Sophie’s fate was originally less ambiguous.
Joker is proving to be one the most popular movies the year, and therefore, there are a lot fans who want answers to the film’s more ambiguous plot details. The details around Zazie Beetz‘s character, Sophie are intentionally unclear throughout the film, but the last time we see her, we are left completely in the dark about what happens next. Now, Todd Philip’s has explained what happens to Sophie after the camera cuts away.
“He doesn’t kill her,” Philips tells IndieWire. “Definitively. As the filmmaker and the writer, I’m saying he doesn’t kill her. We like the idea that it’s almost like a little bit a litmus test for an audience to say, ‘OK, well how crazy is he?’ And most people that I’ve spoken to think he didn’t kill her because they understand this idea that he’s only killed people that did him wrong, so to speak. That have fucked him over. She had nothing to do with it. Most people understood that he was living by – even as a villain – a certain code. We thought when he kisses Gary on the head, the little actor, and he runs f, he clearly has a code he lives by. Of course, he didn’t kill this woman down the hall and her child.”
Philips also discussed removing a late scene that showed Sophie watching Arthur during his climactic scene on Murray Franklin’s show.