Batman II delayed, Matt Reeves says Gotham is ‘more like our world’

Theatergoers will have to wait a little longer for Robert Pattinson’s Batman to return to the big screen. Matt Reeves’ follow-up to the 2022s Batman has passed one year from the publication date of October 2, 2026 to October 1, 2027.

Warner Bros. greenlit the untitled sequel in 2022, Reeves will direct and write the screenplay along with uncredited Batman screenwriter Mattson Tomlin, with filming expected to begin in mid-2025. Most of the main cast, including Pattinson, Geoffrey Wright, Andy Serkis and Colin Farrell, are already confirmed to return.

Of course, Reeves and Tomlin are keeping the sequel’s script under wraps, but the director did drop some hints when you talk to Digital Spy this week. Although Paul Dano’s Riddler is locked up in Arkham now, Gotham faces a slow recovery from the catastrophic flood he caused by destroying the city’s seawall. And according to Reeves, that’s made things pretty complicated for Batman.

“In the first film, Batman looks at things very simplistically, he sees things in black and white. What he can represent and how he can influence that,” Reeves told Digital Spy. “When we go into the next movie, there’s a lot more gray. There are many more people at odds. There is much more division in the city. It’s much more the way our world is now, there’s a lot of unrest because people are in their camps and they’re not communicating.”

Reeves added: “And when things are in grey, it makes it very difficult to be Batman, so this is part of the challenge going into it.”