Speculation on new Batman villains has become almost a rite of passage for the various cinematic adaptations of the Caped Crusader. The tradition extends back as far as the Adam West show, which gave big stars of the day like Art Carney and Milton Berle villains tailored to their personas. The success of Tim Burton's Batman perpetuated the notion by casting A-lister Jack Nicholson as The Joker, and from that moment forward, every onscreen incarnation of the Caped Crusader has prompted speculation on who will play which villain next.
The Batman is the latest big-screen blockbuster to receive the prediction treatment, with a massive box office haul and an official sequel announced on April 26. That, of course, fed longstanding talk of which villains should be involved. While the first film already presented an impressive array, the Dark Knight has arguably the deepest rogue's gallery in all of comics. And with four of the top spots already filled in the first movie, it's not hard to arrive at a specific name for the follow-up: Poison Ivy.
At first glance, Ivy is a poor fit for director Matt Reeves' version of Gotham. Her central power -- control of plants -- trends toward the outlandish, which would be absurdly out of place amid its noir decay and puzzle-box plots. A similarly stripped-down version of Ivy, however, would make an outstanding fit: focusing on her use of toxins and eco-terrorist agenda to create a killer similar in tone and style to Paul Dano's Riddler. She also provides a potential romantic foil for Robert Pattinson's Bruce Wayne since Zoe Kravitz's enticing Selina Kyle was last seen heading for the exits. So who should play her? A short list of five contenders follows, each offering something unique that makes them well-suited to Pamela Isley.
Rebecca Ferguson Makes a Terrifying and Seductive Monster
Ferguson first gained attention outside of her native Sweden with the BBC's The White Queen, depicting political machinations surrounding the War of the Roses. That led to international stardom opposite Tom Cruise in the Mission: Impossible films and, more recently, Lady Jessica in Denis Villeneuve's Dune saga, among other roles. All of them show a knack for the smart, often ruthless personality traits required for a Reeves-esque Poison Ivy. But it's Rose the Hat in Mike Flanagan's Doctor Sleep that makes her such a compelling option: an utterly terrifying monster who justifies her wickedness in stark, black-and-white terms. Ivy is nothing if not a villain who thinks she's the hero -- again, much like Dano's Riddler -- and in Rose, Ferguson delivers a master class on how that's done.
Chloë Grace Moretz Understands Matt Reeves' Dark Vision
Grace Moretz has a singular selling point when it comes to Poison Ivy: she worked with Reeves before to great effect in his 2010 horror remake Let Me In. As an ancient vampire in the body of a young girl, she demonstrates the kind of harsh ferocity that a Reeves-based Ivy would require and clearly has a strong sense of what the director might want from the role. That same year, she starred in the original Kick-Ass, further demonstrating a ready ease with comic book action scenes and a more thoughtful approach to four-color mayhem. When combined with a good script, the combination could prove unbeatable.
Scarlett Johansson Could Make a Splash for DC After Conquering Marvel
Johansson's run as Black Widow in the Marvel Cinematic Universe helped cement the franchise's current standing as the king of the pop culture cage. She also defined Natasha Romanoff for an entire generation of new fans and turned what had been a second-tier Marvel character into one of the centerpieces of the franchise. Moving to Gotham City would be a piece of cake for the veteran performer, as well as giving her the chance to "cross over" into rival DC's territory. She's effectively played monsters and similar sinister figures before, most notably in Jonathan Glazer's Under the Skin. And like Ferguson, she's Pattinson's contemporary (he's two years younger than she), making romantic sparks far easier to generate.
Anya Taylor-Joy Would Make an Intense Poison Ivy
Taylor-Joy possesses many of the same credentials as the other names on this list. That includes several appearances in superhero films -- including Split, Glass and The New Mutants -- as well as a star-making turn in Netflix's The Queen's Gambit. The head games and strategic maneuverings of that series make a good match for the jockeying factions of Reeves' Gotham, along with a focused intelligence and intensity that suits Pamela Isley well. Those qualities were also on impressive display in The Witch, where inverted questions of good and evil match those of The Batman's villains. Her Ivy could recapture that feeling quite quickly and make the often-exotic character feel right at home in Reeves' Gotham.
Sophie Turner Deserves Another Shot at a Great Villain
Turner made a terrific choice for Jean Grey in the latter-day X-Men movies, starting with X-Men: Apocalypse and ending with X-Men: Dark Phoenix. Neither of those films left an especially lasting impression with fans, however, and the last one effectively killed the X-Men franchise at 20th Century Fox. None of which was Turner's fault, who stepped adroitly into a role that had seemingly been defined by Famke Janssen. Her strength in comparatively weak material was wasted with Dark Phoenix, but Poison Ivy could give her another shot. And with Reeves at the helm, the results are apt to be a considerable step up in quality.