2016’s Suicide Squad may have been critically-mauled, but its hefty box office gross has ensured that DC’s decided to create a franchise around it all the same, with Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn leading Birds of Prey and James Gunn working on The Suicide Squad. One major player who hasn’t made a comeback yet, though, is Jared Leto’s Joker, who – to put it mildly – wasn’t too popular with fans.
A while ago, there were reports of a Joker and Harley Quinn movie being in the works, but that was put on the back-burner in favor of BoP and the non-DCEU Joker film starring Joaquin Phoenix. We all assumed this meant the comic book couple movie had been abandoned, but We Got This Covered has heard from our source that the project isn’t actually cancelled. Rather, it’s just stuck in development hell, alongside many other touted DC films.
The big news though is that if the Joker and Harley movie got up and running, it would definitely feature the return of Jared Leto in the role. It isn’t expected to restart his career as the Clown Prince of Crime, however, as we’ve been told the film would mark his final appearance in the iconic part. We’re not sure whether that means the studio has plans to recast afterwards or simply rest the oft-used villain, but our source tells us it’d be a “one and done” type of thing.
For those of you out there who are fans of Leto’s performance, this will come as good news, especially after our source also confirmed that he won’t appear in Birds of Prey. The Joker will, however, turn up for a cameo, he just won’t be played by the Suicide Squad star. Rather, Warner Bros. will use a stand-in actor and we won’t see the villain’s face.
Circling back to the Joker and Harley Quinn project though, and as it languishes in development hell, Jared Leto has now moved over to Sony’s Universe of Marvel Characters to play the lead in Morbius, which will be with us in July 2020.
