When James Gunn was assigned as DC Studios co-CEO alongside Peter Safran, the filmmaker made it clear that we would still see Elseworlds projects from time to time despite the "DCEU" being rebooted (with some exceptions) and rebranded as the DCU.
For now, the only Elseworlds project on the horizon (that we know of) is Matt Reeves' The Batman sequel, but Gunn has now confirmed that he is open to developing more - as long as the script meets his extremely high standards.
"It is going to be mostly DCU, and then occasionally there's some Elseworlds tales," the Superman director tells EW. "There are things that naturally lend themselves to Elseworlds tales. We have a lot of animated projects and they are sort of a different beast; they aren't all like Creature Commandos. The truth is, the DCU, we give people a lot of freedom to tell different stories, but also we have to be really involved to make sure that, say, the power set of Supergirl and Superman are the same. There's a lot of really silly s--- that we have to give notes on in screenplays, like powers or what cities exist in the DCU that don't exist in other places. We aren't the regular world; we're the DCU. There isn't necessarily Seattle, but there's an Evergreen. There isn't necessarily a New York, but there's a Gotham. So all of that type of stuff needs to be dialed in.
Gunn went on to reveal that a certain "very famous" actor pitched him on an idea for an undisclosed Elseworlds project, but was told that it would need to be approaching the level of a masterpiece for the studio to consider giving it the go-ahead.
"So there's definitely room for people to tell other stories...And when it's somebody who's important, like Matt Reeves — who I've had an admiration for a long time as one of the very, very few filmmakers who is out there making spectacle, commercial fair, that is also an artist — then you have to stand up and listen. The script still needs to be good. We're not going to make it unless we like the script. But I think that there are exceptions. I told it to one person who came in and pitched something that was an Elseworlds tale. It was a very, very, very famous movie actor. I said, 'It depends on how the screenplay comes out...If it's a masterpiece, I'll make it, but it has to be a masterpiece.' [Laughs] And he is like, 'I don't know if it's a masterpiece.' He got all funny. He's still working on it, though. He is still trying to do it, so we'll see. Masterpiece might be pushing it, but it's got to be really great."
"If it's an Elseworlds tale, then it's worth telling something that might tend to confuse a few people," Gunn added. "But also part of our thing is really being clear about what is Elseworlds and what is DCU. And the other thing is not just giving away properties like they're party favors to people doing low-budget TV shows or stuff that we have no quality control over because we're making a few thousand dollars on the rights. It is having some sense of quality control over everything."
Gunn didn't drop any hints about the project or the identity of the actor who pitched it, but there's some speculation that it might be Michael B. Jordan, who was developing a "Black Superman" project focused on the Val-Zod character with J.J. Abrams prior to Gunn and Safran taking over.
Taking Gunn's comments into account, we'd be very surprised if we see more than a couple of Elseworlds movies or shows beyond the "BatVerse" projects that are currently in development - and whether all of them even see the light of day is still up in the air.