Ben Affleck Hints He Is Done With Batman After The Flash And Recalls Awful Experience On Justice League
JB Augustine
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The rumors of a grand return complete with new content for Ben Affleck as the Dark Knight in a contained Snyderverse spinoff are pervasive. We’ve reported on them and if you’re a regular reader you’ve heard them all, but the chatter may be all for naught.
Source: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), Warner Bros. Entertainment
Affleck appears to confirm in recent interviews he is done with Batman once The Flash hits theaters and, not only that, he looked back on the rotten time he had making Justice League – an experience so bad he fell out of love with playing the Caped Crusader.
But on the positive side, he reiterated to Australia’s The Herald Sun that he had fun revisiting the character in The Flash and, what’s more, Affleck thinks he finally turned in an interpretation that got – or “cracked,” as he would say – Batman perfectly.
Source: Batman v Superman, Warner Bros. Pictures
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“I have never said this — this is hot off the presses — but maybe my favorite scenes in terms of Batman and the interpretation of Batman that I have done were in the Flash movie,” the actor said.
And he hopes Warner Bros. doesn’t tweak or taint those scenes in any way. “I hope they maintain the integrity of what we did because I thought it was great and really interesting — different, but not in a way that is incongruent with the character,” Affleck added.
Source: Justice League (2017), Warner Bros.
As he continued, he said filming “was really fun and really, really satisfying and encouraging” and he thought, “Wow — I think I have finally figured it out.” He then remarked it was a “really nice finish on my experience with that character.”
Coupling that with the desire Affleck has expressed to move on from franchise IPs, it sounds like he is more than ready to say aloha to the cape and cowl, which is a decision that may have a little to do with lingering bitterness from how Justice League turned out in 2017.
BEN AFFLECK and TYE SHERIDAN star in TENDER BAR Photo: CLAIRE FOLGER © AMAZON CONTENT SERVICES LLC
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“‘[Justice League]’ was a bad experience because of a confluence of things: my own life, my divorce, being away too much, the competing agendas and then [director] Zack [Snyder]’s personal tragedy (Snyder’s daughter Autumn died by suicide in 2017) and the reshooting,” Affleck explained to the Los Angeles Times.
“It just was the worst experience,” he continued. “It was awful. It was everything that I didn’t like about this. That became the moment where I said, ‘I’m not doing this anymore.’”
Source: The Batman (2022), Warner Bros.
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Therefore, burned out, Affleck walked away from directing The Batman, allowing Matt Reeves to put his own spin on the lore, because, he says, if he doesn’t love what he’s doing, he shouldn’t be involved.
“I looked at it and thought, ‘I’m not going to be happy doing this. The person who does this should love it,’” Affleck said to the Times. “You’re supposed to always want these things, and I probably would have loved doing it at 32 or something. But it was the point where I started to realize it’s not worth it.”
Source: Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016), Warner Bros.
Ben Affleck is definitely not 32 anymore but money may sway him to come back one more time after 2022 to close the Batman chapter of his career properly with an HBO Max movie or miniseries, especially if Zack Snyder is coaxed into doing more with the DCEU too – not that either outcome seems likely anymore.
NEXT: Ben Affleck Explains Why He Quit Batman: “Couldn’t Crack It”
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