Future of DC Films (DCEU)

[T8OO]

“We must… avenge him. As Avengers.”
*cue Steve watching grainy security footage of Thor, Hulk, Hawkeye, Black Widow, and, for some reason, minority teen hero Kamala who should be on the teen hero team the Champions but is now an Avengers candidate for reasons. Each with their own pre-created corresponding logos.*
*smash cut to bald Justin Hammer in jail. “The purple man is coming! DING DING DING!”*

There's an MCU end-credit scene right there.

 

[abake]

Are we still doing the Snyder Sucks, Snyder is Great stuff?

Wouldn't it be more logical to discuss the merits and faults of Gunn's and Safran's works to analyse what we might reasonably expect from the upcoming DC movies?

I don't think I have seen any movies from Gunn other than the GotG stuff and TSS, so his record is a bit sketchy for me. Safran is a non-entity, since I have no idea what he has worked on.

So, having said that, I really liked GotG Vol. 1. I thought it was funny, touching, had great characters and killer music. It was more or less by-the-book MCU fare story-wise, but it was presented in a fresh way. GotG Vol. 2 was disappointing. The story didn't grab me and it felt like it was trying too hard. TSS was interesting, as it was an unabashed, no apologies, straight from the comics movie, adolescent humor and all. That's not a bad thing in and of itself, but I was invested in Snyder's more serious tone, so I wasn't a fan, and I haven't had the urge to watch it again.

With that in mind, I don't feel terribly optimistic about what Gunn can bring to the table for a Superman, Batman or Wonder Woman film. It is intriguing for something like Swamp Thing, if it's actually going to be more of a horror movie, or all the lesser characters he seems to be going for, but I haven't seen something with enough gravitas in his work to induce me to think he can write a good, touching, compelling Superman story for example. Because IMHO he tried that in GotG Vol. 2 and failed. I'm sure he can do fun movies, but I suppose we'll have to look to Matt Reeves and Todd Phillips if we want more nuanced stuff from DC.

 

[Garlador]

There's an MCU end-credit scene right there.

Does crack me up that MCU teases Thanos coming during the end credits of their SIXTH movie, while DCEU teased Darkseid during only their SECOND, and then they didn’t actually confront Thanos in person until their 19th(!) movie, while Darkseid glares the Justice League down during the FIFTH DCEU film. WB put their whole universe on the fast-track. I think it’s hilarious how much they wanted to speed to Endgame-money without putting in the necessary build-up.

It remains to be seen how Gunn and Safran will handle it, but at least they clearly aren’t dashing to the finish line before the race has even properly kicked off.

 

[ZE_501]

What would you say was clumsy about the first 4 DCEU movies leading into Justice League? Granted it was rushed via comparison to the MCU.

Nothing terribly wrong with Man of Steel, if I recall my biggest problem was Suicide-by-Tornado but other than that, not so bad.

I thought Batman v Superman was a poorly conceived and written film along with Suicide Squad. Wonder Woman was a good film but like most MCU films it ended in a weightless CGI mess -- still, forgivable.

But when I say "clumsy" I'm referring to the writing first and foremost, along with some of the more hamfisted cinematography that made me think I was watching a video game -- I'm not going to try and convince you if you liked the films and Snyder's style.

I think this whole "earned" thing is a by-product of the MCU and not in a good way. Until the MCU came out I don't believe anyone would think the DCEU was rushed.

Maybe "rushed" and "earned" are the wrong words and the wrong approach. Maybe what I'm trying to say is that the films failed to resonate with me or make me care about them. Which is odd given that I was a fan of Superman, Batman and DC in general many years before I knew anything about Iron Man or Captain America or Thor.

When this happens it's generally due to what I'd call sloppy writing. I was ready to go along with Snyder's vision for an angsty and alienated, post-modern Superman eventually developing into a hero, but I just don't think he was pulling it off, and I couldn't buy into half the films or the subsequent JL in spite of some decent moments.

It's like if Star Wars was re-made now people would be claiming you can't start a movie universe off with Luke, Leia, Han, Obi-Wan, Chewie, R2, 3PO and Darth Vader all in the first movie, that's rushed.

