Many of you will no doubt remember that Warner Bros. spent years desperately trying to catch up to Marvel Studios. Ultimately, the DCEU failed because the brand needed a long-term plan and someone with a clear creative vision steering the ship. Now it has exactly that. The problem is that James Gunn's vision may not be the one DC Studios needs.
For all of Gunn's strengths as a filmmaker, the DC Universe he's building feels like a playground for characters he personally loves rather than the franchises audiences are crying out for. That's a risky approach at a time when superhero movies are no longer untouchable at the box office. For proof of that, you need only compare the box office returns of The Marvels to Captain Marvel.
Before The Flash arrived in theaters, Gunn infamously declared it one of the greatest superhero movies ever made. While there was understandable enthusiasm from a new DC Studios co-CEO trying to support a film inherited from the previous regime, those comments now make him appear disconnected from reality and clueless about what makes a good superhero movie.
It also suggests that Gunn's instincts don't always align with those of general audiences or other fans, and it now appears that Gunn's creative vision for Supergirl is what derailed that movie (lest we forget, he was also responsible for The Flash's goofy George Clooney ending).
Nobody is suggesting characters like Mister Terrific, Clayface or, uh, Jimmy Olsen don't deserve the spotlight (well, Jimmy certainly doesn't). Comic book readers know how rich DC's catalogue is, and Gunn has built much of his career making audiences care about characters nobody expected to become stars. The key difference is that he did that within a franchise that was thriving.
Guardians of the Galaxy arrived six years after Iron Man. Audiences already trusted the Marvel Studios logo, and had bought into Tony Stark, Captain America, Thor and The Avengers before Marvel asked them to take a chance on a talking raccoon and living tree. DC doesn't have that luxury.
Instead of using Batman, Wonder Woman and Superman as the foundation before branching out, Gunn seems determined to build every corner of the DCU simultaneously. That means projects centred on characters many lifelong DC fans would struggle to name are being prioritised alongside—or, in some cases, ahead of—the company's biggest icons.
Batman still doesn't have a clear place in the DCU. Wonder Woman hasn't even been cast. The Justice League feels years away. Yet we're getting Clayface and DC Crime, with the latter a series not even on the most devoted DC fan's wishlist.
It isn't 2014 anymore. Gen Z hasn't grown up treating superheroes as appointment viewing, and younger audiences are far more selective about what they watch, choosing to instead gravitate towards viral hits like Backrooms and Obsession.
Gunn's "Chapter 1" looks a lot like the MCU's Phase 4, albeit with him attempting to skip several steps. A big part of why Black Panther and Spider-Man: Homecoming succeeded is because their respective leads connected with fans in Captain America: Civil War. Gunn threw everything at the wall to see what would stick in Superman, and a 30-second Supergirl cameo wasn't enough to launch her franchise. Similarly, Mister Terrific being a scene-stealer doesn't automatically justify giving him a spin-off TV series.
By flooding the market with so many B- and C-list heroes, Gunn runs the risk of the A-listers no longer feeling special. If every obscure corner of the DC Universe is treated with the same importance as Batman and Wonder Woman, audiences will inevitably stop seeing all the characters as must-see events, and the DCU will lose its identity completely.
Creative risks aren't a bad thing, especially when so many great DC stories have put lesser-known characters from and centre. However, the priority has to be getting the big guns right first, using Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, and the Justice League to launch this shared world, and allowing moviegoers to decide which supporting players deserve to graduate into leading roles.
Instead, it feels like James Gunn is building the DC Universe he wants to watch rather than the one general audiences are asking for. The biggest casualty from that won't be projects like Supergirl and DC Crime, it will be the DCU itself.