Ben Affleck just can’t catch a break these days. With War of The Planet of the Apes director Matt Reeves now at the helm of Warner Bros’ troubled Batman production he has seen fit to make a few changes and one of those includes ditching Affleck’s original script for the project.
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Talking to MTV’s Happy Sad Confused podcast he revealed from the moment he stepped on board the good ship Batman he would be starting from scratch confirming he had scrapped the earlier script that Affleck, Chris Terrio and DC’s Geoff Johns had worked on: “No, it’s a new story. It’s just starting again. I’m excited about it. I think it’s going to be really cool.”
Reeves, who has been on board the intelligent and sensational Apes trilogy for the last two outings has previously admitted he plans for his Batman character to take the form of a noir character with Affleck staying in the Bat suit. He made no mention of whether the villain Deathstroke, who was to be played by Joe Manganiello, would be featuring in his new story arc.
In another recent interview with Uproxx, Reeves divulged that he isn’t one to be ruled by a studio, they either go with his vision or not and we can’t help but admire him for that.
“When I come in, what I say is, ‘Look. First of all, you’re asking me if I’m interested in this franchise. I am. I love this franchise. I’ve loved it since I was a kid. But here’s the way in which I’m interested in it. And if you’re not interested in it in that way, then that’s totally fine.; And the good news was, they said, ‘Yeah, we’re really interested in that way.’
“And I remember this on Dawn, too. There would be moments where I came in for a pitch that was a certain version of the movie, and somewhere along the way, because they didn’t know me or whatever it was, they’d say, ‘Why don’t we do this?’ And I would just simply say, ‘But that’s not the movie that we talked about. That’s not the movie I want to do.’ And I have to say that they always backed down when it came down to that. And it’s kind of the way that I’ve always done it. And here’s the thing: I’m always happy not to do something. I’m usually looking for the reason to say no.”
Affleck will be attending the San Diego Comic-Con next week to promote Justice League which is due out later this year.
