Is ‘The Batman’ a reboot?

Warning: The following article contains major spoilers for The Batman.

Fans of the Batman character have long waited for the re-emergence of the popular vigilante in a standalone film — and Robert Pattinson is the latest man up for the task.

Matt Reeves’ The Batman was originally supposed to include Ben Affleck’s version of the Dark Knight, seeing as Affleck’s Batman is involved with the DC Extended Universe. However, Affleck faced considerable disagreements when it came to the notorious role and ultimately decided to abandon the role altogether. This eventually allowed Matt Reeves to swoop in as director, and now that Affleck was out of the picture, Reeves decided to make The Batman a diverse update distinct from prior Batman films.

Is The Batman a reboot?

With Affleck gone and no explicit ties to the DCEU to speak of, yes, The Batman is strictly a reboot of the character fans know and love. The movie follows Bruce Wayne / Batman (Robert Pattinson) in his second year of fighting crime within Gotham’s criminal underground. In his second year, Batman encounters the Riddler (Paul Dano), a serial killer who incorporates puzzles into his murderous plan to wipe out Gotham’s elite.

Reeves knew that his particular vision for the movie would be critically different from the flavor of the DCEU and initially pushed Warner Bros. in an effort to make his story much different compared to years past. The film establishes its own intriguing timeline of events and explores a more dark and gritty interpretation of its characters. Reeves even expressed his thoughts for the refreshing reboot in an interview with The Toronto Sun.

I felt to do a standalone Batman film for the first time in 10 years, I needed to make sure that Batman was at the center and that we weren’t trying to keep all these other planes up in the air. Doing a Batman film is daunting; you are taking on some great history and there are some really great Batman films. So I felt like that would have been too much. Thankfully, [Warner Bros.] said I could do that.

But as we continued — I was finishing off [War For the Planet of the] Apes – Ben was re-evaluating what he wanted to do in his life. When he decided he didn’t want to be Batman anymore, I said, ‘I really want to hold on to this idea that this isn’t going to be a part of the DCEU and now we can create a new Batman.’ That’s kind of how it evolved to this place.

Will this set up a new Batverse?

Seeing as both Matt Reeves and Robert Pattinson have hinted at a future sequel, The Batman fans can safely assume that the crime-fighting force will once again return to the silver screen in what Reeves has dubbed as his own Batverse. Further speculation towards Reeves’ Batverse was only heightened as a result of a scene in The Batman between Dano’s Riddler and an unseen figure who has now been officially identified as Barry Keoghan’s Joker.

Additionally, in the film’s closing sequence, Pattinson’s voiceover as Batman refers to several figures which would grab at Gotham’s power now that the city has been flooded and severely wounded, which certainly hints at Colin Farrell’s Penguin rising up in the villain ranks. The idea of several villains emerging at once nearly guarantees a larger Batverse on the horizon.