Costume designer Michael Wilkinson has revealed how Ben Affleck’s Batsuit was updated for Justice League, following on from Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice. In many ways, this year’s DC team-up movie represented a correction of course for Warner Bros’ DC Extended Universe franchise, with Affleck himself describing the film as a “big change tonally“.


In terms of designs, there was a vast amount of new material in Justice League. Batman had some new toys to play with, for example, in the shape of the Knightcrawler and the Flying Fox vehicles. And Wonder Woman’s Amazonian sisters got something of a costume revamp, with some design changes that incurred a lot of online backlash. Wilkinson has talked about that skimpy Amazonian armor recently, defending his decision to alter the designs from Patty Jenkins’ immensely successful Wonder Woman movie.


In terms of Batman’s main Batsuit from Justice League, the changes are a bit subtler. As Wilkinson explains in the tie-in book Justice League: The Art of the Film, decisions were made behind the scenes to alter tiny details of the Batsuit to upgrade it slightly from Batman V Superman’s version:


“We developed the Batsuit a little bit from what we saw in Batman V Superman. We did a slightly different print for the suit, we’ve added very dimensional seaming detail and pieces of armor underneath through the abs and the biceps. It has a little bit more sheen, more dimension to it.”


Considering that the Batsuit design from Batman V Superman was one of the most popular elements of that movie, it makes sense that Wilkinson and his team didn’t make any major changes for Justice League. In adding a little bit more armor and altering the seaming and printing, they ensured that the main Justice League Batsuit feels fresh whilst also retaining most of the key features of Batfleck’s previous outfit.


However, the third act of the film threw in a brand new outfit for Affleck: the Tactical Batsuit, with Night Owl-aping goggles and some lighter coloring. Much like Batman V Superman (in which Bruce Wayne wore a heavily armored Batsuit in certain scenes), Justice League showed fans two versions of the Batsuit: one basic version and one radically different iteration. Going forward, it will be interesting to see what Wilkinson comes up with to keep Batman’s wardrobe feeling fresh and modern.