Warning: This story contains spoilers for The Batman
The Joker is back—again. In one of The Batman‘s final scenes, a foiled and jailed Riddler (Paul Dano) talks with an unseen figure in prison played by Barry Keoghan. Though brief, the scene leaves no doubt that Keoghan is playing Batman’s greatest nemesis, The Joker.
This is the third Joker Warner Bros. has introduced in the last few years. In 2016’s Suicide Squad, Jared Leto played an erratic Joker with “damaged” literally tattooed across his forehead. Then Joaquin Phoenix won an Oscar for playing the Joker in a dead-serious take on the villain in 2019’s Joker. So, currently, there are three different Jokers roaming three different Gothams, which is scary and more than a little confusing.
Here’s everything you need to know about the future of the Joker in the DC Entertainment Universe (DCEU).
How we meet an unseen Joker in The Batman
By the end of the film, Batman has captured the Riddler, though that was the Riddler’s plan all along. The Riddler is under the impression that he and Batman share the same goal: To team up and rid Gotham of corruption. But Batman sticks to his creed: He does not kill people.
He manages to figure out that The Riddler has taken to social media to amass a violent, fringe army of disempowered men who have armed themselves to attack a mayoral candidate who preaches hope, along with her followers. It’s not an accident that these radicalized men target a prominent Black woman.
The film’s parallels to the Jan. 6 Capitol attack are eerie—in the film, as in real life, a mob planned an attack on social media and armed themselves, and specifically targeted certain legislators, most of whom were women and women of color. Director Matt Reeves tells TIME that any parallels were accidental—the script was written in 2017.
Read More: The Batman Director Explains The Film’s End and Its Accidental Real-World Parallels
Batman and Catwoman manage to foil the attack, to the Riddler’s dismay. He begins to lament his failure in his jail cell, attracting the attention of another prisoner, The Joker. The two talk about their similarities—they both like a good joke. And to plot vengeance.
The setup suggests that the Joker doesn’t plan on taking on Batman alone. He may recruit the Riddler, the Penguin (played by an unrecognizable Colin Farrell in this film), and a whole rogue’s gallery of heroes to battle the Caped Crusader.
Barry Keoghan has proven himself a compelling comic book character
Barry Keoghan is best known for playing another comic book character, Druig in The Eternals. Though that movie was stuffed with A-list talent (including Angelina Jolie, Salma Hayek, and Harry Styles), it failed to dazzle critics or make history at the box office. While The Eternals may or may not get a sequel, and Druig may or may not return to the big screen, Keoghan proved himself a compelling comic book anti-hero and will likely make a compelling villain.
The Irish actor has big clown shoes to fill—both Phoenix and Heath Ledger won Academy Awards for playing the Joker. And legends like Jack Nicholson have previously put their stamp on the crazed character.
How The Batman and the Joker fit into the DC Entertainment Universe
The DCEU has grown complicated in recent years. In order to sort through its many parallel universes, it’s helpful to compare Warner Bros.’ production of superhero movies with Disney’s Marvel Studios.
Marvel carefully laid the foundation for movies operating on parallel timelines within a multiverse introduced in Loki and expanded upon in Spider-Man: No Way Home. When three different Spider-Men swung into action in Spider-Man: No Way Home, we understood that each Peter Parker came from a different parallel world.
Read More: The New Batman Is Deeply Unsettling. The Director Says That’s the Point
Warner Bros. by contrast, has produced superhero movies that seemingly exist in several different universes without any in-film explanation. Robert Pattinson’s Batman does not live on the same earth as Ben Affleck’s Batman. Nor does Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker seem to operate in the same universe of either of those Caped Crusaders. Logic would dictate that Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman and Jason Momoa’s Aquaman, who starred together in Zack Snyder’s Justice League, might pop up in each other’s movies but never interact with the Pattinson version of Bruce Wayne. And, by extension, Keoghan’s Joker is a wholly different person than Phoenix’s Joker.
