For reasons obviously related to money but completely unrelated to common sense, Warner Bros have decided to follow up their financially successful but critically pandered run of films by giving Jared Leto‘s Joker from Suicide Squad his own damn movie.
Sources tell Variety that the studio is looking to expand their cinematic universe around the characters from Suicide Squad, a film which has few defenders and many, many haters. The Joker’s role was severely cut down in the final release of that film – much to the annoyance of fans – and it looks like they’re aiming to flesh out the performance with a whole film.
Confusingly, this isn’t the only Joker film currently on the cards for Warner Bros. The studio has already announced it is working on an origin story for the Joker, with rumours abounding that they’ve tapped Joaquin Phoenix for the role. This movie would exist under a separate ‘origins’ banner, meaning it would exist in a different universe to a hypothetical Jared Leto Joker movie. Confused? Join the club, pal!
Warner Bros’ approach the DC Comics universe has been incredibly haphazard over the past few years, clearly in reaction to the well-oiled machine built by Disney and Marvel. Though the so-called DC Extended Universe has a number of defenders who appreciate the darker tone in comparison to the lighthearted romps over at Marvel, it’s generally accepted that their approach to building a universe hasn’t paid dividends – at least yet.
It’s hard to work out where they’re going with this, and whether the average cinemagoer is going to wrap their heads around multiple versions of the one character existing in multiple universes. Then again, maybe they’ve decided that they can create their own identity utterly divorced from the model Marvel has established.
Either way, you’re in for an absolute treat if you for some reason liked Jared Leto’s extremely mid-2000s scene kid interpretation of the Joker. All ten of you are going to have an excellent time.
