Summary
- Joker was a successful and controversial movie that won numerous awards and made over $1 billion at the box office, despite its relatively low budget.
- The sequel, Joker: Folie à Deux, is currently in post-production and is expected to be surprising and successful like its predecessor.
- The release date for Joker 2 is set for October 4, 2024, during awards season, indicating that Warner Bros. has faith in the sequel's quality and potential for recognition.
Joker told the origin story of the Clown Prince of Crime, and it was so successful that the standalone movie is now getting a sequel, Joker: Folie à Deux. The 2019 movie follows Arthur Fleck (Joaquin Phoenix), a clown-for-hire who has a dream of becoming a great stand-up comedian. Arthur is constantly bullied and gets the short end of the stick when it comes to Gotham's economy, leading him down a murderous path that influences a whole movement and transforms him into the Clown Prince of Crime by the time of the Joker movie ending.
Despite Joker being a controversial movie for its divisive exploration of the topic of mental health, it was also a huge award winner. Phoenix won the Academy Award for Best Actor and Hildur Guðnadóttir won for Best Original Score. This is on top of the movie making $1 billion at the worldwide box office (via Box Office Mojo) on a budget of just $55 million. With the star-studded Joker: Folie à Deux cast - and some other exciting reveals that have been released about the movie along the way - it seems Warner Bros. could easily repeat that success.
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Joker 2 Latest News
The second Joker: Folie Á Deux trailer was released on July 23, 2024, revealing more about the upcoming DC sequel and its plot. This release came after a 24-hour livestream build-up to the new teaser's debut, which showed the set for an in-universe Joker & Harley show as the countdown took place, building excitement for the newest reveal regarding the series and its newest chapter.
The first Joker 2 trailer released on April 9, 2024, following a teaser the prior week about its unveiling. While certain story elements are still entertainingly mysterious, the trailer shed more light on what the movie will look like, providing a first proper look at Joaquin Phoenix's Joker and Lady Gaga's Harley Quinn together on-screen.
Joker 2 Trailers
The first Joker: Folie à Deux trailer appears to confirm that a good portion of the sequel will take place in Arkham, following directly on from the end of the original film. The preview shows Arthur Fleck meeting Gaga's Harley Quinn while in confinement, though notably adapts this part of their comic origin story to instead have Quinn be another patient in the facility, instead of Joker's therapist, as is traditionally part of their backstory.
However, the trailer also appears to suggest the pair escape, as the sequence of Fleck being chased by two other people in Joker makeup is notably in Gotham city. That said, it does also appear that the musical sequences of the film will reflect a split from reality, which means anything is possible in terms of what actually unfolds in Joker 2.
The second trailer for Joker: Folie Á Deux sheds further light on story concepts put across by the first teaser, focusing more on the story of Arthur Fleck's upcoming trial and the impact this trial has on both Gotham and Lady Gaga's Harley Quinn more directly. The Joker & Harley show sequences also suggest that the movie title mentioning Folie À Deux - translated as "madness of two" - is in reference to Harley Quinn sharing in Arthur's delusions, as the scene bears parallels to Fleck's previous fantasies.
Excitingly, the captions for the trailer also state that some lines in the video are said by Harvey Dent, supporting the idea that he will play a more direct role in the film. Having Dent appear as a focal character would not only make sense on account of Joker's legal trial seemingly being at the forefront of the movie, but also because this opens up an opportunity for the plot to introduce another of Gotham's rogues gallery by either teasing or directly showing the origin story that sees the character become Two-Face.
Joker 2 Release Date
It will have been five years since Joker was released when the sequel hits movie theaters, as Joker 2 is set for 2024's awards season. Joker 2 will be released on October 4, 2024, and it's hardly surprising that Warner Bros. wants to release the sequel at that time of year, as the original movie was such a huge awards contender. The release date is good news for the movie's quality, as it means that the studio has a lot of faith in the sequel and that it could be another big winner at the 2024/2025 awards ceremonies.
Writer/director Todd Phillips completed the script in 2022, and the movie's development and production were fast-tracked. Joker: Folie à Deux is reportedly over double the budget of Joker, as the production cost is apparently a huge $150 million.
Joker 2 Cast
Actor Name | Role In Joker 2 |
---|---|
Joaquin Phoenix | Arthur Fleck/Joker |
Zazie Beetz | Sophie Drummond |
Lady Gaga | Harleen Quinzel/Harley Quinn |
Brendan Gleeson | Undisclosed |
Jacob Lofland | Undisclosed |
Catherine Keener | Undisclosed |
Harry Lawtey | Undisclosed |
With Joker being led by Phoenix, the sequel obviously wouldn't work without him returning. Phoenix will reprise his role as the Clown Prince of Crime, and he isn't the only returning cast member of the original movie, as Zazie Beetz will be returning as Sophie Drummond too (via Deadline).
