The Russo brothers have stated that they maybe had some interest in directing a Batman film in the past, only to retract those comments later on.
Russo Brothers say ‘Yes’ to Batman?
During an interview with Comicbook.com, the directing duo, Joe and Anthony Russo, were asked if they had any interest directing a DC film. Joe Russo responded with a slightly apprehensive answer.
Obviously James is over there running it, it would be a no-brainer. We love the direction he’s going to take that world in. You know he’s gonna be inventive with it.
Favorite DC characters? I mean, man. There are so many good ones. I always answer based on the comics I collected as a kid, and the two comics I collected the most were Spider-Man — actually, the three — were Spider-Man, X-Men and Batman. There have been a lot of iterations of Batman, so I feel like that’s an obvious answer.
Anthony Russo interjected that Batman was his favorite character as a child. However, he also forewarned that Batman on film has been told and retold in many iterations.
You know, it’s hard not to answer that. Here’s how you know we haven’t actually gotten literal about it and specific about it is because, yeah, Batman would be my favorite character for my entire childhood, but obviously, it’s been well explored.
‘No’ to Batman
Flash-forward to a red-carpet interview with Fandango and the Russos amended their answers somewhat. This time the interviewer asked which movie they’d “never, ever do” and the Russos responded “Batman”.
Joe Russo elaborated more on the reasoning.
We love [DC Studios co-chair and co-CEO] James [Gunn], we adore him. We support everything he’s doing over there [at DC], we’d be happy to work with him at any point — [but] it wouldn’t be on Batman.
Joe also gave a reason for the apparent flip-flop in opinions from interviews. Essentially he chalked it up to being “so very tired”.
We usually try to think of-like-a very funny or off-beat kind of character and we were so tired when they asked us that question, we were like “Oh, all I could think of is Batman.”
To be totally fair if you read between the lines for the Russo brothers interview with Comicbook.com, it already sounded apathetic towards Batman. So Joe’s assertion that they couldn’t think of another character at the moment seems to stand true.
NEW: The Russo brothers would love to team w/ James Gunn on a DC project, but that won’t be Batman, according to them, via @Fandango pic.twitter.com/ugXloDBFG4
— Erik Davis (@ErikDavis) April 18, 2023
While it would be cool to see the Avengers: Endgame directors taking on the Dark Knight, they also did not sound passionate about it. It definitely would be more worthwhile for them to make a film that they can be enthusiastic about. Interestingly, this apparently is not the first time that Joe has mentioned Batman. Allegedly, he reported interest in the Dark Knight soon after Avengers: Endgame came out in 2019. However, there’s been no follow-up since then.
Source: Comicbook.com, Twitter.com
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