The Batman director Matt Reeves tweeted out that the film’s ARG viral website has released the extended prisoner scene that was cut from the film. In it we get a longer look at Barry Keoghan as the Joker. At this point it’s pretty obvious its him — following the series of puzzles participants in the Riddler’s games on the site have been playing, each resulted in the letter “J” being missing. And while we got a fake-out prize of all the the Riddler’s files, some (including us last week) still suspected we would be getting this very scene at the end of the viral campaign.
Of the scene Reeves previously was reported saying, “It’s a really creepy, cool scene,” he says. “That was the scene that was meant to introduce this guy and just to tease the audience to go like, ‘Oh my god, he’s here too? And he’s not yet the Joker — what’s this going to be?’ And then it seems so delicious in the story, since we’d already set him up, to have the end of the story, the completion of the Riddler arc, be that he was in a cell next to this guy.”
From the sense of this clip, this scene happens while Batman looks for ways to figure out what the Riddler has planned. He goes to the Joker for advice, who clearly just wants to celebrate their paper anniversary. So he’s been in there about a year we figure. Maybe if he let himself be romanced by the OG member of his Rogues’ Gallery, he would have gotten more out of this exchange.
If anything we’re excited to see more of Keoghan’s take on the character, who serves as a Hannibal Lecter for Bats here. Having played trickster roles in David Lowery’s The Green Knight and in Chloe Zhao’s The Eternals, he’s perfectly chaotic for the role. And the look is starting to come together. We’re definitely getting a bit of Lee Bermejo Joker in the look, by way of New 52’s face mutilation.
The Batman is in theatres now.