Sophie was portrayed as somewhat of a love interest of Arthur's, though it was revealed that their romance was all in Arthur's head, and she was only a neighbor to him in real life. It was unclear if Sophie survived in Joker, but a deleted scene reveals that she survived, suggesting that her scenes in the sequel won't just be flashbacks.
Phoenix and Beetz are joined by a new and promising supporting cast. In the movie, Lady Gaga will play Harley Quinn, who in the comics is the Arkham Asylum doctor with whom the Joker has a relationship, making her into first a supervillain and then an antihero in her own right after she leaves him. It appears Joker: Folie Á Deux has made some major changes to the character, as the trailers show her as a disillusioned Gothamite who is seemingly also sent to Arkham State Hospital - rather than being a psychiatrist working there - where she then meets Arthur Fleck.
The other major actor joining the cast is Brendan Gleeson (In Bruges, The Banshees of Inisherin), but his role is undisclosed. Several other actors have been cast in as yet undisclosed roles too. Jacob Lofland (The Son) has joined the cast, as has Catherine Keener (Being John Malkovich) and Harry Lawtey (The Pale Blue Eye) (via Deadline).
Harvey Dent appears to have been confirmed for Joker: Folie Á Deux based on the captions for the movie's second trailer attributing some lines to his name, supporting prior theories that the character would appear following set photos that revealed signs with slogans like "Dent Is A Clown" being held at what appears to be a protest in defense of Arthur Fleck. While speculation and rumors point to Harry Lawtey being the potential casting for the role, nothing regarding this role is as of yet officially confirmed.
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Joker 2 Plot Details
It isn't totally clear whether Joker: Folie à Deux takes place some time after Joker's final scene where Arthur kills the Arkham Asylum employee, or just minutes later. The first movie ends with Arthur running from Arkham Asylum orderlies after he murdered a doctor, and it's obvious that Arthur didn't manage to escape yet based on the fact that Joker: Folie à Deux trailers show him in Arkham and explore his impending trial as a major plot feature.
Similarly, the trailer and preview images don't show him to have aged, meaning there likely isn't a time jump in the film. Either way, it has been revealed that much of the sequel is set in Arkham - with the Joker 2 trailers underlining that this will definitively be the case. This is seemingly where Fleck meets Harleen "Lee" Quinzel, and where the pair begin their complicated romance.
Interestingly, the second trailer for the movie appears to show Arkham on fire midway through the video, suggesting the pair will break out of the hospital in dramatic fashion, or potentially be broken out by the Joker's supporters, who appear to be a still considerable faction even after the events of the original movie. Indeed, having loyal fans and a romantic interest potentially invested in Fleck's Joker alias could well be what sees the character commit fully to this identity, encouraging him to leave his former self behind.
The most talked about element of Joker: Folie à Deux is its drastic tonal change, as the Joker sequel will be a musical. It makes especial sense why Lady Gaga was cast as Harley Quinn with this in mind, as not only has the pop star become a great actor, but she's an incredible performer too.
Gaga is ultimately the key to Phillips pulling off the musical element, which has always been a bold choice. As most of the movie will be set in Arkham, it's likely that the musical elements will be in Arthur's head, just like how his relationship with Sophie was in his head in the first movie. That could especially be the case given that the movie's subtitle translates to "madness for two," which is a shared delusional disorder - and the second trailer features Joker and Harley Quinn in full outfits and makeup on their own show, which may well be the premise of their shared delusion.
While Joker 2's musical approach is divisive, it could be a welcome change following the dour and depressing tone of the first movie, and it could be a clever and creative way of doing so. On top of that, the Joker has generally always been theatrical and musical, so this radical shift is rather in keeping with the iconic character. The Arkham setting also opens up a lot of possibilities and opportunities too, as it could potentially introduce other villains in Batman's rogues' gallery.
Other Joker 2 Details
Guðnadóttir delivered an unconventional and hauntingly beautiful stripped-back score for the 2019 movie, which won her an Oscar, and the composer will return to score Joker 2. But her approach will undoubtedly be a lot different for the sequel.
Given that Joker: Folie à Deux will be at least partly a musical, Guðnadóttir has to compose music with lyrical content too. However, having composed music for other suspenseful and dramatic movies like Sicario, The Revenant, and Tár, it's unlikely that the sequel will stray too far from her intense cello work.
Joker: Folie a Deux
R
Joker: Folie à Deux is the sequel to Todd Phillips' critically acclaimed comic book thriller Joker. Reprising his Academy Award-winning performance as the failed comedian Arthur Fleck, Joaquin Phoenix revisits the iconic DC character alongside Lady Gaga, who makes her debut as Joker's lover Harley Quinn in this standalone continuity of the DC Universe.
- Director
- Todd Phillips
- Release Date
- October 4, 2024
- prequel(s)
- Joker
Upcoming DC Movies | Release Date |
---|---|
Joker: Folie à Deux | October 4, 2024 |
Superman | July 11, 2025 |
Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow | June 26, 2026 |
The Batman - Part II | October 2, 2026 |