It was announced today that James Gunn and Peter Safran are the heads of DC’s film, animation, and television efforts as the new co-chairs and co-CEOs of the new DC Studios. Still, it luckily will not impact the production of Joker 2. The original Joker was released in October 2019 and told the origin stories of the infamous DC villain. The film starred Joaquin Phoenix as Arthur Fleck (the Joker), was the sixth- highest-grossing film of 2019 and earned the most Academy Award nominations at the Oscars in 2020.
The search for the new head of DC Films has been in talks for a while. Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav has worked to shake up the DC franchise since he took over as CEO in April 2022. With this and the urgency to cut costs, many DC films and television shows have stalled or been canceled altogether. Gunn and Safran taking over as the heads of the new DC Studios will have them focused primarily on creative and business decisions regarding DC films, television series, and animation.
However, The Joker sequel, Joker: Folie à Deux, will not be affected, per the Hollywood Reporter. While Gunn and Safran transition into their new roles, many DC films in separate creative universes have fates up in the air. Warners film heads Michael De Luca and Pamela Abdy will oversee Joker 2 and work with its director Todd Phillips. The Warner Bros. Discovery switch-up will not impact the much-anticipated film.
What We Know About Joker 2 So Far
Joker: Folie à Deux is set to go into production in December this year– so the project is still mostly under wraps. However, Lady Gaga will join the franchise as Harley Quinn, while other big stars like Brendan Gleeson (Harry Potter) and Harry Lawtey (Industry) have joined the project in unknown roles. The plot is still unknown, but based on the very short teaser trailer, there might be a love story between Gaga’s Quinn and Phoenix’s Joker. The cast includes Catherine Keener, Jacob Lofland, and Zazie Beetz, who is reprising her role as Sophie Dumond from the original Joker.
Although the movie will take place entirely in Gotham, a fictionalized New York, most of the Joker sequel is set to film in Los Angeles on sound stages. Many theories have been heavily speculated about the upcoming film– though not officially confirmed–including whether the movie is a musical (and it will be, at the very least, genre-bending) or reprising dumped DC films like Harley Quinn’s movie (through a perspective shift.) Hopefully, more details will come to light before Joker: Folie à Deux’s release on October 4, 2024.
