On Oct. 7, Joker director Todd Phillips headed into Warner Bros. Pictures Group chairman Toby Emmerich's office, buoyed by the film's $96.2 million opening-weekend haul. Sources tell The Hollywood Reporter he proposed an outsized idea — the rights to develop a portfolio of DC characters' origin stories.

Emmerich balked. After all, Warner Bros. is very protective of the DC canon. And all other DC deals have been for one film, and one film only. But Phillips did emerge from the meeting with the rights to at least one other DC story, sources say. And now that Joker has crossed the $1 billion mark, a sequel is on the way. As the movie keeps raking in money overseas, Phillips is in talks to reprise his role as director for a second Joker outing (he and Scott Silver, who penned the gritty Joker screenplay, will write the follow-up), THR has learned.