Fresh off Christopher Nolan‘s Interstellar, and having recently scored both The Dark Knight Rises and last year’s official DC Comics cinematic universe kickstarter Man of Steel, composer Hans Zimmer is returning to score Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. And given his ties to Nolan’s own Batman franchise, Zimmer is enlisting the help of a friend to aid in tackling the theme music for the titular superheroes.
According to Zimmer (via Comic Book Resources), composer Junkie XL, given name Tom Holkenborg, will be taking on scoring duties for Ben Affleck‘s Batman, while Zimmer will use his Man of Steel score as a palette with which to create theme music for Henry Cavill‘s Superman.
Zimmer said he agonized over whether to use any of his previous Batman-related work for Zack Snyder‘s upcoming film, and ultimately he decided he didn’t want to betray what he, Nolan, and James Newton Howard created for that iteration of the comic book character. “And so I asked Zack if it would be OK if I called a friend in,” Zimmer added, and call a friend, he did.
Junkie XL provided additional composing, music, and rhythm help on both The Dark Knight Rises and Man of Steel, and he also just wrapped up his work on Mad Max: Fury Road, for which he wrote and composed the score. In other words, he’s no stranger to DC Comics properties, nor is he a stranger to action-packed blockbusters, so it sounds like the music for the film is in able hands.
Zimmer has composed several of my favorite original soundtracks of the last couple decades, and Mr. XL — ahem, Junkie XL — is a largely unknown quantity, for me at least, so I’m interested to hear what exactly they can put together for the film. But with Zimmer’s seal of approval, we can assume Junkie XL is quite talented, leading me to believe it’s really just a matter of how well the two collaborate with each other.