Things get even more muddled when you consider the remakes and reboots. The first Suicide Squad movie involved a cameo from Affleck’s Batman and introduced Jared Leto’s Joker. But the reboot-slash-sequel that came out last year, The Suicide Squad (note the article), picked and chose what lore to carry on from the previous movie and what to abandon. So it could conceivably still exist in the land of Zack Snyder’s Justice League. Or not.
Warner Bros. executives have explained in interviews that these characters exist on separate, parallel universe planets, Earth 1, Earth 2, Earth 3, etc. The upcoming Flash movie will reportedly unite at least some of these universes. Both Affleck’s Batman and Michael Keaton’s Batman from the 1980s are set to appear in that film.
Write to Eliana Dockterman at .
The other villain on Pattinson’s wishlist? Calendar Man, the creepy, date-obsessed baddie who commits crimes based on holidays. He also plays the role of a Hannibal Lecter-like genius taunting the Dark Knight as he tries to find the serial killer terrorizing Gotham in The Long Halloween by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale, one of the major influences for The Batman.
But before Pattinson can truly turn his attention to owls or calendars, he first needs to deal with Paul Dano’s Riddler.
The sadistic, puzzle-solving masked killer inspired by the Zodiac Killer is not only on a quest to eliminate Gotham’s most elite citizens but to uncover the corruption at the heart of the city, one body at a time. Along the way, he digs up dark truths about the Wayne family that will shock Bruce to his core.
It’s the classic setup we’ve seen in many great comic book stories, a fight for the soul of the city and Batman’s own, but this is still all new to the World’s Greatest Detective played by Robert Pattinson. Only two years into his crime-fighting career, this Caped Crusader thinks he knows Gotham and understands his mission, but when the Riddler comes to town it makes Bruce lose his footing.
“[Bruce] thinks it’s his city in a weird sort of way. He thinks he’s kind of built it,” Pattinson says. But while Bruce has “the money and the castle,” he’ll learn the hard way that he has “absolutely no control or power over anything in the city.”
Riddler is far from the Dark Knight’s only problem in the upcoming movie. Pattinson’s Batman will also have to take on a who’s who of classic villains, including master cat burglar Selina Kyle (Zoë Kravitz), infamous mob boss Carmine Falcone (John Turturro), and freakish gangster Oswald Cobblepot (an unrecognizable Colin Farrell). It’s certainly the biggest challenge this Batman has ever faced.
The Batman arrived on HBO Max this month, with Robert Pattinson donning Bruce Wayne's iconic cowl and beating up Gotham City's criminals in an intense adventure set in the early days of his vigilante career. In writer-director Matt Reeves' movie, Batman faces off against the wildly creepy Riddler (Paul Dano) as the puzzle-obsessed supervillain targets the city's sleazy elites.
Teaming up with Selina Kyle (aka Catwoman, played by Zoë Kravitz) and GCPD Lieutenant James Gordon (Jeffrey Wright), our hero unravels Riddler's dark plot to expose the depths of the city's corruption. It's a twisty-turny tale, so let's take a closer look at the ending, some of the major revelations, Barry Keoghan's chilling cameo and possibilities for the sequel (which Reeves confirmed Tuesday). We also have a separate explainer for the post-credits Easter egg.
Be warned, SPOILERS are about to swoop in.
Gotham underwater
The Riddler allows himself to be arrested after exposing the depths of Gotham City's corruption, but only so he can watch his scheme's final act play out from the safety of his cell in Arkham Asylum. A series of trucks are rigged to blow up the seawall around the city, flooding its streets and forcing everyone to flee to the venue where new mayor Bella Reál (Jayme Lawson) is celebrating her victory.
A bunch of the villain's online followers don his Zodiac Killer-inspired costumes like his and infiltrate the event. They open fire on the trapped crowds, but Batman, Catwoman, Gordon and the city's cops stop them in a pretty epic action sequence.