I think that's comparing apples and oranges. But that being said, what the MCU did in five films leading up The Avengers -- I now concede that it could have been done with the DCEU's four. I just don't think it succeeded mostly due to certain stakes getting ratcheted up too quickly and weak scripts. To each their own.

 

[ZE_501]

So, having said that, I really liked GotG Vol. 1. I thought it was funny, touching, had great characters and killer music. It was more or less by-the-book MCU fare story-wise, but it was presented in a fresh way. GotG Vol. 2 was disappointing. The story didn't grab me and it felt like it was trying too hard.

That's exactly how I felt about them.

 

[karamazov80]

It is intriguing for something like Swamp Thing, if it's actually going to be more of a horror movie

The only reason to do Swamp Thing at all is to do a horror story. When he was created, it was as a horror comic. When Alan Moore took it to the next level, it was as a horror comic. Doing anything else would be the equivalent of making Booster Gold a gritty, Punisher-style murder revenge fantasy story.

Nothing terribly wrong with Man of Steel, if I recall my biggest problem was Suicide-by-Tornado but other than that, not so bad.

Oh man, I forgot about that. Made me chuckle.

 

[TheClient]

I know his humor is not everyone’s taste, and I also think it can go overboard at times, but I think Gunn has a solid understanding of story structure, dramatic escalation, character arcs, and how to pull it all together in a finale with satisfying emotional payoffs. His characters are clearly defined and you know what they want. To me, all this is pretty essential to a good story.

I do not think he is a great fit to direct Superman but he has only committed to writing it so far. With the right director it could be something really special.

 

[karamazov80]

I know his humor is not everyone’s taste, and I also think it can go overboard at times, but I think Gunn has a solid understanding of story structure, dramatic escalation, character arcs, and how to pull it all together in a finale with satisfying emotional payoffs. His characters are clearly defined and you know what they want. To me, all this is pretty essential to a good story.

I do not think he is a great fit to direct Superman but he has only committed to writing it so far. With the right director it could be something really special.

I am a Gunn fan and defender. . .however, one thing that does give me pause is that he is not only overseeing things as Feige does in Marvel, but also giving himself opportunities to write/direct, and presumably cast (e.g., criticism over his wife being cast in everything). Just because of human nature, there is a possibility for abuse here, and for him to be moving forward with things that aren't in the best interest of the DC-verse as a whole. I don't think this will be a major issue, but it could be. One analogy is professional wrestling. Back in the 1980s, Dusty Rhodes was a booker (guy who decides who wrestles who, and who wins and loses) and a wrestler at the same time. He often ended up in really good positions as a wrestler, being champion or a guy at the top of the card, and while he was a popular wrestler it seemed wrong and inappropriate that he would push himself at the expense of others.

 

[RavenAsh]

I was wrong, there’s one movie on this slate that interests me and that’s the Supergirl one. I love Kara when done right, even more so than Superman himself. I even really liked most of the early seasons of the Melissa Benoist Supergirl TV show.

One of the things I hated about the way Hamada was going to ‘reboot’ was that he was replacing Superman with Supergirl as if they are just interchangeable characters. They aren’t. I’ll be interested to see an actual Supergirl story ESPECIALLY based on the Tom King comics. I hope I really like the creatives they choose for it.

 

[Alatar]

So reportedly James Gunn says WBD has been in contact with Netflix and the subject of licensing the Snyderverse to Netflix didn’t even come up (although they talked about other IPs). Nor has Zack expressed an interest in that, Gunn says.

I really don’t trust James Gunn. But if this is true then honestly Zack needs to just come out and say it’s over, it ain’t happening, etc. You all fought the good fight and got ZSJL completed—which is astonishing. But you can rest now. If that’s really what the truth is.

If it’s over this needs to come from Zack.

 

[ironwez20]

He won’t he loves the circle jerk to his ego. He could of said stop after all the death threats

 

[batfan08]

What would you like to see introduced instead?

With the DCEU we got Metropolis, smallville, Krypton, Gotham, Themyscira, Atlantis, black gate, etc. I’m sure I’m forgetting a few.

Diversity of content. Everything Snyder did was a deconstruction and it didn’t work. How do we know it didn’t work? Because nobody working under it gave enough of a **** to want to work with it.

