The Daily Planet - Superman News and Speculation Thread (🚨TAG SPOILERS🚨)

[Snow Queen]

Thank you.
Again, I cannot wait for the whole shared universe gimmick to go the way of the dinosaurs.

I think there's some fun to be found in these shared universe gimmicks allowing for characters that wouldn't usually get a shot to elbow their way in there. However, the rigidity and "building to the next big event" that's expected of the format is a burden and exhausting. If they loosened up, went for a number of ongoing franchises under distinct creative voices that exist in the same unvierse but more in a sense of "yeah, that sure is happening way over there, don't stress about it" and some crossover here and there when they want to, sure. That sounds like it could be fun.

But ultimately, just give me a trilogy from a talented director and I'll be happy. I expect to enjoy Reeves' work a lot more than this DCU stuff.

 

[Ultramankrypton]

Why would you think he wanted to use Dick as Robin? Not only is Damian an extremely James Gunnian character, but also, starting off at Damian allows him way more story opportunities in terms that if he wants to do Bat-Family spin-offs and explore characters like Nightwing, Red Hood, etc he can just do them outright.

I also straight up don't understand the idea that the crossover would in any way benefit Gunn or the DCU. Benefit them how? If they wanted to do a JLI project they couldn't put Batman on it until Pattinson's Batman is ready for that, if they wanted to do a Teen Titans project they'd have to wait till Pattinson's Batman has a Robin and on top of that has a Robin that seems capable enough to go up against metahumans. In every single way I can think of it's also way more appealing of an idea to create his own Batman which he can do whatever he wants with.

If Gunn originally planned to incorporate Reeves into the DCU, then Brave $ The Bold was obviously a contingency plan, it wasn’t what he originally wanted to do with Batman

You’re assuming that Gunn wanted to jump straight into the Batfamily and not properly build up to it. IMO it makes way more sense for Pattinson because he’s at a similar stage in his career as Corenswet’s Superman, there’s overlap there

I’ve always hated the idea of Bruce being 10+ years older than Clark, because I’ve always seen them like brothers

Rick Grayson is probably gonna be introduced in Batman II, and building off of that in the DCU would’ve allowed Gunn to do a proper version of the Teen Titans, with Dick as the main Robin and maybe Kory as the female lead. But now we’ll never get to see their romance told properly because Dick & Kory will be adults, and the Titans will either all have aged out of teen or they’ll be wayyy older than Raven, Beast Boy etc

This is all because Reeves wouldn’t be a team player

 

[Tra-El]

Gunn's idea of a consolidated cinematic version is old news and almost 20 years behind the times.

Gunn doesn't think so, though. He's a firm believer in story connectivity and is what the audience craves with superhero content if done correctly. That's where the long-term goldmine is if you're homing a DC Studios.

This actually would have been the perfect opportunity to roll out more DC films in the Reeves mould.

This is exactly why the Elseworlds label was created. To me, the more logical play at bat if I was looking at things from within if these conversations would ever be an idea to materialize, would to point The Batman and Todd Phillips' The Joker franchise's towards a collision course. That would make much more sense as a theory than position it in Gunn's DCU.

 

[Lily Adler]

Thank you.
Again, I cannot wait for the whole shared universe gimmick to go the way of the dinosaurs.

Movie Studios: We hear you... So you want a Jurassic Park Cinematic Universe.

 

[Ultramankrypton]

Unified brand, state of the brand, media consolidation, why should that be put above a talented creative doing something they believe in? A brand is only as valuable as the storytelling it facilitates and Matt Reeves is a shining example of when it goes right.

I just don’t understand Reeves. Why doesn’t he believe in the DCU? How does his Batman simply existing in the same world as Superman, negatively affect his movies?

He can still tell his story and build his little Bat-verse, just in a bigger sandbox. Don’t think Gunn wokekbe messed with his movies. Sure his Dick Grayson would probably be loaned out to the Teen Titans, but what’s so wrong with that? That’s how the story should be told!

 

[SwordOfMorning]

i agree that Reeves shouldn’t be “forced into” doing it but don’t you think that’s a bit selfish of him? Especially considering the state of DC brand right now.

