Rumor: Zack Snyder and Jared Leto To Develop DCEU Joker Movie

JB Augustine |

Feb 22, 2021

Hearing that the Snyderverse branch of the DCEU will carry on after the Justice League Director’s Cut is like listening to a broken record by now, but a new rumor suggests that there’s reason to believe at least one particularly ‘damaged’ character will see a Zack Snyder-led cinematic future following the Snyder Cut’s March premiere on HBO Max.

The latest encouraging hint that the DCEU will live on comes from Small Screen, as Founder and Editor-in-Chief Edward Lauder reported that, according to a source, Snyder and actor Jared Leto are working together on a Leto-led Joker movie.

“It sounds as though Jared Leto and Zack Snyder enjoyed working together so much on the set of Justice League that they are now working on a story for a Joker solo movie together,” wrote Lauder.

The alleged source further noted that the two are in the very early stages of crafting the story for the film, telling Lauder “Jared and Zack are working on developing a standalone Joker story together to be made into a future movie. Things are very, very early days at the moment, but they’re very excited about the idea.”

When pressed, they added, while the story is meant for a movie, it could be turned into a graphic novel or TV series.

“As it stands, this idea is for a solo Joker movie, but it could very well end up being a TV series,” the source allegedly told Lauder. “I’ve even heard rumours that they might release this story as a graphic novel. That’s something that both Zack and Jared are very interested in doing.”

Despite his having been brought back to finish his cut of Justice League, Snyder will most likely need all the luck he can muster to see his vision realized, as the director has previously discussed how DC rejected his pitch for a DCEU prequel comic which would have seen Joker kill Robin and set fire to Wayne Manor – a story the director has been itching to tell.

“You know, we talked about doing a, I guess it would be DC, they decided not to do it,” said Snyder. “But we did talk about doing a mini-kind of comic book run on the death of Robin, right? And what happened? How Joker killed Robin and what it did to Batman and started him down this dark, darker road that ended, kind of culminated, with the arrival of Superman”

Should Snyder and Leto get their movie, it might serve as a way for the latter to get back at Warner and Todd Phillips for making Joker, a movie the Little Things actor allegedly wanted to “throttle in its crib”.

Conversely, it’s possible that he might instead let bygones be exactly that and, with the understanding of the nouveau studio logic propping up the DC Multiverse theory, allow Leto and Phoenix’s respective Jokers exist side by side. After all, the studio logic dictates that as long there is HBO Max, all variants of The Joker can coexist.

With that principle in play, it’s possible the story Snyder and Leto have in mind to adapt is The Killing Joke, a theory that lines up with an earlier rumor that HBO Max execs are discussing a Snyder-and-Leto led adaptation of the classic Alan Moore graphic novel.

What do you make of Snyder and Leto returning to the character of the Joker? Let us know your thoughts on social media or in the comments down below!