Arrow Why is WB afraid of a seperate universe?

[Lighthouse]

I haven't checked to see if there is another thread on this, but I, from the day Superman Returns came out, never understood why WB, or Christopher Nolan were so afraid of a separate DC universe between TV and films. It's not inherent but I believe audiences can discern between the two. If Batman showed up in Smallville(a show I retrospectively hate by the way) no one would give a crap! The box office would have remained the same. Anyone else have opinions on this?

 

[Mike Murdock]

I think they feel there's better story potential for a separate universe. Arrow would have been a far different place had General Zod just threatened the entire world. Why did Superman not help stop Slade's Army? What if they have an idea how to use a character that's already been used in the other medium differently? While there are plenty of story opportunities for a shared universe (Agents of SHIELD helped show that), there are also limitations.

I don't think they're afraid of a shared universe so much as prefer not to have one.

 

[erehwon0]

I still don't get why people cannot get the simple concept of what's best for both the cinematic universe and tv universe is to keep them apart.

Keeping them separate gets rid of the crutch story wise. Both will be free of referencing one or the other. This almost works for the Marvel Universe because they have three movies a year, but with DC it's another story.

And how much of the movie going audience will watch the TV shows? 10% or less? So you want the movies to reference only 10% audience would know? That's impossible. Movies will have a wider reach but a shorter time to tell a story. Having smooth storytelling between both mediums is not impossible but certainly highly problematic. It probably will help if there is a group of writers for both. But that would be unlikely.

And having 2 version of the same character for both mediums won't be a problem. Unless you're either really young, really a massive fan of the TV shows or let's face it a little slow on the uptake, it won't be a problem. I'm sure they'll make both characters quite distinct from one another!

 

[kguillou]

I don't really understand the question of the thread. WB IS using separate universes. It's a shared universe they don't want to use and with good reason. With separate universes there are no rules or boundaries for shows like Arrow, Flash and Gotham. Obviously, we're probably never going to see characters like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman in those shows, but pretty much any other DC character is fair game. I wouldn't be surprised if we get Hal Jordan/Green Lantern in season 2 of Flash. I think separate universes is really the best way to handle these properties.

 

[Hush]

I don't think they're since they are currently doing it. I think having separate universes hurts the brand though, that's a certainty. The Arrowverse would be served a great deal if we knew Superman and Batman can show up, not that they have to but that they could, it makes me as a fan just shake my head because I know that for the foreseeable future that won't happen and it just makes Warners look dumb.

 

[Destructus86]

I'm glad they are keeping the films separate from the show...because honestly, I think the new movie is going to suck. Arrow and it would seem Flash are doing better justice to the source material.

 

[Grommers]

I don't really understand the question of the thread. WB IS using separate universes. It's a shared universe they don't want to use and with good reason. With separate universes there are no rules or boundaries for shows like Arrow, Flash and Gotham. Obviously, we're probably never going to see characters like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman in those shows, but pretty much any other DC character is fair game. I wouldn't be surprised if we get Hal Jordan/Green Lantern in season 2 of Flash. I think separate universes is really the best way to handle these properties.

I think he's referring too a scenario like this -

Henry Cavill is superman - in the movies.

Whose to say we couldn't have someone else play superman in arrow in a seperate universe outside of man of steel. e.g. they aren't the same superman.

And I have a hard time, because I don't want to see a billion batmans or supermans in every single sort of media. I like having the one or two, however it is frustrating knowing we don't see arrow's interpretation of batman or anything.

 

[DrCosmic]

No one wants two competing continuities. Disney isn't going to come out with three different Cap films that are in three different unrelated continuities, different actors, plots, worlds, tones, etc. A separate continuity with the same character provides competition between your own stuff, on top of outside competition. People who like Cap in general may see one Cap and be disappointed and decide not to see the other ones. Or they may see one and really like it and consider it better than the others, and then you see a sort of controversey between who's the true Cap, Chris Evans' Cap, or Aaron Eckhart's Cap? Or Chris Pine's Cap? Even those who don't get into the controversey may be satisfied with one and not feel a need to go see more Cap that's different from the one they like.

It's called 'Cannibalizing your audience' in marketing. The only way around it is if the second continuity is marketed towards a different audience (comic geeks, kids who watch cartoons, die hard Smallville fans). It's not that audiences can't discern between the two, audiences won't love the two equally.

