This year just will not go peacefully into that good night! In aggressively 2019 news, Todd Phillips’s controversial but popular Joker film is likely getting a sequel, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Phillips is currently in talks to direct the follow-up. What comes after a gritty origin story? Don’t know, but Todd Phillips is going to figure it out. Joaquin Phoenix is staying on to play the artist formerly known as Arthur Fleck, and Phillips and Scott Silver, who wrote the first film together, will reteam for the second. On top of getting the go-ahead for a second Joker, Phillips has also been given the reins to at least one other DC property, though no other details have been announced. Per THR, Phillips is looking to make more origin stories for the iconic characters. At this point, it could be anyone, except Batman and Wonder Woman. Robert Pattinson and director Matt Reeves are already reimagining the oft-reimagined caped crusader. Meanwhile, Patty Jenkins’s Wonder Woman, starring Gal Gadot, has a sequel coming out next summer. Whoever it is, we cannot wait to see their dance moves.
Update: In a new interview with IndieWire, Phillips takes issue with reports of a surefire Joker sequel and the assertion that he’s now developing more DC origin stories for Warner Bros. “Here’s the real truth about a sequel,” Phillips told the site. “While Joaquin and I have talked about it, and while touring the world with Warner Bros executives — going to Toronto, and Venice, and other places — of course, we’re sitting at dinner and they’re saying, ‘So, have you thought about … ?’ But, talking about contracts, there’s not a contract for us to even write a sequel, we’ve never approached Joaquin to be in a sequel. Will that happen? Again, I just think the article was anticipatory at best.” Addressing where the report of a follow-up may have come from, Phillips added, “I don’t know how it gets started, if it’s some assistant trying to gain street cred with a writer.”
That seems extremely clear! So, no sequel is officially in the works from the filmmaker at this time, and he also says he’s not working on a series of superhero origin stories for WB, either. “I can honestly say to you there was no meeting that ever happened” in which he asked for “the rights to develop a portfolio of DC characters’ origin stories,” Phillips explained. Basically, everyone just needs to calm down.
