James Gunn on DC cancellations: ‘Some things are true, some are half true, and some are false’

If The Hollywood Reporter surprised us with the news on Dec. 8 that James Gunn and Peter Safran’s plans didn’t include Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman or Henry Cavill’s Superman in DC’s future, the day after the ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ director ‘ he used Chirping to confirm that there is truth in the rumors, but what other things are right “half true”others are lies and others is that they have not directly decided whether they will be true or not.

Peter and I chose to run DC Studios knowing that we were entering a contentious environment, both in the stories being told and in the audiences themselves and there would be an inevitable period of transition as we move towards telling a coherent story across film, TV , animation and games.

? James Gunn (@JamesGunn) December 8, 2022

“Although this first month in Washington has been fruitful, building the next ten years of history takes time and we are only just beginning. Peter and I chose to run DC Studios knowing that we were approaching a challenging environment, both in the stories that were being told and in the audience itself, and that there will be an inevitable period of transition as we move to tell a coherent story across film, television, animation and video games.”

Gunn and Safran took over the leadership of DC Studio on November 1 with the plan to unify all factions of this universe following the example of the MCU, as at this time the studio has several, for example Batman (Ben Affleck, Robert Pattinson and Michael Keaton) or characters with very different tones depending on the production (‘Justice League’, ‘Wonder Woman 1984’).

We know we won’t make every single person happy every step of the way, but we can promise that everything we do is done in service of STORY and in service of DC CHARACTERS, we know you care and we’ve loved our entire lives.

? James Gunn (@JamesGunn) December 8, 2022

Ultimately, the inconvenience of that transitional period was dwarfed by the creative possibilities and the opportunity to build on what has worked at DC so far and help fix what hasn’t. We know we won’t make everyone happy at every step, but we can promise that everything we do is in service of STORY and in service of the DC CHARACTERS we know you love and have loved all your life.”

It was clear that achieving consistency with so much material by prioritizing theatrical releases would lead to casualties, the massacre with “Batgirl” had already begun, but perhaps it wasn’t expected to reach this scale, Well, there’s even talk of Jason Momoa quitting Aquaman to become Lobo, an interstellar mercenary and bounty hunter who has yet to make his screen debut. With these tweets, Gunn pleads with fans for patience and vaguely points out that not everything THR has leaked will end up being true: “For more answers about the future of the DC Universe, I’ll sadly have to ask you to wait. We’re giving these characters and stories the time and attention they deserve, and we ourselves still have many more questions to ask and answer.”, finish the thread.

nothing is official

We don’t know if these messages will have calmed the nerves of their followers, but it seems that internally the creators associated with the studio are not satisfied at all: “He created quite a ruckus”assures an anonymous source to Deadline, “Leaves a horrific outlook. This business is about relationships.” When asked about a possible re-cast for Wonder Woman, Superman and Aquaman, this same person doesn’t understand that the production company wants to risk the monetary problems it could cause: “These franchises are already making a ton of money, why stop them? How can such a heavily indebted studio afford to start from scratch? There are scripts and actor costs to sort out.”

The last DC film released in theaters was ‘Black Adam’, with Dwayne Johnson as one of the enemies of ‘Shazam!’, and although its passage at the box office has not been as fruitful as one might expect, it knows nothing of a possible sequel, Johnson appears to be one of the few who are not in danger in the new DC Universe.

According to the source consulted by Deadline, no one would have actually informed the internal team that Cavill, Gadot or Momoa would have been “fired”; and Gunn and Safran may not want to make such big decisions until after the premiere of “The Flash” on June 16, 2023 and “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” on December 25 of the same year. In any case, these three performers and Johnson are also represented by the WME agency (as well as Andy Muschietti) so, if a massive replacement is chosen, we could end up seeing another legal war like the one CAA has started against Disney for the work of Scarlett Johansson.