James Gunn & Peter Safran Reveal Big Plans For Warner Bros. DCU Film Franchises
Written by djfrosty on February 1, 2023
Source: Daniel Knighton / Getty
After weeks of disappointing and straight up infuriating fans of Warner Bros. DCU, James Gunn might’ve gotten himself some leeway with his direction of the film franchises he’s taken over. He’s finally laid out a pretty interesting roadmap as to where he plans on taking the beloved cinematic universe that’s been struggling for quite some time now.
Deadline is reporting that James Gunn and his partner-in-crime, Peter Safran, have revealed that the first portion of their DCU run will be titled Gods and Monsters and will kickoff in 2025 with five films. These include a rebooted Man of Steel dubbed Superman: Legacy, Batman and Robin: The Brave and The Bold, Swamp Thing, a new Supergirl and an introduction film for fan favorite DC rogue superhero squad, The Authority. Keep in mind those are just the feature films planned to release between 2025 and 2027.
On the HBO Max side, Gunn and Safran plan on producing a Peacemaker spinoff series, Waller, starring Viola Davis as your favorite ruthless government official, Amanda Waller, a new Lantern series, an animated Creature Commando’s show and a Booster Gold series amongst other shows.
Though James Gunn revealed that he is penning Superman: Legacy, he hasn’t committed to directing the highly-anticipated superhero film. That being said, he also didn’t reveal who might be approached to take on the mantle of the Man of Steel. We surely know who it won’t be though and that still kinda sucks. Still, Gunn seems to have a pretty ambitious plan going forward with the DCU. And truth be told, we’re interested to see how things play out. Certainly can’t be any worse than what we’ve been getting post-Man of Steel.
“One of our strategies is that we take our diamond characters — Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman– and we use that to help prop up other characters that people don’t know. Like what happened with the Guardians (of the Galaxy) in some way. Like taking teams like The Authority, which is I know is just as spectacular idea for a film that is completely different take on superheroes. Because it’s really connected to Superman. It’s about to use those well-known properties to help lead into lesser known properties,” says Gunn.
“We’re going to promise that everything from our first project forward is going to be unified,” said Gunn.
“But we’ve gotten very lucky for the next four projects,” added the filmmaker on the slate that was previously shepherded by former DC boss Walter Hamada.
Those being Shazam! Fury of the Gods (March 17), The Flash (June 16) the latter which Gunn says “resets everything.”
“I will say here that Flash is probably one of the greatest superhero movies ever made,” Gunn added.
As for movies like Todd Phillips’ Joker: Folie a Deux, Matt Reeves’ sequel to The Batman and J.J. Abrams’ Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Black Superman, those projects are still a go but will be operating outside of the main DC Universe Gunn is creating and will be considered part of DC-Elseworlds.
“The bar is going to be very high for projects outside of the DCU,” asserted Safran.
Y’all know Wonder Woman fans are tight that Gal Gadot and Patty Jenkins couldn’t get the same courtesy as the aforementioned films.
What do y’all think of James Gunn and Peter Safran’s plan for the DCU going forward? Do y’all have faith that they’ll right the ship that’s been seemingly sinking since Batman V. Superman happened in 2016 or nah? Let us know in the comments section below.