Snyder’s preoccupied with air bubbles and Shakespearean drama (something that worked wonders for Thor) when he introduces Aquaman in his Justice League. James Wan gives us a technicolored underwater dreamscape that’s make Jim Cameron wet his jockeys and it’s rife with giant armored Sea Horses, Octopus Drummers, and Gladiator Fights atop subaquatic volcanoes.


Snyder wants a tortured Wonder Woman who gives up on humanity and laments the horrors of war. We get little glimpses of her weird motley crew of warriors like a Samurai, a Scot, a Zulu, and a Native American while she poses in front of them with a bunch of German soldiers’ severed heads. Jenkins gives us, perhaps, the first contemporary counterpoint to Reeve’s Superman since 1978. A film chock to the brim with optimism despite being set amidst the backdrop of total annihilation in which a charismatic, powerful lead makes entire audiences fall in love with her.

Shazam remained only tangentially attached to Snyder’s DC Extended Universe and it was…utterly fantastic. It was like if Amblin made a Superhero Movie. You had action and adventure and humor and coming-of-age angst and one or two scenes that could traumatize children and it blended together to make for one hell of an engaging Superhero movie.


And then you had Suicide Squad.

Are you noticing a pattern? All the best received movies to come out of the DCEU succeeded in spite of Snyder and his vision, not because of him.

The fact is that the DC Universe is not the Marvel Universe. Marvel’s got the world outside your window. You’ve got Asgard and Wakanda and The Negative Zone, but for the most part, it’s just New York. Thousands of heroes roaming around the five boroughs without, somehow, constantly being on top of one and other. It’s part of why I believe Disney can’t solve their theme park problem. Because how do you build a Marvel land? A miniature NYC in Orlando? What is this? A Las Vegas Mini-Golf Course? If people want to see New York, they’ll just go to New York.

But DC has an entire universe at its disposal. Gotham is a gothic Lovecraftian hellscape that varies within every page; a place where you wouldn’t think twice upon seeing a horned figure lurking atop a roof because you’d just mistake him for another Gargoyle amidst the architecture. Metropolis is…Tomorrowland. A glistening city on the hill that thematically punctuates the aspirational value of Superman by offering him a home as pure and virtuous as its protector. Central City and Keystone are electric. Bustling city streets loaded with traffic and pedestrians offer an equally-fast paced landscape for The Flash to traverse as he dukes it out with his colorful Rogues.

And it’s not just geography. DC has always leaned more fully into the off-kilter than Marvel in terms of informing their brands’ identity. Adam Strange and his jet pack fly through the pulpy, sci-fi city of Rann battling Pikts before catching a Zeta Beam back home to earth. Lobo chases down some dirty bastitch to a seedy bar in the furthest reaches of space before chaining him to the back of his hog and dragging him back to his employer, dead or alive. Jonah Hex battles his demons as he’s laid bare before the (Weird) Wild West and Sgt. Rock and Easy Company make their last stand against Nazis in the European Theater.

That’s why I’m excited by Gunn’s line-up. He gets it. Take something like Booster Gold. When he came out in the ‘80s, Booster was so incredibly ahead of his time, but now? Booster Gold is the hero of today. A self-promoting super hack who stole a Legion flight ring and a Time Machine to come back and make himself rich and famous. In the age of Keeping Up With The Kardashians, when you can’t open up social media without seeing High School Kids with Broccoli Haircuts giving new Air Jordans to Hobos for likes on Instagram, it could make for an utterly hilarious and scathing satire of consumerism, influencers, and the artifice of performative altruism.

Not to mention, it could set the stage for a Justice League International superhero workplace comedy.

He's got Paradise Lost. A story chartering Themyscira and the Amazon's history from bondage and enslavement to the female utopia that exists within the Contemporary DCU. A show he described as Game of Thrones in the DC Universe, which honestly sounds like something that Snyder would've been right at home introducing introducing into his universe.

Lanterns puts John Stewart and Hal Jordan on the road discovering a dark mystery, "True Detective" style in Gunn's words, but look at the story and the character selection and you see a golden opportunity to tell a meaningful story about class, race, and social issues through the lens of two very distinctive characters with two distinctive worldviews and experiences. It also seems like it could potentially, conceptually evoke Dennis O'Neil and Neal Adams' seminal "Hard Travelin' Heroes" run on Green Arrow/Green Lantern.

