Tag: Superman

The decade-old DC Extended Universe (DCEU) has finally come to an end. Despite featuring some of the most famous IPs of the modern world, and some of the best talents coming together to promise a franchise like no other, the DCEU never really took off. After three consecutive duds earlier this year culminating in last week’s underwhelming Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, it’s safe to say that the franchise had very little scope to recover. It’s quite ironic to have a team of superheroes when a franchise can’t be saved!

Thankfully, it’s not all over for the fans of Superman, Batman or Wonder Woman, because the DC Universe (DCU) is coming up to soft-reboot the franchise and our beloved superheroes are probably yet to hang up their boots. As a franchise that has seen soaring highs and brutal lows, the story of the DCEU — filled with enough controversies to fill up its fictional planets and more drama than what most of its films had — has been quite a journey for the studio and its die-hard fans. Here’s a recap on the journey of DCEU which, for the lack of a better word, has been extremely bumpy.

The origin story

Warner Bros., just like the DC comic books, wanted to bring the various DC Comics superheroes together in films since 2002 and there were plans on various crossovers, including a Justice League film. But the box-office bomb of Green Lantern of 2011 — which lead Ryan Reynolds even joked about in Deadpool — made the studio scrap their initial plans. Two years later, Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel (2013) came out and officially started the DC Extended Universe.

Snyder set a darker tone with the plots and characters, which the franchise will be known for. While Marvel took four years and five films before coming up with their first crossover film Avengers (2012), the DCEU did it with their second film, Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. It’s safe to say that the film’s announcement broke the internet!

The beginning of the end

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was the first time two of the comic world’s biggest superheroes, who have had multiple solo outings, were seen together.

The film set new box-office records but experienced a historic drop in its second weekend from which it never recovered. What should have turned out to be one of the biggest success stories of Hollywood ended with less than favourable reviews. Amongst many reasons, what stuck out predominantly was the introduction of a villain like Doomsday at such an early stage of the franchise, a step Marvel brilliantly circumvented with Thanos. The final nail in the coffin was how the film, just the second entry in the DCEU, kills off Superman… only to bring him back in Justice League (2017). And let’s not even talk about Jesse Eisenberg’s take on the villainous Lex Luthor.

The fall of the Titans

Speaking of villains, 2016, which gave us Batman v Superman, also gave Suicide Squad. If the minor cracks in the studio’s plans of making the DCEU big became evident in that year’s first film, the second one made huge dents to the plan by arguably becoming the worst entry in the entire franchise.

Just like the previous film’s Lex Luthor, this entry’s Joker, played by Jared Leto, is often regarded as the least favourite interpretation of a crowd-favourite character. The fact that the character was just handed over to him from Heath Ledger who posthumously won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his portrayal in Christopher Nolan’s 2008 film The Dark Knight made it a tough nut to crack.

On the flip side, if Batman v Superman introduced us to Wonder Woman, a character that got a standalone film that worked wonders for the franchise, Suicide Squad became the first feature film to showcase the infamous Harley Quinn. Similar to Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman, Margot Robbie’s Harley became an integral part of the DCEU and Wonder Woman is unsurprisingly the highest-rated DCEU film right now.

Only when it felt like the franchise had finally gotten a hang of itself, Justice League was released. On paper, it had everything to be as much of a success akin to the Avengers films for the MCU. But a personal tragedy caused Snyder to back away from the film and the studio brought in Joss Whedon who had directed the first two Avengers to take over the project. And, as difficult as it might be to say this as a fan, this film was a disaster.

Unfulfilled projects and unrealised potential

This fiasco also caused the studio to pull the plug on a sequel that would have been helmed by Snyder featuring a far more intense storyline involving Darkseid killing a pregnant Lois Lane that would have given us the Knightmare sequence. But, the film never happened and Snyder had to part ways with Warner Bros; while Justice League was supposed to be the franchise’s $1 billion film, its successor, a relatively smaller film Aquaman surprisingly pulled off that feat. The DCEU tasted success once again with Shazam!, but by then it was clear that all the films were separate entities that the studio was trying to tie around a franchise that was not working out. The repercussions of Justice League not working out in their favour also disrupted the DCEU’s slate which saw the scrapping of films that were supposed to be standalone films for Superman, Batman, Cyborg, Green Lantern and Nightwing. And to add insult to injury, they made a Batgirl film which was called off despite it being ready for release.

ALSO READ: Jason Momoa says his fate as Aquaman in future films not looking good

The fact that Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman and Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn couldn’t repeat their magic for Wonder Woman 1984 and Birds of Prey respectively, made it clear that the DCEU was sinking. But thanks to fans’ outcry, the studio brought back Snyder for his cut of Justice League which was considered by most to be superior to the 2017 theatrical release. Surprisingly, despite its success, Warner Bros. still considers the theatrical version to be the cannon and we will never know why!

What followed was another pleasant surprise in the form of The Suicide Squad which had a fantastic cast, and John Cena’s Peacemaker which went on to be DCEU’s only television series and also one of its best titles. This was also the time we got Robert Pattinson’s The Batman and Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker; two successes that were not a part of the DCEU.

The studio though, thought Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam would take the franchise to new heights and the actor himself was often quoted saying, “The hierarchy of power was about to change”. But the film did not walk the talk and DCEU got to a point of no return.

The future looks bright

Discovery Inc. acquired DC and Warner Bros. parent company WarnerMedia in 2022, forming a new company named Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD). James Gunn and Peter Safran were brought in as the co-chairmen and CEOs of DC Studios and they pulled the plug on the DCEU with just four more films coming out after Black Adam, with none of them turning out to be profitable ventures.

Earlier this year, the duo came up with their slate of ten DC projects which were to be part of the DC Universe (DCU), and the new franchise will be a soft reboot and spiritual successor to the DCEU. Their first step is a decade-long plan consisting of two chapters with the first one titled Gods and Monsters. It will feature the films Superman: Legacy (2025), The Authority, The Brave and the Bold, Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, and Swamp Thing, and five series in Creature Commandos, Waller, Lanterns, Paradise Lost, and Booster Gold.

ALSO READ: Henry Cavill confirms he is not returning as Superman after James Gunn announces new film

Considering it’s a soft reboot, actors like Viola Davis (Amanda Waller) and John Cena (Peacemaker) are set to reprise their roles but the fate of bigger characters is yet to be clarified. They also stated that any project that did not fit into the DCU’s shared universe would be categorised (just like their comic counterparts) as DC Elseworlds, and the upcoming sequels to Joker and The Batman as well as a slew of other films that are already in the pipeline would fall under this label.

For a franchise that has got the plots to be one of the most entertaining and profitable ones in Hollywood, the DC Universe has barely made a dent in its decade-long stint with most of its films struggling to break even. Now, with the reboot plans in safer hands, promising a fresher and more pragmatic approach, the new DCU seems to have everything that takes to bring us out of superhero fatigue. After all, if characters like Superman and Batman can’t pull it off, who else can?