Culture

How to Read the 'Justice League' Rumor of Christian Bale Returning as Batman

A (pretty) well sourced report suggests that Bale will return to his role as the Caped Crusader for Warner Bros.' answer to The Avengers franchise. So how would this work?

By Esther Zuckerman
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Is Christian Bale set to get all growly again? Latino Review's (pretty) well sourced El Mayimbe is reporting that Bale will return to his role as the Caped Crusader for Warner Bros.' answer to The Avengers franchise, the Justice League. According to the report Bale will team up with Henry Cavill, Zack Snyder's new Superman, for a film that could be helmed by Snyder himself and produced by Bale's Batman director, Christopher Nolan.

"So, what is going on with the Justice League movie. Well, it remains a high priority for the studio," El Mayimbe says in a video report. "For starters, Chris Nolan has completely taken over the DCU at Warner Bros., so anything having to do with these superheroes goes through him now."

Of course, the Justice League rumor mill has been going strong, with word at one point that Joseph Gordon-Levitt would take up the Batman mantle. The author of that report, Drew McWeeny of HitFix, defended his assertion in light of today's revelations:

Here's the thing, though… while I have no doubt El Mayimbe's latest piece on what's happening at Warner Bros is factually accurate, I also have no doubt that things are changing weekly at Warner when it comes to the future of their DC Universe movies, and that the piece I wrote about Joseph Gordon-Levitt was accurate when I wrote and published it.

So, yes, all reports about the Justice League revolving door should, at this point, be taken with a healthy bit of skepticism. Cain Rodriguez at at Indiewire's The Playlist notes in a parenthetical: "and remember that Latino Review, as often as they have been right, were also dead wrong about that whole Planet Hulk thing."

It's also important to consider Nolan and Bale's previous comments about returning to the Batman franchise. Nolan has been pretty set on not making a fourth Batman movie, while Bale has made some remarks that would seem to imply he'd be okay returning to the character under the right circumstances. Of course, El Mayimbe's Latino Review report implies that Nolan would have an overseer role, and this wouldn't exactly be a continuation of the Dark Knight storyline. Another important question: Will Man of Steel be any good?

So how would this work? Remember the ending of The Dark Knight Rises, which (spoiler alert) saw Bale's Bruce Wayne alive, content, and leaving Batman behind. Well, El Mayimbe has a theory: "Think of the following hot trailer shot: Bruce Wayne, bearded, retired, salmon fishing in the Yemen somewhere. Out of nowhere, Superman flies down and tells Bruce Wayne, 'yo, I'm putting a team together.' Are you kidding me? Fanboys would squeal like 13-year-old girls at a Justin Bieber concert." For what it's worth, Michael Caine is in.

The prospect of Nolan and Bale re-teaming in some capacity is exciting to fans, obviously:

You can watch El Mayimbe's full report here:

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