In Justice League the heroes may not have the ability to fly on their own, but thanks to new concept art fans can get a fresh look how they still can take to the sky in Batman's Flying Fox.
The Flying Fox began as a series of sketches by the Parisian-born Tatopoulos, as he tried to find an overall design that would nod to classic planes like the Harrier jet while showcasing the bold, brutalist aesthetic of the Dark Knight.
Tatopoulos first major brainstorm: shifting the cockpit back from its usual spot near the nose of the plane. That little movement made it special, said Tatopoulos, who also served as production designer on last years Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
"That little movement made it special," Tatopoulos said. "It started to make it more like the Batmobile."
You can check out the concept art in the gallery.
Tatopolous, who also served as production designer on last year's Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, also wanted to give the Flying Fox a look similar to the Batmobile's well-used quality, something he achieved by roughing the Fox up a bit inside and out.
Physically constructing the entire jet was deemed unnecessary given the magic of CGI. But Tatopoulos and his team designed and built a full-scale three-level interior, with a bottom cargo area big enough to easily fit the Batmobile and a slew of do-gooders, a middle floor packed with tech ("like a Batcave in flight") and an upper-level cockpit making sure to give it all a slightly roughed-up quality. "You can tell it's used," Tatopoulos says. "Batman doesn't go in the Batcave every weekend and wash the car and the jet," he expained.
While Tatopoulos and his team didn't need to actually build a full-scale version of the Flying Fox for the film, they did build a full-scale version of the vehicle's interior, creating a cargo area at the bottom, a tech area that Tatopoulos described as an in-flight Batcave in the middle, and a cockpit on the top. But even with the interior built out to scale, the full Flying Fox wasn't the only thing witheld from Justice League.
Not all of the Flying Fox's capabilities made it into "Justice League." Can it go underwater? Fly into space? For now, Tatopoulos won't say. But he and his team designed the plane with features like a machine-gun turret that can be utilized in future movies and sooner than that for any kids who get their hands on a Flying Fox toy this holiday season.
The vehicle has more capabilities than what will be seen in the upcoming film but will make it into the hands of kids. Tatopoulos said that the Flying Fox translates very well to a kid's toy.
"The more cool things it does, the more it becomes a great vehicle for the movie and a great toy for kids -- it's all the same thing," he said. "We're all like kids. We all want that jet on our desks at home."
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