DC doesn't want to do that with any of their characters either. They won't do it on TV either because it leads to the same problem, though to a lesser degree because of the smaller audience, but you still have the cannibalization problem. The last thing DC needs is its fans arguing whether Ian Somerhalder or Ben Affleck is the "true" Batman. So they avoid that altogether and just use one version of a character at a time, for the most part.

The twist is that DC has separate continuities so you have the CW-verse, where Superman/Batman/Wonder Woman more or less don't exist and the focus is on what are usually B (And C?) level heroes. I think that's cool. And honestly, you really don't want Superman and Batman coming in and being more cool and important and iconic than Arrow and Flash, that'd kinda suck.

 

[kguillou]

Well, to be honest, I think its more of a Hollywood thing. Hollywood likes to iconize their stars people in general prefer to have one person being the definitive version of their favorite character. I mean let's imagine for second that the Agents of Shield tv show was in separate universe from the MCU films. Let's say in this Agents of Shield show we had a different version of Captain America and Nick Fury in recurring roles rather than Sam Jackson and Chris Evans. At that point it sort of becomes a weird competition as to who is the better more definitive version of character, the movie version or the tv version. Imagine if right after CA:TWS came out and got all that critical acclaim and then the very next week on AoS we saw Captain America show up in a cameo role who is completely different than the one we saw in the movie. Contrary to popular belief, I think it would indeed throw a lot of people off and like I said create a sort of weird competition between the different actors playing the same character.

Now note that I said THE SAME CHARACTER. I don't mean something like Tom Welling playing a young Clark while Brandon Routh plays the grown up Superman. I'm talking the SAME EXACT CHARACTER. We're about to have a kid version of Bruce Wayne and an adult Bruce Wayne on screen at the same time and thats OK because your exploring two different eras of the same character. But if Gotham was a show about an adult, fully formed Batman running around fighting crime while in BvS we get the same adult fully formed Batman played by a different actor, like I said, it creates conflict and an endless nonsensical debate of "Who is the better Batman?"

Not to mention the very real possibility of the movie version of said character overshadowing the television version. This is what I'm worried about with The Flash. People really love Grant Gustin as Barry Allen/ The Flash and I think he has a bright future playing the character. But wouldn't he be rendered obsolete if they cast someone else entirely as Barry Allen/ Flash in the big budget movies at the same time Gustin's show is running? Especially if people somehow end up liking the movie version better? But the thing is, Justice League is coming and WB is going to have to make a very important decision on how they're going to handle the Flash's appearance in that movie. They can't have two different Barry Allens at the same time.

Just my two cents on the matter.

Edit. Dr Cosmic and I posted our posts at the same time and he made the same exact point as me. Thank you for pointing this out as well, Cosmic.

 

[Roadkill]

Adding more confusion for the casual viewer is the likely existence of multiple DC TV universes. I'm assuming unless someone has heard information to the contrary that non-CW DC shows like Gotham and Constantine are doing there own thing. While unlikely, it would be possible say for Dr. Fate to show up on both Constantine and an Arrowverse show and have no connection with each other. Or perhaps a younger version of Slade Wilson shows up in Gotham with no reference to his Arrow origin story. And of course, none of these will have anything to do with the DC cinematic universe so technically you could have a third variant of Dr. Fate or Deathstroke if the various writing teams don't make an effort to weave around each other.

 

[bes628]

I want a connected universe simply for the fact, that most of the roles they have cast on TV have already been filled pretty well.

It would also feel like a waste of time to me, as far as watching one of the mediums.



Manu Bennett as Deathstroke vs Batman in a Zack Snyder led film is everything I can dream of.

 

[kguillou]

Heck, I wanna see Amell's Arrow vs Batman. I think he would be a very formidable opponent against the dark knight.

 

[ZIPBAGS]

I might be in the minority. But, I think its ridiculous not to have the Arrowverse in the movieverse. Doesn't mean that Supes or Bats have to help in an episode. Even in Marvel it doesn't happen. In Iron Man 3 the president is kidnapped and Tony goes in by himself without the armor to try to save him. Where is Captain America or any other Avenger to help.

I am not saying Green Arrow has to be in the movies. But, you can mention it events in both mediums.