There’s a reason why Gunn is trying to create a unified brand, because it’s a stronger media consolidation. Reeves is the outlier here and it sounds like Gunn WANTED to fold him in, originally, and had a plan for how it would work

I wouldn’t be surprised if Gunn wanted to use Dick Grayson as Robin initially before Reeves got in the way

Why should Reeves care about DC as a brand or anything outside of making his movies the best they can be? Plus: one of these two men has already made them a bunch of money and it ain’t Gunn yet.

 

[Shinobi Shaw]

Thank you.
Again, I cannot wait for the whole shared universe gimmick to go the way of the dinosaurs.

But I think you can still have both. You can have shared universes and let creatives be creative with whichever character they're tackling in that universe. Just sprinkle in some connective tissue here and there, but ultimately let the writer/director do their thing.

The only real issue is that these studio execs need to just stop playing auteur.

 

[Snow Queen]

I just don’t understand Reeves. Why doesn’t he believe in the DCU? How does his Batman simply existing in the same world as Superman, negatively affect his movies?

He can still tell his story and build his little Bat-verse, just in a bigger sandbox. Don’t think Gunn wokekbe messed with his movies

I mean, there's a lot of reasons to not believe in the DCU if you mean in the cinematic sense. This is the third go at it, under a company that seems ready to shift hands again in the near future, that would require him to conform what he wants to do to what Gunn wants to do ten years from now. Or maybe he just doesn't like it. Maybe he just doesn't like Superman. I don't know the guy. But what I do know is that he's made a number of excellent films, including his DC outing, and I think trusting talented creatives to do something they believe in is an ideal to strive for on a studio/brand level.

 

[Invader Joker]

If Gunn originally planned to incorporate Reeves into the DCU, then Brave $ The Bold was obviously a contingency plan, it wasn’t what he originally wanted to do with Batman

Even the original report didn't say anything about Gunn having a well constructed plan about incorporating Reeves into the DCU. It was just talked about as something they considered. It does not mean he was actively wishing for Reeves to say yes. It does not mean it was his preferred option and it sure as hell doesn't mean that now that they're a year and a half past that with a lot of projects already in active development and a clear universe bible already established that now he's wishing Reeves would suddenly change his mind when it'd create more problems for both of them if he did so.

You’re assuming that Gunn wanted to jump straight into the Batfamily and not properly build up to it. IMO it makes way more sense for Pattinson because he’s at a similar stage in his career as Corenswet’s Superman, there’s overlap there

I'm assuming it because his plan is a 8-10 year plan and there's only so much you can do in terms of building the whole Bat-Family within that timeframe lol. And unlike other people, I actually don't think it's a given for Gunn to stick past that if it comes to materialize. He's gonna be 68 by that point, I could see him wanting to move on to other things.

Rick Grayson is probably gonna be introduced in Batman II, and building off of that in the DCU would’ve allowed Gunn to do a proper version of the Teen Titans, with Dick as the main Robin and maybe Kory as the female lead. But now we’ll never get to see their romance told properly because Dick & Kory will be adults, and the Titans will either all have aged out of teen or they’ll be wayyy older than Raven, Beast Boy etc

I gotta be honest: I really doubt that James is gonna be crying to himself to sleep at night over that, especially when the opportunity to create his own Batman tailored to his sensibilities is a ridiculously more exciting one.

 

[Invader Joker]

The thing that baffles me the most around this Pattinson DCU discussion is the immediate assumption that it'd immediately benefit the DCU when I don't think it'd. It puts creative shackles on Gunn and Safran as well and severely limits the scope of what they can do with Batman. So no, Reeves isn't being "selfish" and I doubt James or Peter think about it that way at all. Not connecting is the best option for literally everybody involved.

 

[DKDetective]

I kinda hate this argument because literally the only character this argument works for is Batman lol. Superman Returns was a disaster, as was Man of Steel underwhelming which was originally made with those lens. Wonder Woman 84 wouldn't suddenly be a better movie if it wasn't in a connected universe, and neither would stuff like Shazam Fury of the Gods.

It isn't "DC characters that have worked best in standalones", it's literally just Batman. Pretty much every other attempt at some sort of a standalone DC film that isn't Batman related over the past 30 years has been a disaster. Its track record with standalones might be even worse than with connected universe because at least during the connected universe era they had Wonder Woman and Aquaman.

That's bull. It isn't just Batman. Superman The Movie is an all-time classic and the ****ing benchmark for the genre. Wonder Woman 2017 was a success because it had a strong-writer director who did her own thing and told a great, accessible solo adventure. It didn't need its stupid DCEU bookends.

