DC Studios May Have Quietly Confirmed That Robert Pattinson Is the DCU's Batman

Despite news that Netflix has acquired Warner Bros. Discovery following a successful bidding war, it appears that the new DC Universe spearheaded by DC Studios’ CEOs James Gunn and Peter Safran is staying put. Fans and industry officials had been speculating that the newly established shared cinematic universe was doomed, but now, all seems to be well.

The New DCU Will Push Forward

In an interview with Businessweek (via Bloomberg) following the news that the streaming giant had won the bidding war, WBD President and CEO David Zaslav assured fans that the DCU will continue across television and film as intended, while praising Gunn and Safran:

“The work of James and Peter, their creative vision, it’s compelling and a great economic return. There’s no storytelling content that we have that provides a bigger palette than DC, and there’s nobody around right now who can tell these stories with the same imagination and excitement.

The DC universe is big enough and strong enough that it should be available on all platforms. There are some stories that are important to be told in theaters around the world, and some stories that are important to be told as series.”

The DCU was officially launched on the big screen earlier this year with Superman (2025), which was directed and written by Gunn himself. The film grossed $616.8M worldwide and received mostly positive reviews from audiences and critics.

Two new films have now been marked for theatrical release: Supergirl, which stars Milly Alcock as the titular Kryptonian, flies into theaters in June next year (2026), and Superman: Man of Tomorrow, which will see David Corenswet’s Man of Steel return, lands in 2027.

Recently, Warner Bros. unveiled the first trailer for Supergirl, further proof that the DCU is continuing to push forward despite massive organizational changes away from the screen.

What’s Happening With Batman?

Other films on the slate include the Batman reboot The Brave and the Bold, which is expected to cast a new actor as the Dark Knight in a role separate to Robert Pattinson’s version from Matt Reeves The Batman (2022) and the upcoming sequel The Batman —Part II (2027).

Those films take place in DC’s Elseworlds, the official collective name given to standalone projects that are unrelated to the studio’s shared cinematic universes. However, that hasn’t stopped fans from speculating that Pattinson will be integrated into Gunn and Safran’s DCU.

Gunn himself has fueled this fire. “I’ve met him [Pattinson] before, we’ve talked about it before, ” he told Entertainment Tonight earlier this year. However, he added,  “But it’s not what’s happening right now. Everything is in flux, so we’ll figure out what we’re doing next.”

Related: ‘Batman’ Reboot Gets ‘No Way Home’ Treatment, Unites Several Characters From Different Timelines

Who Will Be the DCU’s Batman?

It seems that, for now, Robert Pattinson’s Battinson will continue in his own series of standalone films and that The Brave and the Bold will bring in a new actor as Bruce Wayne/Batman. However, DC Studios may have just thrown things into uncertainty again.

Recently, DC Studios unveiled an epic display of David Corenswet’s Superman alongside Robert Pattinson’s Batman, which has, unsurprisingly, sparked hopes among fans of seeing the latter hero appear in the DCU at some point in the future.

Shared to X (formerly Twitter) by The Direct, who were recently in attendance at Tokyo Comic-Con 2025, the life-size displays include the new Man of Steel, along with the dog Krypto, and the current Bat of Gotham at his side in a stunning “shared universe” display.

DC Studios Could Be Teasing a Crossover

Could this be DC’s way of teasing a crossover project? Maybe. But it’s worth noting that Corenswet is set against the Christopher Reeve/Richard Donner Superman logo, and that Pattinson’s Dark Knight is stood in front of the Michael Keaton/Tim Burton Bat-logo. In other words, it looks like DC hasn’t put a great deal of thought into the overall feature.

With all that said, many fans doubt that Pattinson’s Batman will become part of the DCU anyway, not only because the dark and gritty style of those films would clash with the vibrant aesthetic of Superman, but these newer projects have also established that superheroes, monsters, and aliens have long been part of our lives, which is not in line with The Batman.

Where There’s a Multiverse, There’s a Way

There is, of course, always the DC Multiverse, which allowed The Flash (2023) to cross over with non-DCEU projects such as the Tim Burton Batman films and many others.

Still, the question remains: will Robert Pattinson ever appear alongside Corenswet? Putting the Multiverse possibility aside, it’s very unlikely. Gunn has been asked about it a few times since the DCU was first announced, with varying responses. One minute, it’s possible, the next, a new actor is being cast and that the two franchises will remain entirely separate.

We also know that the Batman silhouette that appears in the animated series Creature Commandos (which is a DCU entry) is that of Ben Affleck’s Caped Crusader from the DCEU, as Gunn previously revealed in an interview to Rotten Tomatoes that he wrote the series before he took over as the head of DC, which heavily implies it was modeled off the Batfleck.

Meanwhile, The Batman director Matt Reeves has expressed that he’d prefer to keep his films standalone.

The DCU is also causing confusion around continuity. In recent months, Gunn divided fans by cherry-picking characters and films from the DCEU and stating they’re part of the DCU.

So who knows which Batman exists in Gunn and Safran’s universe. The likely answer is that they have no idea yet. There’s been plenty of back-and-forth about this already, and this new Corenswet/Pattinson display will likely see it continue.

Would you like to see Robert Pattinson’s Batman integrated into the DCU? Let us know your thoughts in the comments down below!