Ben Affleck

As is tradition, the night before the Oscar ceremony takes place, the 37th Annual Golden Raspberry Awards will descend on Los Angeles to commemorate the worst that Hollywood had to offer in 2016. A mean-spirited diss-fest in the estimation of some, a good-natured ribbing to others, the so-called Razzies are twice as unpredictable and ten times as frank as the usual awards program. The expected categories of Worst Picture, Worst Director and Worst Actor/Actress share space with the distinctions of Worst Screen Combo and Worst Prequel, Remake, Ripoff, or Sequel at the ignominious ceremony. Some celebrities take the jokes in stride (Sandra Bullock famously showed up to receive her Worst Actress Razzie for All About Steve the day before she dropped by the Oscars to pick up her Best Actress prize for The Blind Side), but the program goes widely ignored by the industry overall.

After years of watching a certain segment of fans argue over which Enterprise captain was the best, I think it might be time for Star Trek fans to admit that they’re no longer the leader in casting fan arguments. Now all the cool kids want to argue over which Batman actor played the role best. While the obvious answer for most millennials would be Christian Bale, I tend to gravitate towards the early performances of Michael Keaton, a Batman who was a bit more believable as an intellectual than subsequent versions of the character. To each their own, I suppose.

Rough year for Ben Affleck, noted Jennifer Garner spouse and one-time star of Gigli. His big starring vehicle Batman v Superman made a whole lot of money but was critically reviled almost across the board, his latest directorial effort Live by Night got a quiet and unceremonious limited release that was buried in the holiday craziness, he was spotted sadly vaping in a car, and now a pall of uncertainty has been cast over his future. He’s confirmed for Zack Snyder’s upcoming Justice League crossover, but Affleck’s relationship with the Dark Knight’s cowl and cape may be getting a bit strained. In a new interview, Affleck indicated that what was once presumed to be set in stone is, in fact, still up for debate.

We all know that Ben Affleck’s performance as Batman was one of the few things both critics and fans of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice could completely agree on. From his shallow playboy persona as Bruce Wayne to his thinly veiled rage as the Dark Knight, Affleck’s take on the character got everyone very excited to see what the actor-writer-director could do with a free hand for his standalone The Batman movie. Unfortunately, things have slowed considerably since, with rumors of mediocre scripts and a shifting release date taking some of the buzz off the upcoming release.

One of the biggest problems (and one that we’ve covered quite a bit) with Warner Bros’ DCEU is the way the studio is reverse-engineering its Justice League franchise. Instead of establishing their characters in individual films and slowly building toward a big crossover, they’ve done the reverse. And by building their productions around meeting a release date deadline, they wind up with films that are kind of a mess. If Ben Affleck’s approach to his Batman standalone film (and the recent decision to delay Justice League 2) is any indication, then maybe — just maybe — WB is learning from their mistakes.

With all the heroes joining Batman and Wonder Woman (and Superman) in Justice League, plus almost all of them getting their own solo movies, it’s almost impossible to find room for them all. Warner Bros. recently did a bit of reshuffling with their slate of films, and pushed back the release of Justice League: Part 2, which until now had had a mid-2019 spot, to make room for Ben Affleck’s Batman movie. And now that Snyder has some free time on his hands, he’s turning his attention to Afghanistan war thriller The Last Photograph.

We don’t know much about Ben Affleck’s solo Batman movie, save for its blessedly punctuation-free title and the fact that Affleck and Deathstroke will be in it, and with all the work being done on Wonder Woman and Justice League, The Batman is probably pretty far on the back burner right now. But plans are still being set in motion, and our latest Alfred, Jeremy Irons, says that the movie will start production as soon as next summer.

The future of the DC Cinematic Universe is filled with lots of mystery. We don’t know what that second Justice League film we be called, nor do we have many details on Aquaman and Shazam. But we might finally have an idea as to when Ben Affleck’s solo Batman movie will hit theaters.

Hollywood is so obsessed with superheroes these days they made a superhero movie about an accountant. It’s called The Accountant, and it is indeed about a guy who prepares people’s taxes, looks for deductions, and monitors financial records for fraud. But in his off-hours, this guy is also a master martial artist and a sniper capable of hitting targets a mile away. He also has a secret identity and what amounts to a low-rent Batcave, an Airstream trailer full of weapons and cash, stashed in a storage unit. He’s played by former Daredevil and current Batman Ben Affleck. He doesn’t wear a cape, but he might as well.

We finally know what Ben Affleck‘s solo Batman movie will be called, and thank the superhero gods, it won’t have a colon or a subtitle.

There were a lot of rumors about perennial DC Comics bad guys Deathstroke the Terminator showing up in Suicide Squad. He’s gonna be in the movie! (He wasn’t.) He’s gonna be a hired assassin competing with the Suicide Squad! (He didn’t.) He’s the breakout character in the movie! (He wasn’t.) Scott Eastwood’s gonna play him! (He didn’t.) So, so many stories about this character who wound up not being in the movie at all, in any way.

The DCEU has been keeping Ben Affleck pretty busy with Justice League and plans for a new solo Batman film, which the actor will also co-write and direct. Those commitments are partially responsible for the repeated delays on his Dennis Lehane adaptation, Live by Night, which may or may not hit theaters before the end of the year. Despite his increasingly crowded schedule, Affleck has picked up another project to direct and star in, but who knows when he’ll have the time to actually make it happen.