It’s been largely quiet on The Batman front since September’s DC Fandome event, which showed off Matt Reeves and Robert Pattinson’s gothy take on the Caped Crusader. Now, there’s an international trailer that goes heavy on procedural vibes (that’s fitting, considering that HBO Max is plotting out an upcoming prequel series that goes procedural with an eye on police corruption). As well, this trailer spends more time with the baddies of the Reeves movie, including more of the film’s presumed central villain, Paul Dano’s Riddler.
Notably, this trailer skims over the movie’s unabashed use of the most glorious movie cliché (as uttered by Zoe Kravitz’s Catwoman) in history: “Maybe we’re not so different.” She does make an appearance, however, as does Colin Farrell’s Penguin; John Turturro’s crime boss, Carmine Falcone; and Jeffrey Wright’s Commissioner Gordon. There’s something else here that seems, well, fuzzy, as well as possibly a figment of the imagination. This is where I mention Hollywood Reporter‘s Dec. 10 edition of Heat Vision, which plays with the rumor of “Barry Keoghan maybe, maybe not, playing the Joker” in this film. THR neither confirms nor squashes that rumor, but the newsletter suggests (via anonymous sources) that “Warner Bros. has been testing two different cuts of The Batman, one with a certain actor, one without.”
No one (who isn’t supposed to know) knows whether there’s a grain of truth to the rumor, but this trailer does nothing (intentionally or not) to put the rumor to rest. There’s zero definitive evidence that the Joker will appear in The Batman. I’m not sure too many people would even be interested in a new Joker actor right now? Then again, there are unlimited Batmans in this world. And even though we don’t need any more Joker takes, the speculation is out there, and so, let’s pass some time by looking at a few interesting moments in the above trailer.
Shot 1 #1: At the 0:10 mark, we presumably see The Riddler’s stalker-photo collage.
Let’s have a closeup on a key panel, which shows off an unsettling, Joker-esque smile in the background. Nightmare fuel.
Shot #2: At the 1:30 min mark, we catch a glimpse of a giggling menace with his face hidden. It’s hard not to think of a certain scene from 2008’s The Dark Knight here, although (from the rest of the trailer) it seems that The Riddler’s your guy here.
For what it’s worth, The Batman and the Joaquin Phoenix-starring Joker both sit outside of the DCEU. Yes, Joker got sneaky and tried to insert a Bruce Wayne origin story into Joker, but there’s no indication that the opposite will happen here. Again, yeah, it’s definitely not needed. The Batman, however, takes place same universe as the Gotham PD-focused HBO Max series coming up. And Colin Farrell’s Penguin will see his own HBO Max spinoff, too. The Goth-Bat universe is already sprouting wings, man.
The Batman arrives on March 4, 2022.
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