All they had were release dates. They had no real vision about what they actually wanted to do, they just assumed BvS would be this massive thing that would solve everything. Part of why I want Universal's Monsters Universe to work is because they are following the same formula as Marvel, building slowly film by film. If that works its proof the only way you make a cinematic universe work is if you actually take the time to do the ground work. The DCEU will then forever be the lesson as to how you don't do this type of thing.
Like I said, not a great plan.
But that would be nice to have someone ANYONE else do it right, so that it's less "Oh Marvel whatever" and it's just plain old strategy.
Remember when the executives at WB announced the DC slate at a shareholders meeting? And those of us who took issue with that, fearing it was an indicator of a reactive, short-sighted mindset amongst the suits at WB, were loudly ridiculed by some around here?
Good times.
I'll take a slice of that humble pie. I really thought they had something other than just titles and assumptions.
How can you make a coherent extended universe when every movie you make is just reactionary to what came before? You are right, I think the plan lasted all of 2 films.
Apparently you can't. In their defense, I don't think they realized they were cowards who weren't able to function outside of an ideal circumstance.
Or maybe MoS wasnt the success they wanted so they rushed even further into a team up movie. I really don't think that MoS did what they wanted. Let's say they spent MoS 320 mill making and marketing MoS, which I think is a fair number. It made $660 mill. Only a little then double of the "reported" budget. That and Joe Starr of ScreenJunkies claimed once that they let people go after the release of MoS
But MoS was meant to launch a Cinematic Universe. Remember the Wayne Tech satellite, and apprently there were easter eggs for Aquaman
CGI easter eggs can be added late in post production if need be. The story structure that is hostile to a shared universe however is something different.
He also works on DCTV.
Not great, but not too shabby.
Honestly, that makes it more Shabby to me. Geoff Johns' silver age take on the Rogues kind of lowered the quality of the whole show. For the first few episodes there was room to suspend some disbelief on why Barry didn't handle business at super speed, but by the time Geoff's big Rogues episode hit, it was full on 'two guys with guns that Flash can't figure out how to punch' and the show has been bereft of meaningful physical tension ever since. Flash is a hard character to challenge, physically, but Johns really didn't give a F, his love for the silver age took that show down a peg.
What's saddest is that it's kind of proof positive that visual storytelling in comics is different than on television. Basically, when I cut from Flash dodging a blast to him thinking in a comic, the reader's brain fills in the missing panel to make it interesting, challenging, and etc. In film, on TV, we can clearly see that he's just standing there, not using his most basic abilities, and it doesn't work as well.
And that weakness, and not realizing that weakness is why I have very little confidence in his fabled 'quality' pass on the GL 2011 script. He's an A list comic book writer, but when I look at GL 2011, I see a lot of angles that would have worked well in the comics, the expositional character development, the rube goldberg style constructs for conflicts, bit there's no good movie to pull out there like there is for, say, the Star Wars Prequels, or even FFINO.
So, Boo to Geoff Johns as a filmmaker or Kevin Feige replacement or any such thing. Write moar comics.
