Sometimes, you can’t help but admire the way the internet’s collective hive mind works, with the Christian Bale conspiracy the latest to capture the imagination in the aftermath of The Flash trailer.
Of course, it takes the joining of many dots to reach the favored conclusion, but that’s part of the fun. Last week, rumors abounded that the Scarlet Speedster’s solo debut had recruited another former Batman to join Ben Affleck and Michael Keaton in the cast, even if James Gunn didn’t waste any time in shutting down the notion that it would be George Clooney.
With Val Kilmer sadly ruled out due to the loss of his voice following a battle with throat cancer, that left Christian Bale as the only viable alternative. Naturally, a shot in The Flash promo of the Dark Knight riding a motorcycle away from some incoming devastation led many to believe it was Christopher Nolan’s Caped Crusader, including infamous Spider-Man: No Way Home spoiler merchant Jon Campea.
Naturally, the first thing on everyone’s mind was to repurpose the entire tweet almost word-for-word and meme the ever-loving sh*t out of it, which is par for the course when it comes to any self-respecting viral sensation.
Is it Bale in the trailer? Almost definitely not, seeing as set photos of Affleck riding his motorcycle around the streets of Glasgow were widely circulated when The Flash was in production. As always tends to be the case with anything superhero-related, though, there’s no way to rule it out with the utmost certainty until the film rides into theaters in June.