Warner Bros announced today that they are now developing a follow-up to their billion-dollar mega-hit Joker starring Joaquin Phoenix.
The Hollywood Reporter announced Todd Phillips is expected to return as director along with screenwriter Scott Silver. When the film was first announced, they had said that it would just be a standalone film. However, a lot of people became desperate to see more and since money talks most times, we will be getting a sequel as well as another project from director Todd Phillips which will also be a part of the DC universe.
Joaquin Phoenix had teased that he would come back to reprise his role for a couple weeks now which is very good news for the fans of the movie that wants to see more from the fantastical and psychotic mind of Gotham City’s most infamous supervillain.
Joker is the first-ever film that has an R rating that breached the one billion dollar mark while having an extremely different take on one of comic book’s most popular villain with a darker, grittier and dives deeper in the psychological aspects of the character where a lot of fans have been crying out for an Oscar win for Phoenix for the role.
Interestingly, this huge announcement carries a lot of weight. Rumors surrounding the Robert Pattinson Batman film will be set during the 1990s. And if that is the case, it wouldn’t be impossible for the studio to tie the two films together which will give us a face-off between Phoenix’s Joker to Pattinson’s iteration of the dark knight. Even though there has yet to be information released regarding the second DC film that Phillips is working on, some can assume that it can be a tie-in movie or even a new origin story for one of DC’s bad guys.
The Joker sequel if truly happening might see a 2022 release and Warner Bros seems to be heading the right direction with this new vision to correctly create their own universe after their first attempt has been mediocre at best beside a few bright spots here and there.
Joker just recently won the Golden Lion award at this year’s Venice International Film Festival. Phoenix already won the TIFF Tribute Actor Award last September during this year’s Toronto International Film Festival and will be heavily favored to win major awards on the Academy and Oscar Awards this coming year for his portrayal of Arthur Fleck.