 

[Roadkill]

Manu Bennett as Deathstroke vs Batman in a Zack Snyder led film is everything I can dream of.

This. I think Manu Bennett with movie grade fight choreography and FX would absolutely kill it as Deathstroke in a DC movie.

 

[DrCosmic]

Not to mention the very real possibility of the movie version of said character overshadowing the television version. This is what I'm worried about with The Flash. People really love Grant Gustin as Barry Allen/ The Flash and I think he has a bright future playing the character. But wouldn't he be rendered obsolete if they cast someone else entirely as Barry Allen/ Flash in the big budget movies at the same time Gustin's show is running? Especially if people somehow end up liking the movie version better? But the thing is, Justice League is coming and WB is going to have to make a very important decision on how they're going to handle the Flash's appearance in that movie. They can't have two different Barry Allens at the same time.

Just my two cents on the matter.

Edit. Dr Cosmic and I posted our posts at the same time and he made the same exact point as me. Thank you for pointing this out as well, Cosmic.

Indeed and agreed. It will be interesting to see how they handle Barry Allen in the Flash/GL film.

I might be in the minority. But, I think its ridiculous not to have the Arrowverse in the movieverse. Doesn't mean that Supes or Bats have to help in an episode. Even in Marvel it doesn't happen. In Iron Man 3 the president is kidnapped and Tony goes in by himself without the armor to try to save him. Where is Captain America or any other Avenger to help.

I am not saying Green Arrow has to be in the movies. But, you can mention it events in both mediums.

This. I think Manu Bennett with movie grade fight choreography and FX would absolutely kill it as Deathstroke in a DC movie.

The other problem you guys are getting into is creative control. If The Arrowverse and Movieverse are the same, then that means Goyer has to have Slade be a product of the island, with Billy Wintergreen a peer, and Slade has to have an obsession with Ollie Queen, and have lost the Mirakuru, and it has to be Mirakuru, and can't tie into something toatally different that they're doing. Goyer and Snyder can't just use Deathstroke however they want, because they have to adhere to Berlanti's creative decisions.

This also goes for world-spanning problems. The Movieverse can't tell a story where metahumans come from X, because Flash already established the Molecular Accelerator incident bringing all these X elements into the universe. Oh, and what if the movies want to do a storyline where Parademons or White Martians invade the whole world killing a bunch of folk... well, now Arrow and Flash have to show or at least talk about that, even if it doesn't fit their storyline.

This is on top of the Movieverse might just want to have different (better?) actors as Flash and Green Arrow, and may not work well or market well with Armell and Gustin... or maybe the Arrowverse may want to have Green Lantern guest star, but can't pay the fees for an appearance by Josh Hartnett or whoever.

Marvel gets around this by giving full control of everything to Feige and giving strict guidelines to everyone in that universe what they can and cannot do. Agents of SHIELD gets a very limited stretch of things to play with and then they get told 'hey, here's what's going on with the universe, so you have to do this storyline now.'

I wouldn't want that for Arrow or Flash. It's better for them especially if they stay independent father than having Goyer and Snyder come and tell Berlanti what they can and can't do since they only have 4 million viewers and are only pulling in so much money.

 

[king666]

I REALLY like the idea of a "B-list" DCU.

So far:

Spoiler

Green Arrow
Deathstroke
Merlyn
Huntress
Count Vertigo
Black Canary
Ra's Al Ghul
The Flash
Vibe
Killer Frost
Katana
Bronze Tiger
Deadshot
Captain Cold
China White
Amanda Waller

ARGUS, The HIVE, League of Assassins, STAR Labs, Stagg Industries, Queen Consolidated, Kord Enterprises, [BLACKOUT]Waynetech[/BLACKOUT].

It's getting bigger.

 

[kguillou]

Indeed and agreed. It will be interesting to see how they handle Barry Allen in the Flash/GL film.





The other problem you guys are getting into is creative control. If The Arrowverse and Movieverse are the same, then that means Goyer has to have Slade be a product of the island, with Billy Wintergreen a peer, and Slade has to have an obsession with Ollie Queen, and have lost the Mirakuru, and it has to be Mirakuru, and can't tie into something toatally different that they're doing. Goyer and Snyder can't just use Deathstroke however they want, because they have to adhere to Berlanti's creative decisions.

