Matt Reeves Stands With Paul Dano After Quentin Tarantino Diss
After Quentin Tarantino took a weak sauce swipe at Paul Dano’s There Will Be Blood performance, The Batman Part 2 director Matt Reeves steps up, defending his Riddler star and pushing back on the backlash.
Quentin Tarantino torched Paul Dano on a podcast, and The Batman Part 2 director Matt Reeves stepped in fast to defend his guy. If you missed it, yes, we are somehow debating whether Paul Dano is 'weak sauce.' Let’s walk through what actually happened.
What kicked this off
On The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast, Tarantino took aim at Dano’s performance in Paul Thomas Anderson’s There Will Be Blood, arguing the movie isn’t the two-hander it’s meant to be because Daniel Day-Lewis steamrolls him. He didn’t exactly sugarcoat it:
'Obviously, it’s supposed to be a two-hander. But it’s also drastically obvious that it’s not a two-hander. [Dano] is weak sauce, man. He is the weak sister. [Daniel] is eating him [alive].'
Tarantino even floated a hypothetical recast:
'Austin Butler would have been wonderful in that role. He’s just such a weak, weak, uninteresting guy... you put him with the weakest f--- actor in SAG? The limpest dick in the world?... I’m not saying he is giving a terrible performance, I am saying he’s giving a non-entity performance... I don’t care for him.'
Matt Reeves weighs in
Reeves, who directed Dano as the Riddler in 2022’s The Batman and is currently steering The Batman Part 2, jumped on X on December 4, 2025 with a simple, pointed defense:
'Paul Dano is an incredible actor, and an incredible person.'
The replies backed him up, with fans praising Dano’s range and shouting out performances beyond Gotham, including his turn in The Fabelmans.
Support from inside The Batman sequel camp
Mattson Tomlin, the screenwriter of The Batman Part 2, added his voice the day before, December 3, 2025. He called Dano not just a terrific actor but also an impressive director, and nudged people to watch Dano’s 2018 feature debut Wildlife for proof.
A co-star from There Will Be Blood pushes back
TMZ asked Dillon Freasier, who acted opposite Dano in There Will Be Blood, what he thought of Tarantino’s take. Freasier didn’t hedge: he called the film 'a work of art' and said it got there because 'everyone was perfectly cast' — Dano included.
The irony bit
For what it’s worth, Tarantino has previously ranked There Will Be Blood as the fifth-best film of the 21st century. His new claim is that Dano’s performance is the part that kept it from ranking even higher.
Bottom line: Tarantino swung hard, Reeves and company closed ranks around Dano, and the internet did what it does. Whether you think Dano gets swallowed up by Day-Lewis or plays a quieter, more needling counterweight, the guy has receipts — from Gotham to Spielberg to a very solid directorial debut.