Matt Reeves spent the hours after dropping The Batman Part II bombshell doing what he’s done all production: confirming details one fan reply at a time.
Two confirmations came out of the camera test footage overnight.
The new cowl has longer ears. And the sequel is shooting on custom Panavision anamorphic glass built specifically for it.
‘You Are Not Crazy’
The camera test shows Robert Pattinson slowly turning in the suit while rain falls, sirens wail, and Michael Giacchino’s theme rumbles underneath.
One fan looked at the silhouette and asked the question on everyone’s mind: “THE EARS LOOK LONGER TO ME AM I CRAZY.”
Reeves’ reply: “You are not crazy. 😊🦇”
The exchange blew past 2.9 million views and 165,000 likes within hours.
So the cowl redesign is official, straight from the director. The longer ears push Pattinson’s silhouette closer to the comics, with fans already measuring it against the Keaton and Bale profiles.
Eagle-eyed viewers combing the footage have flagged more: a chinguard that wasn’t there in 2022, what looks like a higher collar, and a reworked bat emblem in the new title logo. None of that is confirmed.
The ears are.
Costume designers David Crossman and Glyn Dillon were asked about the new suit back in April and wouldn’t give up a thing. “I don’t think we can talk about that,” Dillon said at the time.
Now we know why.
The Lens Detail Everyone Missed
While the ears went viral, Reeves quietly confirmed something for the film nerds.
A Canadian content creator, filmmaker, and photographer on X praised the footage’s photography, pointing to the “custom Ultra Panatar II Panavision anamorphic lenses they had made for this” and the choice to light Pattinson so you can just barely make out his eyes without giving away the rest of the cowl.
Reeves quote-tweeted it: “Indeed, we are…”
That’s the director signing off on the tech specs.
For the uninitiated: Ultra Panatar II is the anamorphic line Panavision launched in 2024 for its 70th anniversary. Rental-only, like all Panavision glass, with a 1.3x squeeze engineered to feel like classic 2x anamorphic — vintage character, warm flares, organic falloff — while covering modern large-format sensors. And per the tweet Reeves endorsed, the production had custom versions built for this movie.
Why The Lens Confirmation Actually Matters
Here’s the context the ears coverage skipped.
The Batman Part II lost Greig Fraser.
Fraser shot the first film — work Roger Deakins publicly called Oscar-worthy — but he’s locked up shooting Sam Mendes’ four Beatles movies and had to pass on both this and Dune: Part Three.
Reeves confirmed Erik Messerschmidt as his replacement in December. Messerschmidt won the Oscar for Mank and shot The Killer for David Fincher.
So this camera test is the first public look at Messerschmidt’s Gotham.
And the fan reaction Reeves chose to amplify — praise for the lensing and for lighting Pattinson’s eyes just so — is Reeves telling everyone the visual DNA survived the DP change.
The first film’s grimy, vintage texture was built on anamorphic photography. Bespoke Panavision glass says that look isn’t changing just because the man behind the camera did.
The Reeves Playbook
This is how Reeves has run the entire production.
In May it was #SnowTires — Batmobile camera tests tearing through a snowy Gotham — and an “Indeed, it is” when a fan begged for a bloody Batman in the snow.
Now it’s “Indeed, we are…” and “You are not crazy.”
No press releases. No trade exclusives. Just the director dropping confirmations in replies while the marketing machine sleeps until 2027.
Where Things Stand
Cameras have been rolling at Leavesden since June 12, with the winter Gotham setting all but locked by those snow tests.
Pattinson — who showed up to The Odyssey premiere still wearing his Batman makeup — leads a cast that adds Scarlett Johansson, Sebastian Stan, Charles Dance, Brian Tyree Henry, and Sebastian Koch, with Reeves co-writing alongside Mattson Tomlin.
The Batman Part II opens February 18, 2028 — a delay I covered earlier today, along with what my sources say really caused it.
