Michael Keaton On Playing Batman Again: "It's Like Muscle Memory"

Although fans have always dreamed of a potential Batman Beyond live action movie starring Michael Keaton, few could've expected last year's bombshell news that the Beetlejuice star would put on the cowl again and make his grand return as an older Bruce Wayne in The Flash, of all movies. But that's exactly what's happening and, while we might still need to pinch ourselves to believe it, Keaton himself found the transition back into his iconic Batman role to be ... oddly normal.

Keaton is currently doing press for The Protégé and, in an interview with Jake Hamilton, obligingly answered some nerdy questions about his experience slipping back into the suit from Tim Burton's Batman and the 1992 sequel Batman Returns. As it turns out, the veteran actor experienced all sorts of emotions while reprising such a nostalgic role:

"It was shockingly normal. It was weird. And like, I went, 'Oh, oh yeah, that's right. But also, as you start to play the scenes, it was like a lot of memories ... a lot of really interesting, like sense memories, actually. It's [like muscle memory]."

This sounds very similar to what previous actors have said about returning to iconic roles years after the fact. Keaton is a pro's pro and doesn't strike me as the kind of person who might get overwhelmed by the moment or lost in nostalgia after three decades away from the character (or at least admit to it), but it's cool nonetheless that he even agreed to return in the first place and was able to relive his memories while filming for the new movie.