The Warner Bros. and DC Studios shake-up has given us a revolving door of caped crusaders
By Lucy Ford
23 January 2023
Aquaman 2 has officially been in production for so long that it’s had to churn through multiple Batman actors.
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom will hit our screens this Christmas, making it five years since the release of the first film back in 2018. Though a sequel was, naturally, greenlit as production was underway on the first movie, the road to release has been a bumpy one thanks to pandemic-related delays. But Warner Bros. and DC Studios may have created an even bigger headache for themselves with this one thanks to their ever-changing strategy and revolving door of actors as a result.
Jason Momoa has revealed that he filmed with multiple different Batman actors for Aquaman 2 as part of a classic superhero crossover moment. At Sundance Film Festival, he told The Wrap “I shot with a couple different Batmans”, and added that “you just don’t know what’s going on and we’ll see what the end product is”. Now, there are a couple of ways that this could be read. The first is that Warner Bros. and DC are making good on their promise to build out their own version of a multiverse within the DCEU, starting with Batman.
Though Robert Pattinson was the last actor to portray the caped crusader on screen in Matt Reeves’ The Batman in 2022, it’s been confirmed that his version of the superhero lives separately from the wider DCEU for now. This means it’s unlikely Pattinson will ever cross paths with the characters being laid out by new studio heads Peter Safran and James Gunn, much like Joaquin Phoenix’s take on The Joker in 2019.
The last Batman actor to inhabit space with a cohort of other DCEU characters, including Jason Momoa’s Aquaman, was Ben Affleck in 2017’s Justice League. Cast in 2013, Affleck’s run as the Dark Knight wasn’t exactly smooth sailing thanks to his debut in the widely-panned Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016) and the quagmire of issues that arose from everything to do with Justice League. Though the initial intention was for Affleck to get his solo, first at his own hand and then later with Reeves at the helm, he eventually left the project altogether, effectively ending his tenure as the character. Well, that’s what we assumed, at least.
Back in July 2022, Momoa uploaded a picture on Instagram with Affleck captioned “REUNITED bruce and arthur. love u and miss u Ben WB studio tours just explored the backlot alright. busted on set all great things coming AQUAMAN 2”, leading many to expect to see Affleck’s jaw poking out of the mask at some point in Momoa’s second outing.
But not so fast, as there’s the Michael Keaton of it all to consider.
Keaton was set to reprise his famed version of Batman, which he first inhabited over 30 years ago, in Batgirl, which was unceremoniously shelved indefinitely by Warner Bros. last year in its first big bout of structural changes for both the studio and the DCEU. To add to the confusion, he also filmed scenes for The Flash, which is still set to be released next year despite controversy. There’s no real clarity on what the connecting tissue between the films was set to be, or how Keaton’s presence in the role ties into Affleck’s run. There had been rumours of, off the back of these appearances, Keaton getting a standalone film as an elder Bruce Wayne, but that also looks to have been scrapped by Warner Bros.
Momoa’s off-hand revelation could mean the Batman multiverse we assume was being set up in Batgirl is now being set up in Aquaman 2, with both Keaton and Affleck making appearances as the same character. However, it could also mean that though he filmed with multiple actors, only one makes it into the cut as production overlapped with such massive changes within the future vision laid out by Safran and Gunn.
The Snyderverse gang are increasingly being cut by the wayside, with Henry Cavill’s Superman, Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman and Dwayne Johnson’s late addition of Black Adam effectively being axed from the universe. Affleck was a key component of that world alongside Momoa and Ezra Miller’s Flash, but if Aquaman 2 is going to bridge the gap between the Snyderverse and beyond, there’s a possibility any scenes he may have filmed may end up on the cutting room floor.
As always, there’s never a dull day in DCEU land, but at least Jason Momoa seems to be having fun with the chaos of it all.
