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.

And with the film in need of a little bit of a spark, it would appear Affleck found the perfect way to shift focus back to the parts of The Batman audiences trust (himself) and away from the things that give fans pause (Warner Bros.). Yesterday, a user on Reddit (via Hollywood Heroic) posted a photo of Affleck’s interview in the most recent issue of Entertainment Weekly. In his remarks, Affleck weighs in on the current state of the project and whether he’d move forward with a movie he doesn’t feel is up to par:

I’m still working on the script. I’m not going to write and direct anything that I don’t think is good enough to be made. I’m definitely going to make sure I have something that is special  —  there’s not enough money in the world to make a mediocre version of Batman worth it.

Talk is cheap, as they say, and any questions raised by Affleck’s comments could probably be answered by reading the fine print on his contract with Warner Bros. With Affleck’s performance one of the few parts of Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice to pull in really solid reviews, it’s hard to imagine that Warner Bros. would simply let the actor close up shop. It’s probably better to view Affleck’s comment as a way of spinning the recent headlines that The Batman script isn’t very good or that David Ayer had Suicide Squad snatched out from underneath him. This way, fans’ faith in Affleck is reaffirmed and the studio looks like its making good on its promise that the DC Cinematic Universe will be an auteur driven affair (one of the ways it has attempted to differentiate itself from Marvel and its well-known house style).

With a brand new release date of June 2019, Ben Affleck and Warner Bros. have plenty of time to get this one right. Fingers crossed that there’s a little bit of fire to go along with all Affleck’s smoke.

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