Now while “sex and psychological torture” do seem like the standard reasons an R-rated film would become Restricted in the first place, Sam Liu also mentioned another interesting piece of information: he and executive producer Bruce Timm, he of the legendary Batman: The Animated Series, both thought the film would get a PG-13 rating!
Much like its predecessor, Batman: The Killing Joke has landed in theaters with a somewhat controversial, but appropriate, rating during its two night engagement.
While the rating didn’t cause the film to suffer financially, its director, Sam Liu, still kind of takes issue with the MPAA’s decision.
Their reasoning was that while the film contained elements of the criteria previously mentioned, they weren’t exploited to a gratuitous extent.