Swamp Thing is introducing the dark and supernatural horror side of things to audiences; an entire sub-genre of the DC Universe that opens all sorts of doors to everything from The House of Mystery to John Constantine to The Demon Etrigan and The Justice League Dark.

Even his take on Batman with The Brave and The Bold, based on what little we know, implies an understanding of the character and his cinematic history that few others have managed to grasp. Introducing Damian not only lends itself to introducing Ra's Al Ghul and Talia, but, in doing so, it gives the audience the potential to see something they’ve never seen before: the Globe Trotting, Swashbuckling Batman of the Adams/O’Neill era. A Batman who finds himself sword fighting, shirtless in the desert atop a bubbling Lazarus Pit and, more than that, it introduces the idea of something we’ve not seen….ever: A Batman who comes face to face with supernatural and extraordinary threats. No longer do we have to settle for a guy in a clay mask murdering people and stealing their identities and calling himself “Clayface,” we might, dare I say, get to see Batman fight a giant clay monster for once.

That’s why I can’t understand all the people lamenting the new line-up or saying this is going to be the Next Marvel. I’d argue he’s improving on Marvel’s method because, in addition to creating something for everybody, he also seems to be setting the stage for a DC Universe that doesn’t fall into the same traps as Feige. I look at a show like She-Hulk (and really most of Phase 4) and part of why I feel it failed to land with so much of its audience was because it subverted expectations and challenged the ‘Marvel Method’ that’s been employed to the point where it was a bit jarring for them to accept something so different. Introducing stuff like Booster Gold on the ground floor prevents things like that.

 

[csutkakoma]

Very well said batfan08! Completely agree!

 

[ZE_501]

Spoiler

Diversity of content. Everything Snyder did was a deconstruction and it didn’t work. How do we know it didn’t work? Because nobody working under it gave enough of a **** to want to work with it.

Snyder’s preoccupied with air bubbles and Shakespearean drama (something that worked wonders for Thor) when he introduces Aquaman in his Justice League. James Wan gives us a technicolored underwater dreamscape that would make Jim Cameron wet his jockeys rife with giant armored Sea Horses, Octopus Drummers, and Gladiator Fights atop subaquatic volcanoes.


Snyder wants a tortured Wonder Woman who gives up on humanity and laments the horrors of war and we get little glimpses of her weird motley crew of warriors like a Samurai, a Scot, a Zulu, and a Native American while she poses in front of them with a bunch of German soldiers’ severed heads. Jenkins gives us, perhaps, the first contemporary counterpoint to Reeve’s Superman since 1978. A film rife with optimism despite being set amidst the backdrop of total annihilation in which a charismatic, powerful lead makes entire audiences fall in love with her.

Shazam remained only tangentially attached to Snyder’s DC Extended Universe and it was…utterly fantastic. It was like if Amblin made a Superhero Movie. You had action and adventure and humor and coming-of-age angst and one or two scenes that could traumatize children and it blended together to make for one hell of an engaging Superhero movie.


And then you had Suicide Squad.

Are you noticing a pattern? All the best received movies to come out of the DCEU succeeded in spite of Snyder and his vision, not because of him.

The fact is that the DC Universe is not the Marvel Universe. Marvel’s got the world outside your window. You’ve got Asgard and Wakanda and The Negative Zone, but for the most part, it’s just New York. Thousands of heroes roaming around the five boroughs without constantly being on top of one and other. It’s part of why I believe Disney can’t solve their theme park problem. Because how do you build a Marvel land? A miniature NYC in Orlando? What is this? A Las Vegas Mini-Golf Course? If people want to see New York, they’ll just go to New York.

But DC has an entire universe at its disposal. Gotham is a gothic Lovecraftian hellscape that varies within every page; a place where you wouldn’t think twice upon seeing a horned figure lurking atop a roof because you’d just mistake him for another Gargoyle amidst the architecture. Metropolis is…Tomorrowland. A glistening city on the hill that thematically punctuates the aspirational value of Superman by offering him a home as pure and virtuous as its protector. Central City and Keystone are electric. Bustling city streets loaded with traffic and pedestrians offer an equally-fast paced landscape for The Flash to traverse as he dukes it out with his colorful Rogues.

