Titans Season 3 Has Cast Its Scarecrow, But Will He Be Better Than Gotham’s?

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When Titans Season 3 premieres on HBO Max in the near future, we’ll be delving even deeper into the Batman mythology. Brenton Thwaites’ Dick Grayson and Curran Walters’ Jason Todd will be joined by fellow Bat-Family members Barbara Gordon (played by Savannah Welch) and Tim Drake (payed by Jay Lycurgo), and the superhero team will also cross paths with the nefarious Dr. Jonathan Crane, a.k.a. Scarecrow. Now Titans has found the actor to bring this Batman baddie to life, which now leaves us asking the question of if this version will be better than the one we watched on Gotham.

As reported by Deadline, Mad Men alum Vincent Kartheiser has been cast as Titans’ Scarecrow, with announcement eight months after it was first revealed the character was coming. Like his comic book counterpart, Kartheiser’s Jonathan Crane has terrorized Gotham City with his fear toxin, but when we meet him in Titans, he’ll be an inmate in Arkham Asylum. Along with Charlie Tahan and David W. Thompson playing the role across Gotham’s five-season run, Scarecrow has previously been portrayed in live-action by Cillian Murphy in the Dark Knight film trilogy.

For those who missed out on Gotham’s version of Scarecrow, the young Jonathan Crane was introduced in Season 1 as the son of Gerald Crane, who created the original fear toxin formula. Unfortunately for Jonathan, his father injected him with the toxin and destroyed his sanity, so by the time Jonathan returned in Season 4, he made the full transition to Scarecrow. From there, he wreaked havoc on Gotham City both on his own and with fellow villains like Jerome Valeska, by instilling fear in its citizens. Gotham’s Scarecrow was simultaneously an unusual, yet rather faithful take on the character, so it’ll be interesting to see how Vincent Kartheiser’s Scarecrow on Titans compares.

It is worth noting that while Scarecrow is one of Batman’s most famous enemies, it doesn’t sound like he’ll be causing trouble in Titans Season 3… or at least, not necessarily right away. It was previously revealed that while locked in Arkham Asylum, Jonathan Crane is offering his services as a profiler and consultant for the Gotham City Police Department. However, that’s not to say that Crane couldn’t break out Arkham during the course of Season 3 and start spraying fear gas everywhere, either for his own machinations or in partnership with one of the season’s other villains.

As far as Vincent Kartheiser goes, he is arguably best known for playing Pete Campbell on the hit AMC series Mad Men, although he made a splash on TV beforehand as Connor in The WB’s Angel. In recent years, Kartheiser’s standout credits have included Casual, Das Boot, Proven Innocent and The OA, and he also played the A.I. representations in the documentary The Social Dilemma.

Titans Season 3 doesn’t have an HBO Max premiere date yet (you can sign up for the streaming service with this link), but production is expected to conclude this June. While we wait for more news items about these upcoming episodes, which hopefully includes getting an early look at Vincent Kartheiser as Scarecrow, browse through our 2021 spring TV schedule to learn when your favorite shows are currently airing.