Todd Phillips, director of Joker 2a.k.a Folie à deuxdoes not want to extend its universe at DC. At least that’s what he just said.
Joker had enjoyed phenomenal success. It won the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, then grossed more than $1 billion at the box office, making it the biggest success in history for an R-rated film at the time. . A record that was only broken very recently, with the release of another superhero film: Deadpool & Wolverine. A real coup for its director and co-writer Todd Phillipswho was until now best known for Starsky et Hutchthe trilogy Very Bad Trip et War Dog.
Folie à deux released in the United States on October 4, 2024, it is too early to compare them, but we can say that Warner saw the big picture: a budget of $200 million according to Varietythe arrival of Lady Gaga alongside Joaquin Phoenix, almost 2h20 on the clock and hints of a musical… A hell of a bet to follow up one of the biggest hits in the DC stablea few months after the slow, painful agony of the DCEU.
Joker: madness for two and no more
Interviewed by the Hollywood Reporter During the Los Angeles premiere, Phillips had the opportunity to talk about meeting Lady Gaga. When asked if he would ever want to do an independent film centered on this character inspired by Harley Quinnhe responded in the negative:
“That’s not really what this film is going for in my opinion. I feel like my involvement in the DC Universe was these two films.”
He seems to have definitely finished with Gotham City, since he had already assured that he did not want to do Joker 3. Or at least that’s what he says on a red carpet, in the middle of a promo rush. Not that we doubt his motivations or that we suspect the existence of a future film dedicated to Lee (it is indeed highly improbable). But the director has already changed his mind in the past.
In August 2019, he announced to Total Film that he would do “anything with Joaquin Phoenix”. In September 2019, following the rumor started by this declaration, he returned to CinemaBlend : “We have no plans for the future. […] The film is not made to have a sequel. » A billion dollars later, we see the result.
The DC universe is on the verge of being reborn, or rather attempting to be reborn. The saga of Batman of Matt Reeves also acts as interim with the series The Penguinbefore the second part expected for October 2… 2026 in the United States. James Gunn’s new DCEU starts on July 11, 2025 with Superman Legacy.