And it’s not just geography. DC has always leaned more fully into the off-kilter than Marvel in terms of informing their brands’ identity. Adam Strange and his jet pack fly through the Pulpy Sci-Fi City of Rann battling Pikts before catching a Zeta Beam back home to earth. Lobo chases down some dirty bastitch to a seedy bar in the furthest reaches of space before chaining him to the back and dragging him back to his employer, dead or alive. Jonah Hex battles his demons as he’s laid bare before the (Weird) Wild West and Sgt. Rock and Easy Company make their last stand against Nazis in the European Theater.

That’s why I’m excited by Gunn’s line-up. He gets it. Take something like Booster Gold. When he came out in the ‘80s, Booster was so incredibly ahead of his time, but now? Booster Gold is the hero of today. A self-promoting super hack who stole a Legion flight ring and a Time Machine to come back and make himself rich and famous in the age of Keeping Up With The Kardashians and High School Kids with Broccoli Haircuts giving new Air Jordans to Hobos for likes on Instagram could make for an utterly hilarious and scathing satire of consumerism, influencers, and the artifice of performative altruism.

Not to mention, it could set the stage for a Justice League International superhero workplace comedy.

He's got Paradise Lost. A story chartering Themyscira and the Amazon's history from bondage and enslavement to the female utopia that exists within the Contemporary DCU. A show he described as Game of Thrones in the DC Universe, which honestly sounds like something that Snyder would've been right at home introducing introducing into his universe.

Lanterns puts John Stewart and Hal Jordan on the road discovering a dark mystery, "True Detective" style in Gunn's words, but look at the story and the character selection and you see a golden opportunity to tell a meaningful story about class, race, and social issues through the lens of two very distinctive characters with two very distinctive worldviews and experiences in a way that could honor Dennis O'Neil and Neal Adams' seminal "Hard Travelin' Heroes" run on Green Arrow/Green Lantern.

Swamp Thing is introducing the dark and supernatural horror side of things to audiences; an entire sub-genre of the DC Universe that opens all sorts of doors to everything from The House of Mystery to John Constantine to The Demon Etrigan and The Justice League Dark.

Even his take on Batman with The Brave and The Bold, based on what little we know, implies an understanding of the character and his cinematic history that few others have managed to grasp. Introducing Damian not only lends itself to introducing Ra's Al Ghul and Talia, but, in doing so, it gives the audience the potential to see something they’ve never seen before: the Globe Trotting, Swashbuckling Batman of the Adams/O’Neill era sword fighting, shirtless in the desert atop a bubbling Lazarus Pit and, more than that, it introduces the idea of something we’ve not seen….ever: A Batman who comes face to face with supernatural and extraordinary threats. No longer do we have to settle for a guy in a clay mask murdering people and stealing their identities and calling himself “Clayface,” we might, dare I say, get to see Batman fight a giant clay monster for once.

That’s why I can’t understand all the people lamenting the new line-up or saying this is going to be the Next Marvel. I’d argue he’s improving on Marvel’s method because, in addition to creating something for everybody, he also seems to be setting the stage for a DC Universe that doesn’t fall into the same traps as Feige. I look at a show like She-Hulk (and really most of Phase 4) and part of why I feel it failed to land with so much of its audience was because it subverted expectations and challenged the ‘Marvel Method’ that’s been employed to the point where it was a bit jarring for them to accept something so different. Introducing stuff like Booster Gold on the ground floor prevents things like that.

Great post, @batfan08 -- I love the optimistic analysis and hope you're at least half right. I guess personally, I have superhero burn-out and feel like DC content is going to fail me on the writing; I've gone from just being happy to see spectacle to not wanting to waste my time unless someone competent wrote the damn thing (Exhibit A: Andor).

A lot of DC content has felt like it's made for teenagers or just plain trying too hard; maybe I'm the wrong demographic at this point. I've abandoned the MCU for similar reasons in spite of wanting to give Phase Four a chance; they simply lost me.

Moreover, it's not as if something like Peacemaker, for example ... wasn't a good product within the context of what it was meant to be; I just feel like I've seen it all before.