This also goes for world-spanning problems. The Movieverse can't tell a story where metahumans come from X, because Flash already established the Molecular Accelerator incident bringing all these X elements into the universe. Oh, and what if the movies want to do a storyline where Parademons or White Martians invade the whole world killing a bunch of folk... well, now Arrow and Flash have to show or at least talk about that, even if it doesn't fit their storyline.

This is on top of the Movieverse might just want to have different (better?) actors as Flash and Green Arrow, and may not work well or market well with Armell and Gustin... or maybe the Arrowverse may want to have Green Lantern guest star, but can't pay the fees for an appearance by Josh Hartnett or whoever.

Marvel gets around this by giving full control of everything to Feige and giving strict guidelines to everyone in that universe what they can and cannot do. Agents of SHIELD gets a very limited stretch of things to play with and then they get told 'hey, here's what's going on with the universe, so you have to do this storyline now.'

I wouldn't want that for Arrow or Flash. It's better for them especially if they stay independent father than having Goyer and Snyder come and tell Berlanti what they can and can't do since they only have 4 million viewers and are only pulling in so much money.

Agreed, man. And you know what? Eventhough fanboys won't admit it, the moment they let a heavy hitter like Batman and Superman pop up in Arrow or Flash, people are gonna keep asking "When's Batman gonna show up again?! Where was he during the League of Assassin invasion in Starling City?? Where was Superman when Captain Cold turned Central City into a popsicle?!"

This is PRECISELY the reason why the Gotham tv show is formatted the way it is. They know that they can't have a tv show where Batman pops up occasionally because that's all people will ask for and won't give the show's actual characters a fair chance to shine. Leave Bats, Supes and Wonder Woman to the movies. There's plenty of DC characters to mine for television. Smallville proved that you can still have a "Justice League" with other DC characters.

 

[Roadkill]

Indeed and agreed. It will be interesting to see how they handle Barry Allen in the Flash/GL film.





The other problem you guys are getting into is creative control. If The Arrowverse and Movieverse are the same, then that means Goyer has to have Slade be a product of the island, with Billy Wintergreen a peer, and Slade has to have an obsession with Ollie Queen, and have lost the Mirakuru, and it has to be Mirakuru, and can't tie into something toatally different that they're doing. Goyer and Snyder can't just use Deathstroke however they want, because they have to adhere to Berlanti's creative decisions.

This also goes for world-spanning problems. The Movieverse can't tell a story where metahumans come from X, because Flash already established the Molecular Accelerator incident bringing all these X elements into the universe. Oh, and what if the movies want to do a storyline where Parademons or White Martians invade the whole world killing a bunch of folk... well, now Arrow and Flash have to show or at least talk about that, even if it doesn't fit their storyline.

This is on top of the Movieverse might just want to have different (better?) actors as Flash and Green Arrow, and may not work well or market well with Armell and Gustin... or maybe the Arrowverse may want to have Green Lantern guest star, but can't pay the fees for an appearance by Josh Hartnett or whoever.

Marvel gets around this by giving full control of everything to Feige and giving strict guidelines to everyone in that universe what they can and cannot do. Agents of SHIELD gets a very limited stretch of things to play with and then they get told 'hey, here's what's going on with the universe, so you have to do this storyline now.'

I wouldn't want that for Arrow or Flash. It's better for them especially if they stay independent father than having Goyer and Snyder come and tell Berlanti what they can and can't do since they only have 4 million viewers and are only pulling in so much money.

I actually pretty much agree with all of this. My comment about wanting to see Manu Bennett reprise his role as Deathstroke in a movie was more in the nature of fanboy wishfullfillment. As you allude to, that ship has already sailed. An integrated movie/TV DCU would have to have been planned from the get go to have any hope of maintaining continuity and would be all but impossible in the current circumstance of having DC properties broadcast on different networks. As I mentioned in another post above, we are about to have at least four separate DC universes with their own continuities disconnected from the others.

 

[DarKush]

Well, to be honest, I think its more of a Hollywood thing. Hollywood likes to iconize their stars people in general prefer to have one person being the definitive version of their favorite character. I mean let's imagine for second that the Agents of Shield tv show was in separate universe from the MCU films. Let's say in this Agents of Shield show we had a different version of Captain America and Nick Fury in recurring roles rather than Sam Jackson and Chris Evans. At that point it sort of becomes a weird competition as to who is the better more definitive version of character, the movie version or the tv version. Imagine if right after CA:TWS came out and got all that critical acclaim and then the very next week on AoS we saw Captain America show up in a cameo role who is completely different than the one we saw in the movie. Contrary to popular belief, I think it would indeed throw a lot of people off and like I said create a sort of weird competition between the different actors playing the same character.

