 4: Batman himself has now been spotted. New set video shows off the new Batsuit, with longer ears on the cowl and Batman riding off on a GCPD police bike.
The Batmobile is back on the street, and it looks like it has been through a war.
Night shoots on The Batman Part II are underway in Glasgow, and new set video gives fans their first real look at the car in action since cameras rolled in June.
Video from Scottish Journeys, labeled night one of filming, gets right up close: the bodywork is scuffed and scarred, caked in grime, with fake snow packed into the tires. The caption jokes about Batman’s usual respect for the Highway Code.
Night One In Gotham
Filming kicked off Tuesday night on St Vincent Street, which has been dressed as a frozen Gotham.
Crowds lined the barricades to watch. Local reports describe fake ice covering the road, a Gotham hot dog cart, GCPD cruisers staged nearby, and lighting cranes going up on Wellington Street, with the Batmobile skidding across the ice for the cameras.
Photographer Ross Sneddon caught the money shot: the car kicking up spray on the slush-covered street while the crew watches from under umbrellas.
Several bars and restaurants along the route are closed through August 28 for the shoot, and road restrictions across the city center run into late September.
Battle Damage And Backup Batmobiles
A day before cameras rolled, set photos showed the production trucking in more than one Batmobile.
DC Film News shared a Reddit shot of the cars arriving on a flatbed, including a stripped-down shell riding alongside the fully dressed hero car.
That is standard practice for a stunt-heavy shoot. Nobody hauls a bare chassis to Scotland unless the car is going to take a beating.
What stands out is the condition. The hero car is already battered and filthy, which suggests these Glasgow scenes catch Batman mid-fight rather than fresh out of the Batcave.
Later footage from the same shoot answers part of that: the GCPD opens fire on the Batmobile and chases it down the street. Gotham’s own police are the ones putting dents in the car.
It also appears to be the same muscle-car Batmobile from 2022, essentially unchanged, which fits everything pointing to the sequel picking up not long after the first film.
The Winter Gotham Is Real
The snow is no surprise.
Reeves teased #SnowTires with the Batmobile camera tests tearing through a snowy Gotham back in May, and he has since confirmed the new cowl’s longer ears and the custom Panavision glass the sequel is shooting on.
Glasgow is where that winter Gotham finally hits real pavement. Frost-dressed streets, ice rigs, and the Batmobile sliding through it all at night.
Semper Vigilans
Production vehicles around the city carry signage reading “Semper Vigilans,” the sequel’s reported working title. It is Latin for always vigilant, or always watching.
Fans have connected the phrase to the Court of Owls, which tracks with the July set leak tying Charles Dance’s mystery role to an Owls-style secret society, part of a villain picture that remains publicly unsettled.
Consider the Court of Owls read speculation for now. The signage is real.
Where Production Stands
Cameras have been rolling at Warner Bros. Leavesden since June 12, with location work through London and Liverpool over the summer before the move north.
The Glasgow leg is scheduled for three weeks, hitting the Broomielaw, the Kingston Bridge area, North Street, and the riverside along the Clyde, with a large chunk of the overall schedule reportedly shot at night.
Glasgow doubling for Gotham is tradition at this point. Reeves shot the Necropolis sequences for the first film there in 2020 and told BBC Scotland afterward to get ready for a return. Promise kept.
Robert Pattinson leads the returning cast alongside Jeffrey Wright, Andy Serkis, Colin Farrell, Jayme Lawson, and Gil Perez-Abraham, with Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, Charles Dance, Brian Tyree Henry, and Sebastian Koch all in unannounced roles.
There is no shortage of noise around what those roles are, including the rumored rewrites adding Robin(s) plus more Penguin and Joker.
Pattinson, meanwhile, is staying busy on both sides of the Warner Bros. lot, as we’re told he’s already in the early Oscar mix for Dune: Part Three.
The Batman Part II, delayed four months earlier this summer, opens in theaters on February 18, 2028. For the full picture, see our guide to everything we know about Matt Reeves’ sequel.
