The DCEU Is Dead So Isn't It Time For A New Direction?

[thecolorsblend]

To be fair, the MCU as we first knew it was conceptualized during the production of the first Iron Man. This idea that Marvel Studios went in with a big epic blueprint about where things would go is revisionism and wishful thinking. Phase One was very much Marvel flying by the seat of their pants and getting VERY lucky at times.

[The Laughing Fish]

To be fair, the MCU as we first knew it was conceptualized during the production of the first Iron Man. This idea that Marvel Studios went in with a big epic blueprint about where things would go is revisionism and wishful thinking. Phase One was very much Marvel flying by the seat of their pants and getting VERY lucky at times.

Now there is talk that the MCU is desperate to get the original Avengers cast back. The Marvels is speculated to be the worst-performing film in the franchise to date, and now Feige and co are allegedly hitting the panic button. There is even a rumour that Hugh Jackman's Wolverine and Tobey Maguire's Spider-Man will be in the next Avengers production. To me, this reads Marvel AND superhero fatigue in general is finally settling in.

Meanwhile, HBO boss Casey Bloys has confessed to using bots to attack critics that dared to criticise the network's programming.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/digital/hbo-chief-casey-bloys-fake-twitter-accounts-1235634912/

The irony is Rolling Stone ran a hit piece against Zack Snyder by accusing him of using bots to generate hype and interest in his cut of JL only a year ago, and now, they actually exposed an executive from HBO/WBD of using bots to scare of critics. An executive who, by his own admission, is very thin-skinned. That would explain the overzealous praise of Peacemaker and the attempts to hype up this DCU agenda on social media. If a subsidiary like HBO is using bots, who is to say WBD themselves aren't doing either?

WBD must be bleeding a lot of money if they can't bribe RS to not expose their subsidiary in bad light.

[The Laughing Fish]

The trades are now saying that Gunn has hired his brother Sean to play Maxwell Lord in planned projects. So much for Gunn's promise that actors won't play multiple roles in his desired DC universe: Sean's existing DC credits already include Weasel from TSS and another character in Creature Commandos. Yes, I'm aware that nepotism happens a lot in Hollywood, but it still doesn't look good that Gunn lied yet again.

While we're on the subject, word's going around that Supergirl is planned to be cast for that Superman Leprosy project. The project is already overstuffed with so many other characters to the point they're rushing an entire universe in one film that's supposed to be a new Superman debut. Yet people still say BvS was rushed and overstuffed.

Let's if the investors are really THAT stupid in going along with any of this nonsense.

[The Laughing Fish]

Gunn supposedly lashed out at a fan by denying he broke his promise about not casting multiple actors for DC roles, and this video points out a statement he made to Variety to prove he's bending the truth.

The reason why I say "supposedly" is because the comment has now been deleted, and there's a screenshot of the same fan who called him out was also mocking Snyder fans. Strangely that account has been deactivated, which only had one or two posts anyway.





It's possible that this person was just a guy who hated both Snyder and Gunn. It's also possible that Gunn may have used a bot to respond to make him look like he was putting a disgruntled hater in his place just to make himself feel good by telling a lie. I mean, with Gunn's history of using social media against Nicole Perlman over the GOTG writing credits and Max exec Casey Bloys admitting to using fake accounts to attack critics for giving his shows bad reviews, anything is possible when it comes to questioning Gunn's conduct on social media.

Meanwhile, Zachary Levi had this to say about Sean Gunn's role as Maxwell Lord:

When asked the question, the actor seemed skeptical that jumping into a new DC character would even be possible. Reminded that Sean Gunn, the actor (and brother of DC Studios co-CEO James Gunn) who played Weasel and Calendar Man in 2021's The Suicide Squad has been cast as villain Maxwell Lord in the new DC Universe, Levi quipped, "Listen, when you're the brother of the guy who runs DC, I guess you get to play who you want."

https://au.lifestyle.yahoo.com/shazam-star-zachary-levi-takes-221014384.html

I guess Levi's sucking up to Gunn at the start of the year was all for nothing.

