Warner Bros chairman Toby Emmerich had intentionally lowballed the production cost for Todd Phillips' Joker in order to discourage him from moving forward with the project. Phillips persisted and on a reported budget of $55 million , Joker managed to garner over one billion at the global box office.
After its enormous success, it was rumored that Warner Bros. had begun planning two more sequels to Joaquin Phoenix's Joker . Producer Michael E. Uslan may have suggested adapting another Batman in a similar vein to Todd Phillips , like Mr. Freeze, but it seems like Warner Bros. will be revisiting the Joker once again soon.
TELLING THE SAME JOKE(R)
In a blowout report from The Hollywood Reporter , it was casually mentioned that a sequel to Joaquin Phoenix's Joker is still planned.
Additionally, to clarify the outlet's report, it did not say that Joker and this proposed sequel would take place in the same universe as Robert Pattinson's The Batman and HBO Max’s spinoff Gotham PD. Instead, every DC project moving forward, except for those projects , would take place in the same universe.
ANOTHER SUCCESS WAITING
No matter the quality of this sequel, it is bound to make a huge profit for the company as it's unlikely that the budget would balloon too much. But, of course, the real hurdle will be signing on Joaquin Phoenix for a sequel, let alone two.
The way Joker ended left it open for Phoenix's Arthur Fleck to return as the Clown Prince of Crime, but what else would a sequel explore? In the film, Fleck was already decades older than Bruce Wayne, so it'd be odd for Batman to appear suddenly. Of course, it could be explained away as Fleck being an unreliable narrator, but even that sounds a bit cheap.
As Uslan discussed, other villains could be added, perhaps vying for control of a Gotham City in chaos opposite Phoenix.
