Is DC Studios' DCU already in trouble? It feels like a question we've asked many times before, albeit with good reason. At the start of 2023, James Gunn and Peter Safran announced 10 new movies and TV shows; Creature Commandos has been released, Superman is right around the corner, and both Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow and Lanterns are in active production. The other six appear to be no closer to happening now than they were then.
That's not an assumption either. Earlier this year, Gunn and Safran hosted a press event, best described as ill-advised, which boiled down to them admitting that The Authority, The Brave and the Bold, Swamp Thing, Waller, Booster Gold, and Paradise Lost had all hit stumbling blocks. But hey, on the plus side, they were moving forward with low-budget features revolving around Sgt. Rock and, uh, Batman villain, Clayface.
Having that sort of mix of projects from a studio producing superhero content is far from a bad thing, but those smaller projects need to be mixed with and supported by much bigger ones. They shouldn't be the main offerings from a brand that's been struggling in theaters for years.
Earlier this week, the news broke that Sgt. Rock has been scrapped. There was some damage control via the trades, claiming concerns about the weather in the UK had resulted in production being halted for a possible 2026 shoot. It's an implausible, almost insulting, excuse that doesn't add up (particularly when they're shooting in a country where it often rains more days than not during the summer). Reliable sources have indicated that there were issues with the budget and concerns about Luca Guadagnino's capabilities, with the plug pulled in the middle of pre-production. As a result, the only DC movie being released in 2027 is The Batman Part II, and no one seems sure whether that will ever see the light of day.
Now, with chatter about Clayface also potentially being at risk, it's undeniable that all is not well at DC Studios. While we don't expect Warner Bros. to shelve the brand if Superman underperforms this summer—things aren't quite that dire—Gunn and Safran's inexperience has become impossible to ignore. One is an accomplished filmmaker, and the other a veteran producer; neither of them are studio executives.
The goal is to create a new shared world of successful films and TV shows, but with so much pressure to fix DC, neither has the time to find their footing the way Kevin Feige could with Iron Man and those early Phase 1 movies. Feige has been stretched thin attempting to oversee the Multiverse Saga, so imagine if he were trying to write and direct three or four of those at the same time? Marvel has audience goodwill, DC does not: one flop and it might all come crumbling down.
The pressure is on, and there are indications it's being felt. Gunn has only recently stopped spending a huge amount of his time debunking rumours and sometimes squabbling with fans on social media. Meanwhile, the veteran writer and director wants to keep his friends in work and is eager to reunite with them, leading to a weird mix of new and returning faces in a DCU that's supposed to be a fresh start, yet still somehow just feels like the DCEU with a different coat of paint. And if Gunn is leading the creative while Safran busies himself with everything else, how on Earth do you get that far into a project like Sgt. Rock, only for work to be postponed by a year at the last minute?
There's going to be growing pains, and not everything will be perfect. Even Marvel Studios has discovered in recent years. In the case of DC Studios, though, it's getting increasingly difficult to shrug off these questionable decisions, including the lack of transparency regarding some projects (Gunn has never commented on Gal Gadot's claims she'd been asked to return as Wonder Woman) and the fact they're too transparent about others (the biggest takeaway from Gunn and Safran at the press event mentioned above was arguably, "LOL, we don't know what we're doing").
Sgt. Rock being cancelled isn't the end of the world. Hell, it's a movie that not even die-hard DC fans were asking for. Gunn is a great storyteller, and Safran's Hollywood achievements are many, but that doesn't mean they should be running a studio. The Russo Brothers found huge success in the MCU, but as soon as they launched their own label, they delivered disappointment after disappointment. Now, they hoped to rebound with Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars, two movies that have the potential to save their careers after The Electric State bombed. Gunn and Safran both can do great things for DC, but like the Russos, they need to report to someone other than themselves to be at their best.
Unfortunately, just like Warner Bros. once announced a slate of DCEU movies that failed to come to fruition, it now feels like the DCU is repeating history all over again...