Batman

Talk about the surprise of a lifetime!

We ranked the 25 best superhero films in the history of cinema. Did your favorite make the list?

The video used the score from ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ without approval.

At some point we’re all going to have to stop asking, “Is this real life?! Is this really happening right now?!” The daily proliferation of surreal news headlines will never feel normal (nor should they), but it’s the frequency our country is operating at now, and it will likely continue at this pitch for the next four years, which officially kicked off today. In the latest episode of The Surreal Life, Donald Trump basically plagiarized Bane, Tom Hardy’s mush-mouthed villain from The Dark Knight Rises, in his inauguration speech.

When Ben Affleck took the stage at Comic-Con last year to promote Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, it was a mere matter of minutes before rumors began circulating that Warner Bros. was planning a new solo Batman film with Affleck set to star — and possibly direct. DC’s Geoff Johns confirmed that he was working on a script with Affleck, and since then the news has basically been repeatedly confirmed via interviews with Zack Snyder, Johns and Affleck. And now WB has gone and made it officially official by announcing that a standalone Batman film is in development with Affleck. But we already knew that.

Part of the fun comic book fans have had over the years is debating which superhero could defeat which superhero. Could Wolverine beat The Hulk? Could the X-Men beat The Avengers? There have been entire lines of books devoted to this very topic. Heck, Batman vs. Superman and Captain America: Civil War are both based on this very conceit. So, you can’t blame Matt Damon for getting into the fun when asked if his Jason Bourne, who he calls “my superhero”, could take his pal Ben Affleck’s Batman. As you might expect, Damon’s not stepping down from the challenge.

After yesterday’s three new Batman vs. Superman images from the pages of Empire magazine, today we have even more from the upcoming superhero film. From that same magazine article, we have both Ben Affleck and director Zack Snyder talking about this film’s version of Batman (which Affleck describes as a “f---ed up Batman”), plus a bunch of new photos from the film.

Following the Batman vs. Superman info dump that came out of Comic-Con, we thought it might be a while before we saw or heard anything from the upcoming superhero movie. After all, we did get an extended new trailer, new images and a new poster. But today, we have three new Batman vs. Superman pics each showing off one of the film’s three main characters: Batman, Superman and Lex Luthor.

When Warner Bros. announced their upcoming superhero schedule last year, one title notably missing was a solo Batman movie. Sure, Batman was going to be a big part of both Batman vs. Superman and the two Justice League movies, but would Batfleck be getting his own trilogy, a la The Dark Knight? It turns out, yes, yes he will. Latino Review is reporting that Ben Affleck will both star in and direct the spinoff, titled The Batman, which is set for November 2018.

Anne Hathaway memorably played Catwoman in The Dark Knight Rises, but she very nearly played another catty superhero. The Oscar-winning actress was set to play Black Cat in Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 4, which would have also featured John Malkovich as Vulture. That film was canceled shortly before filming and Sony eventually decided to reboot the whole franchise. That’s just one of the facts packed into the latest episode of You Think You Know Movies, which goes completely batty with The Dark Knight Rises!