I don't care who's calling the shots at DC, just give me scripts that make me care about the characters with mostly believable (again, within context and certain allowances made) situations and good cinematography.

If I see tired tropes coupled with massive plotholes and a video-game cut-scene aesthetic, I'll go read a book instead.

 

[ironwez20]

Batfan always dropping straight facts. Guess u a troll tho still .

 

[ironwez20]

Great post, @batfan08 -- I love the optimistic analysis and hope you're at least half right. I guess personally, I have superhero burn-out and feel like DC content is going to fail me on the writing; I've gone from just being happy to see spectacle to not wanting to waste my time unless someone competent wrote the damn thing (Exhibit A: Andor).

A lot of DC content has felt like it's made for teenagers or just plain trying too hard; maybe I'm the wrong demographic at this point. I've abandoned the MCU for similar reasons in spite of wanting to give Phase Four a chance; they simply lost me.

Moreover, it's not as if something like Peacemaker, for example ... wasn't a good product within the context of what it was meant to be; I just feel like I've seen it all before.

I don't care who's calling the shots at DC, just give me scripts that make me care about the characters with mostly believable (again, within context and certain allowances made) situations and good cinematography.

If I see tired tropes coupled with massive plotholes and a video-game cut-scene aesthetic, I'll go read a book instead.

Same. I just a universe and characters I care about. I don’t care to see them mope around and be rushed into introduction. Flesh out the characters and give us a world we care about. It’s not that hard. Dc animation does it fine

 

[Alatar]

… Everything Snyder did was a deconstruction...

Mmm, ZSJL is reconstruction, though. Its tropes are all fantastical like the comics mythos. So I would not say what Snyder does is not 100% deconstruction. The pendulum swings back to fantastical escapism in ZSJL. Something related to the subject that I posted today for any that are interested:

 

[Alatar]

Now with rumors circulating that a former Batman is going to continue as the Brave and the Bold Batman, combined with rumors that Ben Affleck has agreed to direct that film… honestly, it would be a PR master stroke if WBD allies Affleck to continue in the universe. That would salve the wound for a lot of (imo rightly) disgruntled Snyderverse fans.

Also, didn't Gunn say that Ben was interested in directing a DC film?

 

[Prime Clone]

Mmm, ZSJL is reconstruction, though. Its tropes are all fantastical like the comics mythos. So I would not say what Snyder does is not 100% deconstruction. The pendulum swings back to fantastical escapism in ZSJL. Something related to the subject that I posted today for any that are interested:

Yes, for every deconstruction you need a redemption, and Snyder delivered (people just tend to overlook that, as they do with Hobo Luke Skywalker).

Re Superman II, people also tend to overlook that he killed the Kryptonians in that movie too (or at least showed callous disregard for their lives).

 

[Alatar]

Yes, for every deconstruction you need a redemption, and Snyder delivered (people just tend to overlook that, as they do with Hobo Luke Skywalker).

Re Superman II, people also tend to overlook that he killed the Kryptonians in that movie too (or at least showed callous disregard for their lives).

Haha, that's for damn sure. In the Donner film Superman and Lois both murder the Kryptonian villains with aplomb, actually!

As for TLJ, personally I didn't mind what Johnson did with Luke. I appreciated it. If I understood it correctly... and I may not!... Luke eventually realized that the splitting of the Force into the poles of light and dark, Jedi and Sith, etc., was actually a big problem. Like the "all good" Jedi automatically gives rise in Nature to it's shadow opposite, the "all bad" Sith. So the Jedi inadvertently created the Sith in a way...

I'm not heavy into Star Wars lore, btw. I'm just approaching it roughly from a Jungian theoretical standpoint.

Anyway, maybe I have this wrong as well, but wasn't the Knights of Ren order that Luke (?) established originally supposed to be philosophically "gray" versus "white" or "black?" But then that somehow led to Ben Solo turning completely to the dark side. So maybe I misunderstood that part.

I'm sure there's plenty of SW fans who will be happy to educate me about this!

Any case, if this is even somewhat right, or the basic gist is right even if some details are wrong, I want to see the SW story world evolve and mature, and become a bit more nuanced and sophisticated. So TLJ didn't bother me.