The Riddler's endgame sees Gotham City flooded.
Jonathan Olley/DCStunned after getting shot at point-blank range, Batman jabs himself with adrenaline and almost beats one of the goons to death but is stopped before he goes too far. After unmasking the guy, Gordon asks who he is.
"Me, I'm vengeance," he responds, mirroring Batman's slogan and making the hero realize he's been a bit too dark and broody in his approach to crime fighting.
Batman leaps into action to stop people from getting electrocuted in the flood waters, then rescues the new mayor and a bunch of others who got trapped under debris. As the power goes out, he lights a flare (a Bat-flare?) and leads everyone to safety, becoming a literal beacon of hope for the city.
The Bat and the Cat have a fiery alliance.
Jonathan Olley/DCWith the city flooded and under martial law, Selena tells Batman she's going upstate or to Blüdhaven (a nearby city that, in the comics, is traditionally stomping ground of Batman ally Nightwing, but that character hasn't been established in this universe). She tries to persuade Batman to go with her so they can be broody vigilantes together, but he opts to stay in Gotham.
Joke(r)'s on you
Stuck in Arkham, Riddler is understandably upset that his horrible plan didn't play out fully. However, he's greeted by a seemingly sympathetic fellow inmate (Barry Keoghan). We only see him momentarily, but his facial scars and creepy laugh hint at his identity.
"One day you're on top, the next you're a clown... there are worse things to be," he says. "Gotham loves a comeback story."
A deleted scene offers a clear-ish look at Barry Keoghan's Joker.
Warner Bros."Riddle me this: the less of them you have, the more one is worth," he asks, playing into Riddler's shtick.
"A friend," the Riddler responds. Yay, villain friends.
Keoghan's character is credited as "unseen Arkham inmate," but he's almost certainly this universe's Joker. It's unclear if he's encountered Batman yet or why he's in Arkham, but this appears to be setting up some kind of supervillain pairing in a sequel or at least hinting our hero will face a new kind of threat in this universe. This movie is reportedly the first of a trilogy, and two HBO Max shows (a police procedural set in the GCPD and a Penguin-centric crime series) are seemingly in the works.
Warner Bros. also released a pretty excellent deleted scene in which Batman visits Keoghan's character in prison, seeking his advice about the Riddler's identity. It gives us a better look at the creepy villain's scarred visage and hints they had a run-in about a year before the movie's events. But that shouldn't be taken as canon since the scene isn't in the movie.
Gotham conspiracy
The mayor, police commissioner and district attorney suffer horrible deaths as part of Riddler's insidious plot, due to their roles in a conspiracy to bust crime boss Sal Maroni. The villain's puzzles send Batman and Gordon on a hunt for an unidentified informant known as El Rata Alada -- Spanish for The Winged Rat. Which sounds like it's referring to a bat, but it's revealed that Riddler is hunting for a snitch whose name is derived from a bird -- the super sleazy mobster Carmine Falcone (John Turturro).
Carmine Falcone is the rot at Gotham's heart.
Jonathan Olley/DCWith Maroni off the streets, Falcone took over his drug operation. Those who helped him or looked the other way got paid, and everybody won. Except Gotham, which turned into even more of a cesspool. So Riddler decided to reveal the depths of the city's corruption as he broadcast his killings online.
Before Batman and the GCPD can take Falcone into custody, Selena confronts him with the revelation that he's her father and prepares to kill him. He turns the tables and taunts Selena by confessing to strangling her mother as he chokes her but is stopped by Batman.
Penguin may be Gotham's new kingpin.
Jonathan Olley/DCFalcone is then led outside to be arrested, where the Riddler guns him down from afar -- the supervillain wanted to get the mobster into the open so he could kill him. This leaves a power vacuum in Gotham's criminal underworld, which will most likely be filled by Oz (AKA Penguin, played by Colin Farell).