With the isolated exceptions of Superman Returns and Wonder Woman 84, all of DC's failures have been tied to forced attempts to develop properties without strong creatives. I don't like it, but Aquaman was hit for the same reason in that you got an actually strong creative voice in James Wan to take the property and run with it.

Man of Steel failed because they couldn't get a serious director to agree to take on Goyer's mess of a script and therefore went with Hack Snyder because some suit liked him and nobody else would take the job. It is a lot easier to attract high quality talent if you let creatives take the property and develop their own vision.

 

[Tra-El]

I just don’t understand Reeves. Why doesn’t he believe in the DCU?

The Batman was conceived vigorously during a time of studio turmoil where Reeves even walked away at one point during the negotiations to helm the film once Affleck bowed out. The DCU wasn't even a sparkle in Gunn's eye when Reeves signed on to do his thing and his thing only. I would imagine he was pretty stern on how he would tell his Batman story and would have never signed on if he would have been involved in a connected universe. The Batman's train has far left the station and is nearing the checkered flag while Gunn's DCU is testing out its lights.

 

[SwordOfMorning]

In a hypothetical world where it could happen I think Battinson interacting with a Superman and having to suddenly deal with absurd, comic booky shenanigans sounds super fun. Probably not this Superman (I bet if Reeves BFF JJ was in Gunn’s shoes it might be different), but still. I just think the way that can spin out of control and affect the solo movies isn’t worth it.

Also: what if Reeves wants to fundamentally break the status quo? Reveal Bruce’s identity, kill or alter characters, whatever. It’s entirely possible the story he wants to tell is one you can’t really spin the standard Batman status quo out of.

 

[Invader Joker]

That's bull. It isn't just Batman. Superman The Movie is an all-time classic and the ****ing benchmark for the genre. Wonder Woman 2017 was a success because it had a strong-writer director who did her own thing and told a great, accessible solo adventure. It didn't need its stupid DCEU bookends.

With the isolated exceptions of Superman Returns and Wonder Woman 84, all of DC's failures have been tied to forced attempts to develop properties without strong creatives. I don't like it, but Aquaman was hit for the same reason in that you got an actually strong creative voice in James Wan to take the property and run with it.

The argument you're making is beyond baffling to me because you're listing examples of films in cinematic universes which proves you can do that stuff within cinematic universes as well. Lanterns under the hand of Lindelof, Mundy and Tom King just got greenlit. Booster Gold has a hell of a writing team. I can guarantee you those projects will be in line with what you described as well. But ultimately you can't count on every single character for every single property to get an auteur like that.

 

[Invader Joker]

In a hypothetical world where it could happen I think Battinson interacting with a Superman and having to suddenly deal with absurd, comic booky shenanigans sounds super fun. Probably not this Superman (I bet if Reeves BFF JJ was in Gunn’s shoes it might be different), but still. I just think the way that can spin out of control and affect the solo movies isn’t worth it.

Also: what if Reeves wants to fundamentally break the status quo? Reveal Bruce’s identity, kill or alter characters, whatever. It’s entirely possible the story he wants to tell is one you can’t really spin the standard Batman status quo out of.

It'd only work with a DC Universe where superheroes are either a relatively recent phenomenon or one where they started to pop up after Batman. The way Reeves set up his world it'd straight up make no sense otherwise.

 

[DKDetective]

The argument you're making is beyond baffling to me because you're listing examples of films in cinematic universes which proves you can do that stuff within cinematic universes as well. Lanterns under the hand of Lindelof, Mundy and Tom King just got greenlit. Booster Gold has a hell of a writing team. I can guarantee you those projects will be in line with what you described as well. But ultimately you can't count on every single character for every single property to get an auteur like that.

Both Wonder Woman and Aquaman were made when the DCEU had all but fallen apart and was without any centralized control. They are practically cinematic universe in name only.

 

[Invader Joker]

I just don’t understand Reeves. Why doesn’t he believe in the DCU?

It has nothing to do with believing in it or not. He's gonna produce stuff for them so I don't think he hates them. It has to do with the fact that it does not fit his universe and viceversa. The Batverse would be worse off if it was DCU. The DCU would be worse off if they had to incorporate the Batverse.

