Matt Reeves Will Officially Direct ‘The Batman’ for Ben Affleck
After a brief and weirdly intense game of will they / won’t they, it looks like Matt Reeves will direct The Batman for Warner Bros. and Ben Affleck. Following reports late last week that negotiations had broken down between the Planet of the Apes director and the studio comes a reversal, as Reeves has officially signed on to helm the upcoming solo Bat-project, which was previously intended as a directing vehicle for Affleck himself.
The news comes from Variety, which reports JK, forget everything that happened last week because Reeves will direct and produce The Batman after all. Things have been strangely tumultuous for WB’s new Batman movie; the studio recently offered the job to Reeves when Affleck left the director’s chair a couple of weeks ago, which made finding his replacement their top priority. Affleck says he stepped down as director to properly focus on portraying the Dark Knight (looks like someone finally caught a matinee of Live by Night) — this after a few interviews in which Affleck expressed uncertainty (which he promptly walked back) about whether The Batman would begin filming this spring and if he’d be the one to film it.
Although it looked like Reeves and WB had reached an impasse in negotiations, it seems they’ve smoothed things over. Previous reports suggested the studio wanted a director who would collaborate with Affleck on his script (which was revised by Argo scribe Chris Terrio) and vision for The Batman. It’s not difficult to imagine that Reeves, best known for helming Cloverfield and the two recent Planet of the Apes sequels, probably wanted a little more creative agency.
Either way, The Batman now has a director — and a good one, at that.