Warning: This article contains spoilers from “The Batman.”
“The Batman” director Matt Reeves has a message for you — the final scene with The Riddler doesn’t necessarily set up the sequel.
What happened: At the end of “The Batman,” Riddler is sent to Arkham Asylum, a home for the criminally insane. There, he meets a fellow locked up criminal, who, covered in shadows, agrees to be friends with the Riddler.
- The fellow inmate laughs maniacally in a way that any Batman fan will recognize as the Joker.
What to know: Reeves confirmed in an interview with Variety that the man in the jail cell is Joker.
- But that doesn’t mean Joker is the new villain in a potential sequel, Reeves said.
- Reeves said Joker’s introduction helped develop the ending of the film. It was meant to show that Batman will always have more villains to fight in Gotham City and he can’t leave.
Context: Reeves told Variety that the Joker originally had a bigger role in “The Batman,” including a direct conversation with Batman early in the film.
- He said Batman — distressed over Riddler’s killings — went to Arkham Asylum and chatted with Joker about what was happening.
- Reeves said he will release the scene once more people have seen “The Batman.”
What he said: “It’s a really creepy, cool scene,” he told Variety. “That was the scene that was meant to introduce this guy and just to tease the audience to go like, ‘Oh my ... he’s here too? And he’s not yet the Joker — what’s this going to be?’ And then it seems so delicious in the story, since we’d already set him up, to have the end of the story, the completion of the Riddler arc, be that he was in a cell next to this guy.”
The bigger picture: Reeves told reporters before the film debuted that Mr. Freeze could be a villain in a new sequel, according to Collider.
- “I think there’s actually a grounded version of that story, which could be really powerful and could be really great,” he said.
- “I think to me what would be interesting would be to try and unwind the fantastical and see, well, how could that make sense here? And so that’s kind of my view, how I see it.”