We live in a post Avengers world when it comes to comic book movies. There is no deneying it. What Marvel Studios accomplished with their 5 solo films and 1 epic team-up all exhisting in one cohesive universe was pretty amazing. But with all the sucsess Marvel has had, many comic fans are wondering how DC did beat Marvel to the punch.
Yes you could bring up how WB is only interested in Batman and Superman, how Green Lantern flopped, and that WB likely has very little faith in other DC comics characters to carry their own movies. All of those things factor in to us not seeing a cohesive cinematic DCU, but to me the reason why is very different.
As you all know, DC is owned WB. WB is a studio that is responsible for making all sorts of movies, and not just ones based on comic books. So when they reach into the vast catologue of DC characters, they really are looking more for a new franchise to milk more than they are looking to use it build th rest of the DCU. I even remember when WB was prepping Green Lantern, it was because they knew the Harry Potter franchise was coming to a close, and so soon would Christopher Nolan's rebooted Batman series. They needed a new franchise to make money year after year for them.That is also why we keep seeing reboot, direct sequels etc for Batman and Superman. Those are franchises WB does not want to lose.
It's different over at Marvel Studios. I'm not saying that Marvel is against making franchises, because their movies are a franchises. But each of those franchises exhists to further build the Marvel universe on film as much as it exhists to be it's own thing. You also have to remember that Marvel Studios was created directly by Marvel for the sole purpose of making their characters into movies. While WB has an entity called DC Entertainment to help make their movies, I think at the end of the day, it's the WB big shots making the decisions. Yes, you could point out that Marvel Studios is now a Disney studio, but I think that even though Disney gets involved to an extent, they realize that Marvel knows it characters best.
Basically, Marvel has a more fine tuned razor focus. Comic book movies are their thing. For WB, comic book movies are only of their things.