Wayne family secrets
Riddler also targets Bruce Wayne by sending him a bomb in the mail. It doesn't reach its intended recipient (what kind of billionaire opens their own letters?), instead wounding faithful butler Alfred Pennyworth (Andy Serkis).
During one of Riddler's broadcasts, he reveals some of the darkness in the Waynes' past. Bruce's late mother, Martha, was a member of the Arkham family whose parents died in a murder-suicide, with the trauma leading her to be institutionalised multiple times growing up.
Alfred offers Bruce insight into his late father.
Jonathan Olley/DCMartha apparently found stability when she married Thomas Wayne and had Bruce, but Thomas' decision to run for mayor of Gotham led reporter Edward Elliot to dig into the family's past.
This threatened to expose Martha's story, and Thomas went to Falcone for help (because going to a mobster for aid always ends well) and Elliot ended up dead. Falcone tells Bruce that Thomas had him kill Elliot, but Alfred offers a different version of events: Thomas asked Falcone to scare Elliot off the story, but Falcone killed the reporter and Thomas said he was going to confess everything to the police.
The Waynes were killed shortly afterward -- the murder remains unsolved in this continuity -- leaving the charity fund Thomas established to renew Gotham to be snatched by the city's corrupt elites.
This left Gotham's poor in worse shape than ever, but none more so than young Edward Nashton. The super-smart orphan grew up in squalor, and seeing Bruce earning the city's sympathy after Matha and Thomas were killed filled him with a jealous rage, reasoning that the Wayne family fortune made losing his parents easier than had been for others. And so Edward grew up to be the Riddler.
We get another dose of the Riddler's creepiness after the credits.
Jonathan Olley/DCPost-credits Easter egg
The Batman doesn't have a post-credits scene, but there is one last reference to the Riddler's campaign -- we see a typed "?" followed by "GOOD BYE" and www.rataalada.com seems to flash up on the screen for the briefest of moments. That URL brings you to a viral marketing website where you answer a series of the villain's questions.
Comic inspiration
This movie is conceptually and tonally similar to iconic 1996 story The Long Halloween, which sees Batman trying to deduce the identity of a serial killer who slays people on holidays. He also works with Gordon and DA Harvey Dent to prevent a gang war between the Falcone and Maroni crime families.
The Long Halloween is among the most beloved Batman stories of all time.
DC ComicsIt acts as a followup to 1987 Batman origin story Year One, which The Batman director Reeves also cited as inspiration. Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy weaved in elements from Year One and The Long Halloween as well -- they're essential reading for any Batman fan. They've also been adapted into animated movies.
Martha Wayne isn't traditionally a member of the Arkham family in the comics, but 2012 graphic novel Batman: Earth One takes place in a continuity where she is. In volume 1 of that story, Martha's mother killed her father and left the family scandalized. Thomas Wayne also runs for mayor against Oswald Cobblepot, but he and Martha are killed by a mugger. Bruce's relationship with Alfred is quite similar to the dynamic seen in The Batman too.
Earth One's second volume introduces a serial killer Riddler who plants a bomb to get Batman's attention, resembling The Batman's version of the character.
The idea of the Riddler flooding Gotham mirrors the excellent 2013 storyline Zero Year, which takes place at a similarly early point in Batman's career.
In an interview with CNET, director Reeves noted that 2000 story Ego influenced the movie's approach to Bruce's inner battle.
"It got into the psychology of the beast within being Batman, this drive for vengeance, this instinctual side," he said.
In the 2011 comics storyline Gates of Gotham, Edward Elliot was one of the people responsible for the construction of Gotham City in the 1800s (along with Bruce's ancestor Alan Wayne and Penguin's ancestor Theodore Cobblepot). Elliot is the ancestor of Thomas Elliot, a childhood friend of Bruce whose jealousy led him to become the supervillain Hush and launch a campaign against Batman.
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