Barry Keoghan teases his return as the Joker in THE BATMAN: PART II – “My smile says it all”

Barry Keoghan he appeared as The Joker in the director Matt Reeves’ The Batman. He didn’t have a major role, but once you introduce a character like the Joker, you know we’re going to see more of him. Reeves is developing an Arkham Asylum series and a sequel The Batmanand one or both could feature the return of The Joker.

During a recent interview with Etalk, Keoghan was asked if fans can expect to see him reprise his role as Joker in Batman: Part IIand teased his return, saying:

“I can’t really say anything about it, my friend, but, um, it would be exciting, wouldn’t it? See the Joker come to life again? My smile says it all, you know what I mean?

Keoghan then puts a big smile on his face. Obviously we will see Keoghan as the Joker again!

Reeves previously talked about the Joker’s look, saying, “He’s kept in this suspenseful way, visually distanced from you. But I wanted to create an iteration of him that felt distinctive and new, but also went back to the roots. So it’s very out of the mold of Conrad Veidt and that idea of ​​the silent film of The Man Who Laughs.”

The director wanted this version of The Joker to be based on a child born with a condition where he never stopped smiling. He said, “It’s not a version where he falls into a vat of chemicals and his face is distorted, or whatever. [Christopher] Nolan did, where there is some mystery as to how he got these scars etched into his face. What if this boy had had this disease since birth and was cursed? He had this smile that people stared at, it was grotesque and terrifying. Even as a child, people looked at him with horror and his response was, “Okay, so they played a prank on me,” and that was his nihilistic view of the world.

He expanded on this and compared the character to The Elephant Man. He says, “He can never stop smiling. And that made Mike [Marino] and I think about – I was talking about The Elephant Man because I love David Lynch. And I thought, ‘Well, maybe there’s something here that’s not something where it fell into a vat of chemicals or it’s not the [Christopher] Nolan thinks where he has these scars and we don’t know where they come from. What if it’s something that affects him since birth and he has a congenital disease that prevents him from stopping smiling? And he had this really dark reaction, and he had to go through a life where people looked at him a certain way and he knows how to get into your head.'”

Reeves also explains, “Life has been a cruel joke on him. And this is his response, and eventually he’ll declare himself a clown, he’ll declare himself the Joker. That was the idea.”

I’m excited to see the character arc of this version of The Joker unfold!