The DCEU has undeniably a lot of issues mainly due to Warner Bros. wanting to catch up to the Marvel Cinematic Universe and it's a shame too as DC have an amazing roster of characters that we haven't seen depicted on the big screen. The issues of the DCEU were implanted immediately with the first movie which gave us a Superman origin story. While, I do quite like 'Man of Steel', the problem is with the lack of understanding on what they wanted after.
When 'Man of Steel' was released back in 2013 the idea was to create an individual movie that wouldn't try too hard to set up a universe because at the time Warner Bros and DC Comics didn't know how the audience would react towards the Superman origin. 'Man of Steel' is one of my personal favourite origin movies for a superhero simply because it doesn't try to be something it isn't. It's an origin story for Superman and it is as simple as that, the villain was good and the character of Superman was written quite well. There were a few issues with the pacing, with the third act of the movie but overall, it was an enjoyable movie.
Here's where the problem comes in, this movie was NOT a set up for a universe, at least that's how Warner Bros and DC Comics saw it at the time. This movie was a test to see if the audience would appreciate enough for them to have the green light on creating a universe. Warner Bros and DC Comics should've had a plan, or at least some sort of concept which would've given WB and DC a better idea on what they wanted to do with this universe that they were now creating. 'Man of Steel' was a good origin story, there was nothing horrible about it that made the movie necessarily bad but WB just didn't know where to go from there. Instead of giving us a sequel or another origin story for a different superhero, they went ahead and gave us 'Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice' and that's when it all went downhill.
Personally, I enjoyed BvS for what it was but that doesn't mean I can't see the many flaws this movie had and with those flaws, it brought issues into the overall DCEU. For this, I have two ideas that I think could've worked better than what we got in BvS and by no means am I pretending that I'm a better story-teller than Zack Snyder or the people involved with writing BvS. Take away the whole Batman going up against Superman as it is far too early into the DCEU for a movie as big as this. Instead, have it be a proper sequel to ‘Man of Steel’. Keep the whole arc of the public reacting badly to the destruction of Metropolis, as well as the death count, keep the political opinion on whether there should even be a Superman as this way it truly shows Superman struggling to find his identity in this world. He’s sad, confused and feels like he’s alone. The main bad for the sequel would be Lex Luthor, who obviously blames Superman for the destruction of Metropolis and as a result, he is working on a project called ‘The Bizarro Project’. Throughout the movie, we see Lex working on this project as he uses the DNA of General Zod to create a Superman clone that he could control.
Now, throughout the movie Clark Kent becomes less active as Superman because he truly believes he isn’t doing any good. Of course, Superman can’t just get away with all the destruction in Metropolis though, right? Keep the scene in which Superman goes to the courtroom to discuss and finalise what will happen with him and BAM, the courtroom explodes as it did in BvS and of course it was set up by Lex Luthor to make Superman look bad. Lex Luthor goes on record and states to the public that Superman must be stopped, the people who are now even more afraid of Superman are with Lex Luthor on this. When Superman goes to confront Lex Luthor, ‘The Bizarro Project’ is revealed and before the fight happens, Lex and Superman talk about why Lex is doing this and that he sees Superman as a deterrent to the city. This way Lex isn’t really just a villain doing villainy things. This way Lex seems like the guy fighting for the people of the city rather than just fighting for the survival of the city. When the fight breaks out between Bizarro and Superman, we see the two of them causing havoc once again in Metropolis… Superman realises that he is fighting the wrong fight and instead of only focusing on Bizarro, throughout the fight he saves as many people as he can. After a short while of fighting through the city, Superman pushes the fight away from the city as much as he can and into space. After a long, exhaustive fight, Superman defeats Bizarro and as a result, Lex is sent to either Blackgate Penitentiary in Gotham or Arkham Asylum. The movie can either have a montage or one specific scene where Superman helps to rebuild Metropolis due to any destruction caused during the fight, it can also show Superman saving several people and we see the people’s thoughts on Superman transition and they finally begin to trust him.
For an after-credit scene, they could have a cameo/Easter Egg of Batman if they want to set up Batman's existence in the DCEU at that point. My idea for the after-credit scene would be that Batman vists Lex in prison except we wouldn't see Batman himself. The lights go out completely, it's pitch dark except for this little light flickering, we see a shadow with a bat-symbol on the chest area and the shadow continually gets closer to Lex. He threatens Lex that he'll be watching him from now on and that's it! Like I said earlier, I don't pretend to be a writer or a better story-teller, especially as I have the advantage of hindsight but this is just an idea. I will be making a few articles like this one where I share my ideas on how the DCEU could have gone and probably would have worked better as making it all into one article would be far too long.