[The Laughing Fish]

I saw this report acknowledging the abject failure that was DC Studios this year, albeit still trying to put a positive spin on WBD despite their financial problems and deflecting the responsibility from Gunn and Safran.

https://au.lifestyle.yahoo.com/lifestyle/box-office-report-card-grading-165638561.html

Warner Bros. spent over $660 million (not including marketing) to bring those superhero films to the big screen — only to collectively earn less than 2016's "Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice" ($874 million) at the global box office.

To think people declared BvS a "bomb". It was hilarious to me that somebody here was having a go at me last year about WB wanting to get away from anything Snyderverse-related and the excuse was the studio "wanted to make money". Well, that didn't age very well, all of these films flopped badly, and trust in the DC brand has progressively eroded with every horrible decision made by the studio. Shazam 2, The Flash and Blue Beetle failed to reach Black Adam's box office revenue, and that movie was a flop too. It's still early to tell where Aquaman 2 ends up, but it's looking like yet another failure as well.

If Gunn and Zaslav never declared how great The Flash was in public and how it was one of the best movies they had seen, I would've suspected their handling of these films was an act of sabotage. But Gunn did go out of his way to state Flash was one of the best he had seen, and even gave Muschietti the job to direct a Batman reboot project. This must've been some sort of power move by Gunn to show he had confidence in The Flash and thought his influence would've ensured success. He was DEAD WRONG.

Unless you're a Gunn fanboy, anyone who is paying attention would realise that the man has no credibility.

DC's new bosses, James Gunn and Peter Safran, already announced plans to reset the sprawling superhero universe. If only they could enter the Speed Force to travel back in time and prevent the release of those comic book duds.

I've come to realise that in Hollyweird, it's all about controlling the narrative. This paragraph I've quoted ignores that Gunn and Safran should be held accountable for these failures.

We talked about how moronic it was to announce any sort of reboot before this year's movies were coming out, but Safran in particular should be fired. The fact that he'd go along with this despite producing the Shazam and Aquaman sequels is mindboggling. Aside from the first Aquaman and first Shazam movies, the other DC films he had a hand in producing were bombs (TSS, Shazam 2, his production company financed Blue Beetle). The only reason he's in this position is because Zaslav reportedly couldn't find anyone who wanted to take the DC job. And the only reason Safran is working with Gunn is because the two have a history together; Safran produced some of Gunn's shows back in the 2000s: James Gunn's PG Porn and Humanzee.

I know Hollyweird is nepotistic and it's all about who you know - not what you know - but you can see the pattern here and these two are unfit for DC Studios.

I'll just cap off by saying if anyone is doubting Gunn had a creative influence on any of this year's films, think again:

[The Laughing Fish]

It was brought to my attention that before the news of the Matt Reeves Batman sequel was getting delayed for another two and a half years, the Arkham TV show project he wanted to produce for his Batman universe is instead going to be set in Gunn's DCU.

https://youtu.be/NKVAql_yVYI?si=w-sEOuqJJPie2rvm

DC insiders stated the dual strikes last year had impacted on fast-tracking the sequel - yet Gunn is writing and filming his stupid Superman AND Peacemaker at the same time. I suspect Gunn's a scab and wrote these projects during the strikes, but I still find the excuse rather dubious.

Either the following things are true:

1) Reeves is slowly getting pushed out, and WBD wants to incorporate his Batman in their DCU and turn the sequel into Brave and the Bold. At the moment, they still say Andy Muschietti is attached to direct it;

2) The Reeves franchise is getting scrapped because creepy Gunn wants to cast his own Batman, and Arkham is being hijacked and twisted to fit into his vision. After all, Superman and Lois got cancelled because the studio didn't want another Superman project to compete with the DCU version. Besides, why would Reeves go from playing studio politics to say Affleck is staying on when he wasn't, then the film becomes his own property...only to then produce another TV show for a competing vision of the character?;

3) There's no big deal, the film will get made and come out in 2026.

I don't have a stake in any of this, and I couldn't give a damn about these Batman reboots. But the fact that Gunn is writing Superman, Creature Commandos and another season of Peacemaker (despite he stupidly said the first season isn't even canon to his planned DCU continuity at all), goes to show everything not written by Gunn is getting shoved aside.

The sooner people realise Gunn is poison to the DC brand, the better.