Movies

The Penguin Could Be The Villain Of Matt Reeves' 'The Batman'

The Batman villain
By Chris Evangelista/

Matt Reeves' The Batman is apparently still happening, and now we may know who the villain is going to be.

Rotten Tomatoes critics! No, I'm kidding. It's actually The Penguin.

The DCEU is in a weird state right now. After Justice League, the comic book universe seems to moving in a very different direction. Aquaman is coming later this year, there's a Shazam movie coming later, and a Birds of Prey/Harley Quinn movie in the works as well. And then there's The Batman.

The solo Batman movie has gone through peaks and valleys. Ben Affleck, who plays Batman – for now – was originally set to direct the film. But Affleck allegedly couldn't get the script to where he wanted it to be, and he spread his wings and fluttered away from the director's chair. Matt Reeves took over, and has been working on the film ever since. And now we have a new update. Variety's Justin Kroll has revealed via Twitter that the Penguin is the film's possible villain. Kroll also added that if Penguin isn't the villain in the movie, he might end up in the Birds of Prey film instead.

Kroll went on to add:

"Reeves is still working on the script, so that could always change but of the multiple BIRDS OF PREY scripts submitted, one does have the Penguin as the main heavy. Either way, it seems WB wants this character cast in the universe sooner rather then later."

I guess the question now is: who will play the Penguin? Josh Gad, of Frozen fame, has been teasing playing the part for over a year now. This could just be a case of Gad trolling his fans, or perhaps he's had a few conversations about taking on the role. In my humble opinion, if Reeves really does go with the Penguin for his film, he'll go after a bigger name than Gad. But I could be wrong.

Then there's the issue of Deathstroke. Joe Manganiello has already been cast in the role, and Deathstroke made a cameo appearance during the Justice League post-credits sequence. Is the plan to still have Deathstroke in the film, and does that mean he's teaming up with the Penguin? Or are they considering nixing Deathstroke entirely for a more well-known bad guy?

The last time the Penguin was on the big screen was in Tim Burton's 1992 film Batman Returns. Burton's take on the character, played by Danny De Vito, was vastly different from the comic book Penguin. In the comics, the character is well-dressed criminal genius. In Batman Returns, he's literally a mutated sewer monster that bites people's noses off.

Long before The Dark Knight Rises began filming, rumors surfaced that Christoper Nolan was adding The Penguin to the film, with the part to be played by the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman, but Nolan quickly squashed those rumors. "I'd be more excited to have Philip Seymour Hoffman in the film than to have the Penguin," Nolan said. "There are certain characters that are easier to mesh with the more real take on Batman we're doing. The Penguin would be tricky."

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