The Batman's DC Connections Defeats Its Purpose Of Being Outside The DCEU
It's been hammered home that The Batman will be a standalone movie outside the DCEU, but its apparent DC connections make that rather pointless. For a long period, it was unclear whether or not The Batman, director Matt Reeves' tale of a Dark Knight in the early years of his career as a superhero, would be part of the larger DCEU. The casting of Black actor Jeffrey Wright as Jim Gordon seemed to suggest it wouldn't, due to JK Simmons already playing the role in Justice League and possibly again in the future, but it spent some time up in the air.
By now though, it's been stressed more than once that The Batman is intended to be a standalone story, much like the 2019 Joker movie starring Joaquin Phoenix as the Clown Prince of Crime. That's despite the project beginning life as a vehicle for Ben Affleck's Batman, with Affleck previously set to write, direct, and star. Robert Pattinson's younger Batman is not meant to be seen as an early version of Affleck's Batman or Bruce Wayne.
Yet, if that's the intent, some recent reveals suggested by The Batman set photos call the idea of the film being standalone into question. If The Batman is going to connect to the larger DC world, why did it need to break continuity at all?
For a while there, The Batman needing to be a standalone story kind of made sense. The tone it's going for seems to be even darker than Zack Snyder's, and the versions of various Bat-villains included look to be quite unique. Yet, recent set photos have suggested that Superman, Wonder Woman, and The Flash exist in The Batman's world. If that's the case, and The Batman has larger ties to DC outside of Gotham City, then what's the point in making it a standalone story to begin with?
If Matt Reeves wants to include Superman, Wonder Woman, and The Flash in The Batman, there's no real reason he couldn't have done that without creating yet another new DC movie universe. We know little about Affleck's younger days as Batman, so a new actor, even still Pattinson, could've played a young version of Batfleck. None of the villains found in The Batman have appeared in the DCEU yet, so nothing would need to be retconned there. It's unknown right now how Superman, Wonder Woman, and The Flash might fit into the story, but them having not met Bruce yet could easily be written around to get them in there somewhere. Whereas Joker necessitated a new world, due to Jared Leto's Joker already existing in the DCEU, The Batman requires no such change.