10 Insane Things Studios DEMANDED In Movies

10. The Penguin Can't Smoke Cigars - The Batman

Smoking in movies has become noticeably less commonplace over the years, with most major studios choosing to heavily restrict depictions of tobacco use in their films, especially for projects aimed at younger viewers.

All the same, when Colin Farrell was cast to play The Penguin in Matt Reeves' The Batman, he quite understandably assumed that he'd be smoking a cigar, as the iconic supervillain has in so many prior iterations.

But Warner Bros. mandated that the character couldn't be shown smoking at all, and worse than that, he couldn't even be shown holding an unlit cigar, per their own content guidelines for PG-13 movies which could be viewed by impressionable younger audience members.

Farrell "fought valiantly" for the cigar but ultimately lost - an especially odd outcome given that The Batman is a film jam-packed with brutal murder, and yet a morally reprehensible supervillain can't commit the great sin of... smoking a fat stogie.

There was a silver lining to this, though - for the spin-off TV series The Penguin, Farrell did indeed get his wish, and was freely able to smoke cigars throughout the show, much to his delight.