The Batman director Matt Reeves recently announced that he had finally finished the script for his long-awaited sequel, which he penned alongside co-writer Mattson Tomlin.
The welcome news came in the midst of concerns that the movie, which does appear to be officially titled The Batman - Part II for the time being, may have been cancelled or been hit with another significant delay, with speculation continuing to mount that DC Studios co-heads James Gunn and Peter Safran might be planning to either introduce a brand-new version of The Dark Knight in The Brave and The Bold, or fold Robert Pattinson's take on the iconic hero into the DCU.
Whatever the future may hold for the BatVerse, we are getting at least one more movie featuring Pattinson's Caped Crusader in what will now be branded an Elseworlds tale, and Reeves shared several encouraging updates on the red carpet of last night's Emmy Awards.
Though he declined to share any specific plot details, Reeves did confirm that production is scheduled to get underway early next year.
“We’re beginning. We’re staffing up. We’re starting to get our crew back together. We’re getting ready. We’re basically entering [pre-production]. We’ll be making the movie in the spring... super excited,” he told THR.
“Because of what the first movie was and what [The Batman: Part 2] is, which is so much a detective story, the idea of trying to protect the secrets of the movie is super important because it’s a mystery. That would be an extra level of heartbreak if that part of it started getting out. You wanna keep the surprise so the fans... can have the fun experience that I always love going to the movies, which was to go and be surprised.”
Reeves also confirmed that Pattinson has now read the script - which was delivered to him in a highly secure envelope that required a separate code to open - and was very happy with the story, which will seemingly take the iconic DC Comics hero in a direction we have not seen before. “
"He’s Batman, so if he doesn’t like it, not good. So, I was super excited because I thought that he really would [like it] because the things that it does for his character, for Batman, and for [Bruce Wayne] has never been done before in this way. And I had a feeling he would respond in this way, the fact that he did was incredibly encouraging.”
Finally, Reeves told Variety that there have been "discussions" about a second season of The Penguin, but we'll just have to wait and "see what happens."
We still know very little about The Batman - Part II, but there have been rumors that plot rumors that Hush and/or Mr. Freeze could end up being the villains. There doesn't seem to be much to these reports, but based on previous comments from Reeves, there is a good chance that the movie will have a winter setting.
In addition to Pattinson, everyone from the first film - with the likely exception of Paul Dano's Riddler and possibly Zoë Kravitz as Selina Kyle - is expected to return, along with some characters from The Penguin.