In The Batman, The Riddler is defeated by the Dark Knight and locked up in Arkham. Then, in the closing moments of the movie, the serial killer makes a new friend who we'd later discover is Barry Keoghan's Joker.
Warner Bros. released an extended deleted scene from the movie while it was still in theaters which saw Batman visiting The Joker in Arkham to see if his twisted mind could help track down Edward Nashton. It turns out the vigilante had placed the villain behind bars during his "Year One" in Gotham City, setting the stage for an inevitable rematch between the two arch nemeses.
It's been widely reported that The Joker will return in The Batman Part II, though filmmaker Matt Reeves may have bigger plans for this sinister new take on the Clown Prince of Crime in his eventual third movie.
Talking to Josh Horowitz, Keoghan shared his hope to return as The Joker but claimed he's being kept in the dark about his DC future.
"It's a big one, but I am going to say that, if the opportunity came about, yes, I'd love to explore, and given the opportunity, really dive into it," the Irish actor says in the video below. "But I have not been contacted, I've not heard anything."
He'd go on to confirm that he gave a great deal of thought to The Joker's backstory and appearance, praising the work of makeup artist Mike Marino (who also transformed Colin Farrell into Oz Cobb).
In the video below, Keoghan comments on his role as Druig in Eternals but stops short of weighing in on a possible return or whether he's disappointed that Marvel Studios has essentially given up on the characters following the 2021 movie's big cliffhanger ending.
Talking about putting a new spin on The Joker while promoting The Penguin, Reeves said, "Anytime you’re going to approach any of these characters, you have to find a fresh way to do it. So that makes it incredibly daunting. At the same time, this version of Penguin is a version of Penguin that no one had ever seen."
"The only way to do it is to feel like you’re earning your place because otherwise you’re just doing more, and people are going like, 'Well, we’ve seen it, so what do you got for us?'So how can it be the thing we love, but also something we haven’t seen?" the filmmaker continued. "That’s always the challenge. So with a character like that, that would have to be the bar."
While many fans feel like The Joker has been done to death on screen, the villain hasn't actually shared the screen with Batman since 2008's The Dark Knight (it's up to you whether you count the "reach around" moment in Zack Snyder's Justice League).
Plans for an Arkham-set TV series have been scrapped so only time will tell how much more we see of The Joker in Reeves' "The Batman Epic Crime Saga."
The Batman Part II is set to be released in theaters on October 2, 2026.