On Friday, December 27, 2024, we were given terrible news: The Batman Part II is being delayed by another full year all the way to October of 2027. Naturally, this was incredibly disappointing news for fans of Matt Reeves’ The Batman. This is now the second time The Batman Part II has been delayed. Its original release date was supposed to be October 2025, but was reasonably delayed due to industry strikes and given a new release date of October 2026. Now, it’s been pushed back again.
I theorized the delay was truly because Robert Pattinson’s Batman was going to be integrated into the DCU, which you can read here, and Gunn has not actually confirmed or denied that theory. There’s been tons of rumors and “confirmations”, but no official word on whether or not the merge is happening.
Then, it was reported that the movie was delayed because it was going to need a lot more VFX work than its predecessor. Why that is the case is completely unknown. Maybe all those predictions about Mr. Freeze being the villain are true, maybe it’s because Clayface will be in the movie, or maybe it’s something else. Right now, there is no official word.
Interestingly, on the same day The Batman Part II was delayed, Andy Muschietti said The Brave and the Bold was being delayed. Gunn, the next day, said that, actually, it’s not being delayed. Who knows what’s really going on with all the Batman related chaos.
Now, Gunn has taken to Threads to defend the delay of the movie. These are his comments:
“To be fair, a 5 year gap or more is fairly common in sequels. 7 years between Alien and Aliens. 14 years between Incredibles. 7 years between the first two Terminators. 13 years between Avatars. 36 years between Top Guns. And, of course, 6 years between Guardians Vol 2 and Vol 3.”
Users on Threads pointed out that a lot of these comparisons aren’t quite fair, which were my thoughts exactly. When Alien was made, there were no plans for there to be a sequel. The same goes for Terminator, Incredibles, and Top Gun. These movies all found success and spawned franchises based on that success. Aliens wasn’t even announced until four years after Alien was released. Terminator 2 was announced six years after the first movie was released. Incredibles 2 was announced a whole decade after the first was released. Top Gun took several decades to have a sequel announced. The only two movies he listed that are comparable are the Guardians films and Avatar, but Gunn was fired between the two Guardians movies and managed to get the sequel out in a six year time gap.
The Batman was obviously written with the intention of having two movies follow it. The movie left us on a cliffhanger and a sequel was announced very soon after the movie was released. Reeves has even continued the story already with The Penguin. On top of that, it’s a film that’s connected to a massive comic book line and is about, arguably, the most popular character from any story ever.
Naturally, the response to Gunn’s post was mostly negative. The comparisons he’s making simply aren’t applicable enough to The Batman franchise and its sequel which has also apparently lost its title. Fans are going to react negatively toward the delay of a long awaited movie almost no matter how the delay is defended, but this defence certainly doesn’t seem well thought out.
However, the message that Gunn is trying to relay to everyone makes sense. Gaps in sequels are indeed common. It’s very disappointing news to have a sequel you were excited for get repeatedly delayed, but it’s still better than having an end product that was rushed and, therefore, lacking in quality. What Gunn is trying to say makes sense and is ultimately correct, he just went about delivering the message in an unsuccessful way. There truly isn’t a way to get that message across at this point without backlash from fans. The wound just has to heal with time.
What do you think about all the fuss around the delay? Do you think it’s to integrate The Batman into the DCU? Could Gunn have gone about this better? Let me know!