WARNING: This article contains major spoilers for The Batman
If you’ve seen Matt Reeves’ The Batman (and if you haven’t you really should exit this article here), you don’t exactly have to be the world’s greatest detective to figure out who Paul Dano’s Riddler was talking to through the walls of Arkham Asylum in the final reel. Talk of clowns, a disfigured face, and an incredibly weird laugh made it pretty clear that The Joker, Gotham’s Clown Price Of Crime, does indeed exist in this world, has been captured by Bats before, and is played this time by Eternals star Barry Keoghan. But just in case there was any doubt, yesterday Warner Bros released a deleted scene from earlier in the film that sees Robert Pattinson’s Batman and Keoghan’s Mr J. getting into it at the asylum. Check it out here:
Taking inspiration from Michael Mann’s Manhunter, the scene sees Batman – unnerved by the Riddler’s insistence on involving him in his murderous games – head to Arkham in the hopes of using an old foe to help profile the mystery killer. Classily shot in shallow focuses and intense close-ups, revealing disfigured features rather than a full face to ratchet up tension, we see Keoghan’s Joker take the encounter as a chance to taunt Batman: “Almost our anniversary, isn’t it?” he croaks with a dry cackle, hinting that there’s history between the pair. Later, having given R-Batz the run-around, he suggests that Batman is only so unsettled by the Riddler because he identifies with him, an idea that the film explores implicitly throughout. “I think somewhere, deep down, you’re just terrified,” Joker jabs, “because you’re not sure he’s wrong.”
The scene is, for the most part, just a cool way for Reeves to show us that his Gotham is filled with danger already and that the likes of the Riddler and Colin Farrell’s Penguin aren’t rarities in a city whose nights are stalked by a man dressed as a bat. It’s also, no matter what Reeves tells us, definitely a prime piece of sequels/spin-off bait. But, having reached a critical mass of on-screen Jokers in recent years – Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight, Jared Leto in the DCEU, Cameron Monaghan in Gotham, Joaquin Phoenix in Joker, and Zach Galifianakis in The LEGO Batman Movie (not to mention Mark Hamill and Troy Baker’s work in the Arkham games) – it says something about Keoghan’s talent and Reeves’ vision that this interpretation of Batman’s biggest enemy at least feels like something viewers haven’t seen before.
Will there be more to come from this Joker in the almost inevitable The Batman sequel? We honestly don’t know. But this scene certainly put a smile on our faces.