Booster Gold (Hi-Fi/DC Comics), Superman (Jim Lee/DC Comics), Damian Wayne (Frank Quitely/DC Comics)Graphic: The A.V. Club
When Warner Bros. tapped James Gunn and Peter Safran to run DC Studios, we expected they’d draw a new roadmap for the turbulent comics-to-film universe. Now that they’ve revealed plans for their upcoming projects, we have our first sense of what the map looks like, at least for the near future. This first chapter, which Gunn and Safran are calling “Gods and Monsters,” will include 10 new film and TV projects. Gunn and Safran have said they intend to focus on screenwriting and allowing other creators to put their stamp on familiar characters as well as more obscure ones from the comics.
These titles will exist in their own corner of the DC universe, distinct from upcoming releases that predate Gunn and Safran’s tenure. Still to come this year are Shazam! Fury Of The Gods on March 17, The Flash on June 16, Blue Beetle on Aug. 18, and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom on Dec. 25. Once those are cleared from the slate, the pair expect to launch two films and two series per year from 2024 on. The only DC projects that have broad release dates so far are Superman: Legacy and The Batman: Part II, both due in 2025. Read on for a complete list of all the newly announced titles.
WB Studio TourPhoto: Matt Winkelmeyer (Getty Images)
Can DC ever chart a course to navigate out of Marvel’s shadow? That’s been the question for the last 10 years (since the conclusion of Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy). Newly crowned Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav thinks he has the answer, which is… the same thing the guys before him tried to do, basically.
“You look at Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman—these are brands that are known everywhere in the world,” Zaslav said on the infamous WB earnings call (per The Hollywood Reporter). “We have done a reset. We’ve restructured the business where we are going to focus, where there is going to be a team with a ten year plan focusing just on DC. We believe we can build a much more sustainable business.”
Oh, gee, a 10 year plan? Why didn’t anyone think of that before? It’s a strange bit of corporate gaslighting to pretend we weren’t all around for the attempted Zack Snyder-verse. Further, it’s not much of a “reset” when only one film (Batgirl) was canceled and the rest–which are all still tangled up in the Snyderverse to some degree–are going forward (even the dreaded Flash film).
“It’s very similar to the structure Alan Horn, [former Disney CEO] Bob Iger and Kevin Feige put together very effectively at Disney,” said Zaslav, as if copy-pasting from the MCU handbook worked for any of his predecessors. He may want to consider that Feige is someone that directors actually want to work for; the Marvel boss’ compassionate response to Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah after Batgirl was canned only makes Zaslav and DC look even worse in comparison.
But Zaslav is determined to “focus on quality” and not “release any film before it’s ready,” which sounds more like the baseline for the film industry than an innovative new strategy. “The objective is to grow the DC brand. To grow the DC characters,” he said. “But also, our job is to protect the DC brand, and that’s what we’re going to do.” DC fans will surely sleep better knowing this is the guy protecting their beloved heroes.
The development of 2017 (and later 2021’s) Justice League is one of the most well-documented messes of a film in recent history, and its stars are still feeling its impact years later. Ray Fisher’s spoken about his time working on the film the most, but this weekend, it’s Ben Affleck in the spotlight for his words on the troubled film.
Affleck, speaking to the LA Times, was asked about his short-lived rocky time as Batman that began with 2016’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. At the time, the 49-year-old actor was reported to also be headlining, writing, and directing a solo Batman movie that would eventually become The Batman. But it was his alcohol addiction and the realization of where his life was going that made him drop out to seek treatment. “I looked at it [Batman] and thought, ‘I’m not gonna be happy doing this. The person who does this should love it,’” Affleck recalled. “I probably would have loved doing it at 32 or something. But it was the point where I started to realize it’s not worth it.”
Speaking rather candidly, the actor continued to talk about how Justice League in particular was what he considered “the nadir” of his career. With everything going on at the time — his divorce, the “competing agendas” at Warner Bros., and the death of director Zack Snyder’s daughter Autumn — working on the film was just torture. Describing it as “everything that I didn’t like about this,” he knew that was the moment where he had to leave Batman entirely, but also added that at that point in his life, anything could’ve set him off. “It’s not even about, like, Justice League was so bad. Because it could have been anything.” Bleak as it sounds for Affleck, there is somewhat of a happy ending here: he’s returning to the character for November’s Flash movie, and it sounds like he had some fun with his iteration of the character before putting him to rest.
Now that Batman’s behind him, Affleck’s reorienting himself towards pursuing projects he genuinely wants to do, like last year’s The Last Duel. While the film underperformed financially, his performance as Count Pierre d’Alençon was something he enjoyed doing, and many viewers enjoyed watching. “I really loved the movie!…I was disappointed more people didn’t see it, but I can’t chase what’s going to be cool.” That realization of needing to stick to his guns is what he thinks will be better for every actor going forward, and the industry in general. “I’m not preoccupied with notions of success or failure about money or commercial success, because those things really corrupt your choices. Then what happens is the movies are less interesting and you’re less good.”
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Michael KeatonPhoto: Dia Dipasupil/ (Getty Images)
Michael Keaton famously starred as Bruce Wayne/Batman in Tim Burton’s 1989 film, Batman, which changed the trajectory of the superhero genre. As it turns out, Keaton watched Batman in its entirety then never saw a single comic book-based film ever again.
“After the first Batman, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen an entire [comic book] movie,” Keaton said in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter.
The actor doesn’t have a particular reason, other than simply being too busy to sit down and watch the mountain of superhero films made since 1989. “I just never got around to it. So you’re talking to a guy who wasn’t in the zeitgeist of that whole world,” the Birdman actor said. “When I went down to do the Marvel things in Atlanta … It’s an entire city dedicated to Marvel … They’ll be doing Marvel movies forever. I’ll be dead, and they’ll still be doing Marvel movies.”
Keaton recently reprised his role as Vulture for Marvel’s 2022 feature Morbius, where his lack of background on the MCU caught up with him. “I’m nodding like I know what the fuck they’re talking about. I go, ‘Uh-huh.’ And I’m thinking, ‘You may as well be explaining quantum physics right now to me. All I know is I just know my guy. And I know the basics,’” Keaton said. “So finally, they were looking at me, and they just started laughing. They said, ‘You don’t know what we’re talking about, do you?’ I said, ‘No, I don’t, no idea what you’re talking about.’”
In addition to playing Vulture, Keaton recently suited up as Batman once again for Andy Muschietti’s The Flash starring Ezra Miller, which allowed him to see if he still had the chops needed to ace the character over 30 years later. “Frankly, in the back of my head, I always thought, ‘I bet I could go back and nail that motherfucker,’” Keaton explained. He walked away from the superhero franchise when he disliked the script for the 1995 Joel Schumacher movie Batman Forever. “And so I thought, ‘Well, now that they’re asking me, let me see if I can pull that off.’”
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The Flash will not only bring back Keaton’s version of Batman, but also Ben Affleck’s, in the time-bending film based on the Flashpoint comics. However, it took more than a couple of reads for Keaton to fully understand the multiverse aspect of the film. “I had to read it more than three times to go, ‘Wait, how does this work?’” Keaton recalled.
“They had to explain that to me several times. By the way, I’m not being arrogant, I hope, about this. I don’t say it like, ‘I’m too groovy.’ I’m stupid. There’s a lot of things I don’t know about. And so, I don’t know, I just kind of figured it out, but this was different,” Keaton added. “What’s really interesting is how much more I got [Batman] when I went back and did him. I get this on a whole other level now. I totally respect it. I respect what people are trying to make.”
The Flash is set to premiere sometime in November 2022.