Now note that I said THE SAME CHARACTER. I don't mean something like Tom Welling playing a young Clark while Brandon Routh plays the grown up Superman. I'm talking the SAME EXACT CHARACTER. We're about to have a kid version of Bruce Wayne and an adult Bruce Wayne on screen at the same time and thats OK because your exploring two different eras of the same character. But if Gotham was a show about an adult, fully formed Batman running around fighting crime while in BvS we get the same adult fully formed Batman played by a different actor, like I said, it creates conflict and an endless nonsensical debate of "Who is the better Batman?"

Not to mention the very real possibility of the movie version of said character overshadowing the television version. This is what I'm worried about with The Flash. People really love Grant Gustin as Barry Allen/ The Flash and I think he has a bright future playing the character. But wouldn't he be rendered obsolete if they cast someone else entirely as Barry Allen/ Flash in the big budget movies at the same time Gustin's show is running? Especially if people somehow end up liking the movie version better? But the thing is, Justice League is coming and WB is going to have to make a very important decision on how they're going to handle the Flash's appearance in that movie. They can't have two different Barry Allens at the same time.

Just my two cents on the matter.

Edit. Dr Cosmic and I posted our posts at the same time and he made the same exact point as me. Thank you for pointing this out as well, Cosmic.

To your Flash concern, there's always Jay Garrick, Wally West, and Bart Allen to consider. Overall I think that you and Dr. Cosmic make some good points. Unfortunate though that we'll never see a version of Batman on Arrow. It could be nice to get a mention of Wayne Industries or Lexcorp on Arrow. I hope that Nightwing can be used.

 

[Herolee10]

Honestly, I think it's best for both entities to remain separate from each other.

Neither "Arrow" or "Flash" were created with the intent of being involved with the Cinematic universe. To "shove" both of those shows into the DCU would feel very forced imho.

Plus, there's the fact that with characters like the Flash....given the CW Budget and such, the difference in quality when it comes to producing his effects on television and on film would be very noticeable imho.

Not to mention, I'm sure Warner Bros and others would prefer casting a lot of the major DC roles (heroes and villains) with very big names, the kind of which you wouldn't get to see on the television series.

I'm pretty sure that the Cinematic universe can find a much better actress to play Amanda Waller for example and I think Warner Bros and those involved would prefer getting a great film star for the role of Ra's, who's most likely going to appear in Arrow at some point, portrayed by someone less famous.

 

[ap38]

Big fan of Arrow and liking the look of the new Flash so would like to see them continue in DC media.

Green Lantern look a little out of place but it could work. Despite being a bad film, Ryan Reynolds should be given the chance to make a sequel to see if it's worthy of joining the Snyder universe....

 

[greenlantern248]

I don't really understand the question of the thread. WB IS using separate universes. It's a shared universe they don't want to use and with good reason. With separate universes there are no rules or boundaries for shows like Arrow, Flash and Gotham. Obviously, we're probably never going to see characters like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman in those shows, but pretty much any other DC character is fair game. I wouldn't be surprised if we get Hal Jordan/Green Lantern in season 2 of Flash. I think separate universes is really the best way to handle these properties.

Well its been revealed that the embargoes for characters has been extended not just for Bats, Super and WW but for Ted Kord as well. So it makes me really wonder about the Flash?

 

[ap38]

Found a decent picture of Flash

 

[Mike Murdock]

Well its been revealed that the embargoes for characters has been extended not just for Bats, Super and WW but for Ted Kord as well. So it makes me really wonder about the Flash?

Is the Flash going to be in the movie? My assumption is he is not.

Ted Kord caught me completely by surprise. There must be an interest in having in the movie for some reason if they can't use him in the show, but he seemed an ideal TV character rather than movie character.

 

[Fincher]

I suppose it's possible that a Ted Kord TV show is in development, one that wouldn't mesh well with how Arrow wanted to use him. Other than that and Justice League, I can't imagine what WB would be holding onto him for.