 

[SwordOfMorning]

It'd only work with a DC Universe where superheroes are either a relatively recent phenomenon or one where they started to pop up after Batman. The way Reeves set up his world it'd straight up make no sense otherwise.

I sorta disagree but I think I’m just a lot more comfortable hand waving things like that than you are. But yes anything I say about how I think Battinson in a theoretical shared universe could have been cool is not me saying I think he’d be a natural fit for the DCU.

Pattinson’s performance though tbh feels the most well suited to an ensemble though. I can imagine him playing basically any JLU scene.

 

[Invader Joker]

Both Wonder Woman and Aquaman were made when the DCEU had all but fallen apart and was without any centralized control. They are practically cinematic universe in name only.

That's such a bad cop-out man. They show you can do projects with "strong creatives" even within a connected universe. Period. And again, I'm 99% sure that's gonna be the case for the DCU too seeing how we just got a frigging Damon Lindelof Green Lantern show greenlit. Are some projects gonna have journeymen on them? Yeah, but so what?

 

[Invader Joker]

Pattinson’s performance though tbh feels the most well suited to an ensemble though. I can imagine him playing basically any JLU scene.

Pattinson is literally the only reason it's even worth imagining it. I think he'd make a lot of fun choices in trying to fit within that sort of hyper fantastical tone, and he's signalled his liking for those type of weirder more fantastical stories a lot of times. But sadly him alone is not enough to overlook everything else, so we actually are in sync here.

 

[Alien Anal]

The only way I would introduce Superman into The Batman would be from Bats hearing about a man lifting a car during an accident or some other super natural feat.

Then maybe Batman finds himself pinned underneath something and pretty much going to die when a blurred figure from Batman's perspective floats to the ground in the distance and lifts the heavy thing off of him.

He then takes off and the next day or at the end Bruce receives a knock on the door and it's journalist Clark Kent coming to interview him.

This version of Clark would be a Reacher type character, a man that has been travelling the world and making friends in all different places but keeping a low profile. He has been around for decades and just knows he can't die.

His outfit would be a something basic like a long sleeve Smallville jersey with an S on it and jeans and boots.

One idea anyway. But ultimately, just let Reeves do what he wants and not bother introducing other superheroes

 

[DKDetective]

That's such a bad cop-out man. They show you can do projects with "strong creatives" even within a connected universe. Period. And again, I'm 99% sure that's gonna be the case for the DCU too seeing how we just got a frigging Damon Lindelof Green Lantern show greenlit. Are some projects gonna have journeymen on them? Yeah, but so what?

No, they don't, kid. The whole issue with the Gunn led DCU is that like the MCU, it has strong centralized control with intended long-term story arcs, etc. How many auteurs has the MCU nagged? Not many.

The DCU is attracting some decent talent on the small screen, but it currently has nothing on the big screen. Remember your buddy, Gunn, was going to give Batman (and still officially is) to the guy who made the biggest bomb in DC history.

 

[Invader Joker]

The DCU is attracting some decent talent on the small screen, but it currently has nothing on the big screen. Remember your buddy, Gunn, was going to give Batman (and still officially is) to the guy who made the biggest bomb in DC history.

It's a good thing I firmly believe that was a PR stunt to promote The Flash, the last of every shameless PR stunt they did for that film. (No I do not think anyone at WBD actually thought The Flash was one of the best films of all time, sorry.)

And also, it has nothing on the big screen? The first person they got attached to any big projects was James Mangold on Swamp Thing, who I know did embarrass himself with Indiana Jones 5 but I mean, that is someone that'd literally never sign on to do anything on the MCU and has a solid track record outside of that. Aside from that there's only one other movie. And I'd count Gunn himself as a very, very, very, very strong singular creative.

 

[SwordOfMorning]

Muschietti is so incredibly obviously a director who would appeal to Gunn. I understand the conspiracy theory that WB was worried about The Flash and majorly big upped it (I don't entirely agree, for what it's worth, I think they're just morons) but I feel like why that movie would appeal to Gunn personally is staggeringly obvious.

 

[Lily Adler]

Muschietti is so incredibly obviously a director who would appeal to Gunn. I understand the conspiracy theory that WB was worried about The Flash and majorly big upped it (I don't entirely agree, for what it's worth, I think they're just morons) but I feel like why that movie would appeal to Gunn personally is staggeringly obvious.