When Zack Snyder announced Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, he did so with a quote by having Harry Lennix read a quote from Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns. This older version of Batman informed a lot of Ben Affleck’s take on the character, and director Zack Snyder shared a deeper timeline on his “jaded” Batman. Speaking at IGN Fan Fest, Zack Snyder drew out a small timeline that reveals how Bruce Wayne became the Batman that we first see in Batman v Superman, and later how his character grows even further in Zack Snyder’s Justice League. “Our Bruce has a higher moral, or stronger, moral compass when he first started fighting in Gotham [City] 20 years ago,” says Snyder.