Jared Leto’s Joker sparks criticism online

Director Zack Snyder has shared the first-look of actor Jared Leto's Joker, who has been redrawn for the upcoming director's cut of Justice League. The Academy Award-winner previously played the iconic Batman villain in Suicide Squad, with much of his performance being left on the cutting room floor, reported The Verge.

Snyder, in an interview, teased a meeting between Leto's Joker and Ben Affleck's Batman in his four-hour Justice League, due for release on HBO Max in March. Despite the horrific appearance revealed by Snyder, netizens seem to disagree with the auteur. A user tweeted, “I wish people would stop paying Hollywood to make the same films over and over.”

Another user tweeted, “Jaoquin Phoenix’s Joker would take Jared Leto’s Joker for a walk around the block, feed him treats, pet him, then vivisect him with a smile on his face.”

Lastly, a user tweeted, “Let me get this straight. Everyone’s getting hyped because we’re going to be seeing more of a poorly characterised Joker? That too, from a director who gave us three of the objectively worse DC films in recent memory? Remind me again why people are excited by this I’m genuinely confused.”

“The cool thing about the scene is that it’s Joker talking directly to Batman about Batman,” Snyder told Vanity Fair. “It’s Joker analyzing Batman about who he is and what he is. That’s the thing I also felt like fans deserved from the DC Universe.” That is to say, the Jared Leto Joker and the Ben Affleck Batman, they never really got together.