Director Matt Reeves‘ version of The Batman hit theaters in 2022 and jump-started the post-COVID box office with a dynamic $369 million domestic and $772 million worldwide. Critics were enraptured by Robert Pattinson‘s darker, grittier, noir-style caped crusader, giving the DC Studios movie an 85 percent on Rotten Tomatoes and a 72 score on Metacritic — not too shabby for a comic-book character who’s been skulking around Gotham City since 1939.

With every successful blockbuster comes the inevitable sequel announcement, and The Batman was no different. But ever since being green-lit by Warner Bros., the follow-up has been hampered with production hiccups and delayed at least a year on the release schedule. Read on for everything to know about The Batman 2.

The announcement

Mere months after The Batman was released in March 2022, the sequel was officially announced at CinemaCon in April 2022. Pattinson would return as reclusive billionaire Bruce Wayne who fought crime as the gruff-voiced Batman, while Reeves would write (with Mattson Tomlin) and direct the new movie. “Matt took one of our most iconic and beloved superheroes and delivered a fresh vision,” then-Warner Bros. studio boss Toby Emmerich said. “Matt Reeves, Rob Pattinson, and the entire team will be taking audiences back to Gotham with The Batman 2.”

Returning cast members

Besides Pattinson, three other cast members from The Batman were reportedly in talks for the sequel. Jeffrey Wright (Gotham Police Commissioner James “Jim” Gordon) told Deadline, “I haven’t read the script yet, but that’s the plan,” referring to his eventual return. Andy Serkis (butler Alfred Pennyworth) revealed at 2024’s ACE Superhero Comic Con, “I loved working with Rob Pattinson, and I really look forward to playing Alfred once more.” Serkis later added, “[Reeves] told me the story of The Batman 2, and I was so excited for it.” And Reeves confirmed that Colin Farrell‘s Oz Cobb, aka the Penguin, would come back during a 2024 Comic-Con panel for the HBO spin-off show The Penguin.
Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images

Filming delays

Initially, the sequel was set to begin principal photography in November 2023, according to ScreenRant, but it was pushed back because of the dual Writers Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA strikes. In February 2025, Pattinson told Deadline that The Batman 2 would start shooting “at the end of the year,” which puts production in late fall 2025 or early winter 2025. “Everything feels so long ago, because COVID just erased three years,” the actor said. Pattinson didn’t give away the storyline, though he did tease that the plot is “cool.” According to Production Weekly, principal photography will take place at Warner Bros. Studios in Leavesden, England, the same studio that was used for portions of The Batman.

Pattinson in Dune 3

In April 2025, yet another delay was hinted at, this one involving Pattinson’s potential casting in Dune: Part Three. Deadline reported that Dune franchise director Denis Villeneuve had his eyes on Pattinson as “a new addition to the all-star ensemble” for the upcoming third film. While sources close to the project declined to comment, Deadline’s Justin Kroll wrote on X that since Dune: Part Three “will shoot this summer,” the actor “could shoot in reasonable time and have it not affect Batman 2, whenever that goes into production.” In other words, online rumors suggesting that Pattinson’s involvement in Dune 3 means that The Batman 2 will be canceled are flat-out wrong.

Release date

After originally securing a theatrical release date of Oct. 2, 2026, The Batman 2 was pushed back a full year to Oct. 1, 2027, to give it more time to prep and film. Now, an untitled Alejandro González Iñárritu and Tom Cruise movie will take that 2026 calendar date instead, per The Hollywood Reporter. “Matt is committed to making the best film he possibly can, and no one can accurately guess exactly how long a script will take to write,” DC Studios co-chief James Gunn said in December 2024 about the yearlong holdup. “Once there is a finished script, there is around two years for pre-production, shooting, and post-production on big films.”

Title change

In January 2023, the sequel was initially titled The Batman: Part II. But that didn’t last long, as it was officially untitled as of December 2024, because Reeves was still writing the script. The new title has yet to be announced. Note that previous Batman movie sequels within the DC universe did not include numbers in their titles, and were instead called Batman Returns (1992), Batman Forever (1995), Batman & Robin (1997), The Dark Knight (2008), and The Dark Knight Rises (2012).

Who else has played Batman?

Pattinson follows in a long line of Batman actors who’ve appeared on the big screen, including Lewis Wilson (1943), Robert Lowery (1949), Adam West (1966), Michael Keaton (1989-92), Val Kilmer (1995), George Clooney (1997), Christian Bale (2005-12), and Ben Affleck (2016-21). Scroll through our gallery below of all of the modern-day Batman movies ranked.

‘Batman’ movies ranked worst to best