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Back in October 2022, The Batman director Matt Reeves was hit with a claim that his cape flick based on the World's Greatest Detective had plagiarized an unmade Batman movie script that was written by writer and artist Chris Wozniak. While it wasn't proven at the time that it was indeed the case, Wozniak later sued Warner Bros. and DC Comics for copyright infringement.
However, the case was not in favor of Chris Wozniak as it was ruled by a U.S. judge that The Batman had indeed not plagiarized materials from his unmade script. The verdict just came recently, as documents from the court proceedings were released online, and in a twist of fate, Wozniak was later accused of abusing DC's copyright infringement laws.
Why did Chris Wozniak sue the filmmakers behind The Batman?
Chris Wozniak is a freelance writer and artist who has worked for both DC and Marvel comics. He claimed that in the 1990s, while working for DC, he wrote a story based around Batman called The Ultimate Riddle, which was later retitled to The Blind Man's Hat.
Wozniak's story apparently focused on Riddler going around Gotham and killing some of Gotham's elite and higher-ups, a plot point that was part of Matt Reeves' The Batman as well. The story saw Batman having to solve riddles to find the Riddler, and the third act saw the villain launch a plague on Gotham.
In the movement that was called #Batmangate, Wozniak made a series of YouTube videos in October 2022, pointing out similarities between his and Matt Reeves' script for The Batman.
Wozniak alleged that over the years, he had pitched his story to DC Comics, and even pitched to a producer of the film, reportedly named Michael Uslan. However, his script wasn't turned into a project and rather stayed in the Warner Bros. archives. He later on accused Warner Bros., DC Comics, and Matt Reeves for plagiarizing his story and launched his lawsuit last year.
The court ruled against Chris Wozniak
Recently, a U.S. judge came to the conclusion that Matt Reeves, Warner Bros., and DC Comics hadn't plagiarized Wozniak's unmade Batman script for The Batman as he believed there wasn't enough proof to hold up his claim.
Director Matt Reeves also presented his own declaration, which spoke about how he joined the film and also described his writing process, which further cemented the fact that the script wasn't plagiarized. Reeves further disputed the claim that producer Michael Uslan had anything to do with the film's story and also revealed that he had never met him.
The Batman to receive a sequel
The film was released in March 2022 and was a huge hit among fans and critics who praised it for portraying the Caped Crusader accurately. The film made more than $700 million at the box office and also has a sequel on the way that's titled The Batman - Part II.
While the sequel was scheduled to be released in October 2025, it was recently delayed by a year to October 2, 2026. Matt Reeves is currently writing the film and will return to direct, with Robert Pattinson also expected to return to play Batman.
