When it comes to big budget comic book blockbusters, the stars of the movies rarely hold any sort of creative control or significant input. By all means, they’re encouraged to shape their characters to a certain degree based on both their opinions and performance, but in almost every case, the overall arcs are controlled by either the decision makers in the boardroom or the directors, and sometimes a combination of both.
Robert Downey Jr. may have had a huge say in how Iron Man was portrayed, but he wasn’t in charge of the storylines. Paul Rudd, meanwhile, helped write both Ant-Man films, but there were a total of eight scribes named in the credits across the two installments. Arguably the most influence held by an onscreen talent over a single major superhero movie was Ryan Reynolds on Deadpool 2, with the actor playing the lead role, producing, developing the story and getting a screenplay credit.
Ironically, Ben Affleck’s The Batman was going to see him given an unprecedented level of oversight within the context of the genre when he was first announced to be starring, directing, co-writing and executive producing before it fell apart altogether. And now, insider Daniel Richtman is claiming that Robert Pattinson will be in charge of shaping the direction of DC Films’ rebooted Dark Knight moving forward, but the tipster offers little more than that.
Pattinson’s behind the scenes experience only extends to exec producing Remember Me over a decade ago, though. He’s not a diehard fan of the Caped Crusader, either, nor has he ever headlined a movie of this magnitude before, so it would certainly be a very strange decision for Warner Bros. and DC Films to hand him the reins to his Batman‘s future and essentially neuter the authority and autonomy of director Matt Reeves in the process.
