Well, I guess this is what we all f—ing deserve, because news has broken that Todd Phillips is gearing up to write a sequel to the Oscar-winning film Joker.
This news was dropped in the most chaotic way, in a piece about the most powerful lawyers in the film industry. Great job on that one. In their list of powerful Hollywood lawyers, they include an entry for attorney Warren Dern, who is Phillips’ lawyer. In Dern’s entry, it states that “Todd Phillips struck a deal to co-write the next Joker installment.”
Warner Bros. is yet to officially confirm the project. Considering the fact that Warner Bros. has been doing a lot of fixing to make sure they are doing something exciting, that has also led to a lot of rated R projects, but yet nothing for Birds of Prey. The gays are waiting.
I was not a fan of Joker, but I also felt like, at a certain point, the entire spectacle around it was becoming more theatrical than the actual film. Legitimate concerns were hyped up with stories about having extra security at screenings that nearly guaranteed the film success.
Joker, despite having generally mixed reviews, went on to gross over $1 billion, the first and only R-rated film to do so. It also became the sixth-highest-grossing film of 2019 during its theatrical run. It was a huge success for Warner Bros. and validated the dark turn of the character—not to mention Joaquin Phoenix, who played the titular character, became the second actor to win an Oscar for playing the Joker. (I personally think of that Oscar as being for Walk the Line).
I found the movie to be really meh, and rereading my review of the film, I found that I could viscerally remember all the things the movie made me feel because I was paying almost too much attention: “It added little on the level of an interesting crime thriller, and it also didn’t add anything to the Batman mythos itself, despite the interconnection of the two being the biggest draw of the film. Nothing about this makes Joker, the DC character, more interesting, and Joker adds nothing new to the genre without the way it works in the Batman angle—even then already retreading familiar ground, despite its best attempts.”
What director Todd Phillips created may not have resonated with me, but it did with a huge audience that flocked to the Bronx stairs used in the movie to annoy Black and Brown Aunties and Tias trying to get by. I do hope that whatever Phillips does next, he will at least pick a location that doesn’t make gentrifiers act even more annoying than they already do.
(via Digital Spy, image: Warner Bros.)
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