Rosario Dawson Cast As Batgirl In New Lego Batman Movie

Rosario Dawson has long been an avowed fangirl, having appeared in such geek friendly fare as Sin City, Clerks 3, and the Marvel Netflix Daredevil series. Now, Dawson has been cast as Batgirl in the new Lego Batman film.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Dawson will provide the voice acting for the character of Barbara Gordon, the daughter of police commissioner James Gordon, who later goes on to become the heroine Batgirl.

Lego Batman comes as a spin off of Warner Brothers’ wildly popular 2014 film The Lego Movie, which saw the on-screen crossover of some of pop culture’s most popular characters, such as DC Comics’ Batman, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, and Superman, Star Wars‘ C-3PO, Han Solo, and Lando Calrissian, and Gandalf of Lord of the Rings, as well as historical figures such as Abraham Lincoln and William Shakespeare.

In Lego Batman, which is still in the early stages of casting, Dawson joins a star-studded voice cast reminiscent of the previous film, with Saturday Night Live alum reprising his role as Bruce Wayne Batman, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World star Michael Cera taking the role of Dick Grayson/Robin, and The Hangover film franchise star and comedian Zach Galifianakis in negotiations to play The Joker.

Writer/producer Chris McKay, who served as the animation supervisor of The Lego Movie, will direct. His previous work includes Adult Swim’s Robot Chicken, including a Star Wars parody TV movie, Titan Maximum, and Moral Orel. McKay has already signed to executive produce The Lego Movie Sequel, which has been announced for 2018.

Handling the script for Lego Batman is Pride and Prejudice and Zombies scribe Seth Grahame-Smith, whose previous work includes MTV’s The Hard Times of RJ Berger, as well as the feature film Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, which, like Pride, was based on novels written by Smith. Additionally, Smith has been announced as the scriptwriter for the upcoming Tim Burton sequel Beetlejuice 2, which returns Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder, as well as a forthcoming film based on the popular DC Comics character The Flash, scheduled for release in 2018.

Lego Batman is apparently unrelated to a slate of previously produced straight-to-DVD releases featuring iconic DC Comics characters in the Lego universe, such as Batman: The Movie and Justice League vs. Bizarro League.

As Proma Khosla of Mashable points out, Dawson is no stranger to the comic book world. The self-avowed fangirl has appeared in several on-screen adaptations including the Marvel Netflix series Daredevil, where she stars as nurse Claire Temple, Sin City and Sin City: A Dame To Kill For, in which she played Gail, and has provided voice acting as Wonder Woman in DC’s animated film Justice League: Throne of Atlantis, as well as Artemis in Wonder Woman.

In addition, Dawson has established her geek credibility in other roles, such as Valerie Brown in the 2001 live action cartoon adaptation of Josie and the Pussycats, Laura Vasquez in the 2002 Men in Black II sequel, the co-starring role in Kevin Smith’s 2006 sequel Clerks II, Abernathy in the Robert Rodriquez / Quentin Tarrantino double-feature Grindhouse and Death Proof, Velvet von Black in the 2009 cult hit The Haunted World of El Superbeasto, Persephone in the 2010 film Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, and as the voice of Nix in the 2014 animated movie Tinkerbell and the Legend of the Neverbeast.

Dawson will reprise her role as Temple in the upcoming Marvel Netflix series Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, is also attached to revisit her role as Becky in Smith’s expected Clerks III, and also provides the voice of Elaris in the animated epic Ratchet and Clank, based off of the popular video game series, which is due out next year.

Dawson is also the creator and co-writer of the 2006 graphic novel series O.C.T.: Occult Crimes Taskforce.