The Batman, starring Robert Pattinson as the Caped Crusader, is confirmed to have the longest runtime of any Batman movie ever released.

Warner Bros. has confirmed the runtime of The Batman and it's even longer than expected. Robert Pattinson is set to take on the role of Bruce Wayne in Matt Reeves' highly-anticipated solo film. Originally intended as Ben Affleck's solo DCEU outing, the movie was repurposed when the Justice League actor left the role. Now, The Batman will take place outside of the mainline DCEU and tell the story of Bruce Wayne's early years fighting crime in Gotham City.

Batman will face off against a few different villains in the upcoming movie, including Paul Dano's Riddler and Colin Farrell's Penguin. Zoë Kravitz is also set to star as Selina Kyle a.k.a. Catwoman, with Jeffrey Wright as Jim Gordon, and Andy Serkis as Alfred. Speculation about The Batman's runtime began when several sites posted varying runtimes that ran from just over two hours to nearly three hours. Now, the official runtime for the film has been revealed.

Warner Bros. confirmed to THR that The Batman's runtime is two hours and 55 minutes with 8 minutes for the credits. This makes The Batman the longest solo Caped Crusader movie ever. There's no word on whether or not the 8 minutes of credits include any mid-credits or post-credits scenes.

Like the controversy surrounding the movie's PG-13 rating, The Batman's runtime is likely to be divisive, but it should ultimately come as a relief. While some may question why any movie needs to be at least three hours long, it has been clear from the beginning that The Batman would need ample time to flesh out its entire story. Not only will Bruce Wayne have to face off against Riddler (who looks to be unearthing the Wayne family's dark history), but the presence of Penguin and Catwoman point to various relationships in the film that will need to be fleshed out properly.

With The Batman's runtime, there should be more than enough room to do just that. The nearly three-hour length also puts The Batman in the pantheon of super-sized superhero movies. Not only will it be the longest Batman movie ever, but it will also be the third-longest superhero movie ever made behind only Avengers: Endgame at 181 minutes and Zack Snyder's Justice League at 242 minutes. How this could affect the box office of the movie remains to be seen, but movies of this length typically lose showings at theaters because of their oversized runtimes. With just over a month until The Batman releases, it won't be long until those questions, and many more, are answered.

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Source: THR