Can James Gunn’s new DCU topple Kevin Feige’s Goliath MCU?
Marvel movies, under the supervision of Kevin Feige, have dominated cinema over the last few years. Since the release of ‘Iron Man’ in 2008, Marvel have released multiple movies over a number of phases in a connected/shared universe, called the ‘Marvel Cinematic Universe’ or the MCU. Starting with origin stories these movies culminated in the epic two-part movie story in ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ in 2018 and ‘Avengers; Endgame’ in 2019. These two movies alone grossed an estimated worldwide box office of $4.8 billion. Disney bought Marvel for $4 billion in 2009 and this partnership continues to expand and create more movies, introducing new characters.
DC comics are owned by Warner Brothers. They had great success with director Christopher Nolan’s excellent Batman trilogy from 2005 to 2012. Since then they have not fared so well. Starting with director Zack Snyder’s Superman movie ‘Man of Steel’ in 2013, DC tried to play catch-up with Marvel and started their own shared universe, the ‘DC Extended Universe’ or DCEU. This very quickly brought Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman together in the 2016 movie ‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’. More movies with DC characters followed.
But these DCEU movies were not as well received, by critics or fans, as their MCU counterparts. Marvel meticulously planned their movies to fit an overarching narrative and gave each of their main characters their own stand alone movies before bringing them together in ‘The Avengers’ in 2012. DC however rushed into their DCEU, fast-tracking their own superhero team in ‘Justice League’ in 2017, without introducing many of their characters in their own solo movies first. The overarching plotting of this shared universe became a mess, with films being announced, then delayed, reshot, or in the case of ‘Batgirl’ scrapped entirely when principal photography was almost finished.
The two most critically praised movies based on DC comics at this time were the Joaquin Phoenix starrer ‘Joker’ in 2019 and ‘The Batman’ in 2022 starring Robert Pattinson. Both these movies were ‘stand-alone’ movies, completely outside the DCEU’s continuity and the Shared Universe. The DCEU, or the ‘Snyder-verse’ as it became known, was failing. Something had to be done.
In 2022, DC decided to hire their own version of Kevin Feige in the shape of James Gunn. James Gunn is a director who won critical praise for taking a little known Marvel super-hero team and giving them their own successful MCU movie in ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ in 2014 and its sequel three years later. Gunn then made a superior sequel to the very disappointing DCEU movie ‘Suicide Squad’ in 2016, called ‘The Suicide Squad’ in 2021 (Yes, they just added a ‘The’ instead of a number ‘2’).
Gunn took a big brush to the existing DCEU strategy and, rebranding it simply DCU, swept away much of what was planned. The biggest casualties were the second Superman movie, starring Henry Cavill and the third Wonder Woman movie starring Gal Gadot. When Gunn announced his plans on the internet, loyal fans were outraged and started to demand the return of the ‘Snyderverse’. It is understandable that the loss of Cavill and Gadot have disappointed many fans, as these actors were popular and well suited to their roles. However, fans also seem to have forgotten the disappointments and annoyance they felt at many of the elements of the Snyderverse.
Back in the MCU, however, they were having their own issues, losing direction and focus, since ‘Avengers: Endgame’. With Disney making more and more MCU content, including TV shows for its streaming service, the criticism that they are going for quantity over quality seems justified, with stories, characters and plotting suffering as a result.
Maybe now is DC’s opportunity to take the crown from Marvel. James Gunn has a tough battle ahead of him to win over the comic book and movie fans who love these types of movies.
Gunn’s plans include TV shows (live action and animated), video and movies to be interconnected with actors playing their respective roles across all media. Stories and plotting will be overseen by Gunn to ensure consistency and continuity. Gunn has planned five movies and five TV shows in his first phase, naming this phase ‘Gods and Monsters’. The first of the movies will be ‘Superman: Legacy’ (scheduled release July 11, 2025) which will feature a younger Superman. No actors have been cast yet. The movies to follow include ‘The Brave and the Bold’ which will feature Batman and his extended cast of characters, ‘Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow’ featuring Superman’s cousin, Kara Zor-El and ‘Swamp Thing’ based on DC’s popular horror comic. But the most interesting movie to be announced in this phase is ‘The Authority’.
Non-comic book readers will probably never have heard of ‘The Authority’ but its legacy has reverberated through comics and their movies in the last 20 years. It was created in the late 1990s by writer Warren Ellis and artist Bryan Hitch for Wildstorm comics, which was later bought by DC comics. It featured a superhero team out to save the world but who are unconcerned with the amount of death and destruction they caused along the way or the moral boundaries or world governments they crossed. Hitch pioneered a style of drawing that made it look like it was a big screen action movie. After 12 issues, writer Mark Millar and a variety of artists took over and continued this tone.
Hitch and Millar moved to Marvel comics and, using the lessons and skills they developed on ‘The Authority’ created ‘The Ultimates’. This was a new version of the classic Avengers team, but now it looked like a big budget blockbuster movie. When Marvel set out to make their MCU movies they used ‘The Ultimates’ as a template, with the style and tone taken directly from the comics. They even went as far as casting Samuel L Jackson as Nick Fury, after Hitch used his likeness for the character in the comic.
It is not a stretch to say that without the subliminal influence of ‘The Authority’ the MCU would look very different today – regardless of how good or bad that is. Now that James Gunn is planning to revamp the DC movies, and including ‘The Authority’, he may finally give DC and Warner Brothers what they want – supremacy over the Marvel Juggernaut.
