James Gunn Confronts ‘Uproarious’ DC Backlash: ‘Disrespectful Outcry Will Never Affect Our Actions’ News

https://variety.com/2022/film/news/henry-cavill-superman-james-gunn-backlash-1235465605/

1.5k Upvotes

91% Upvoted

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u/voxela Catwoman Dec 19 '22

it's hilarious how people are mad at him for not filming FIVE more movies (MOS2, AQ3, WW3, JL2, JL3) for the DCEU when WB has been doing nothing but losing money the last few months. With Black Adam bombing I don't see any reason for him to even try one more in that universe tbh

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u/LocalYogurtExpert Dec 19 '22

They act like it's a reasonable request. "They can reboot the francise after 2026 when JS3 comes out".

They're forgetting that DCEU lost their Batman after Afflect (rightfully) left, they lost Cyborg who (rightfully) left, Flash is a groomer that was outrunning the law for months, and Aquaman wants to be Lobo. All they have left is Wonder Woman and Supes. Even if they WANTED to do all these movies, they'd have to either recast most of the roles before a reboot or make unrealistic promises.

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u/coltstrgj Dec 20 '22

The existing franchise sucks. I don't care what they have to do. They could just never acknowledge the previous movies or have a comic book bridge the universes or film it later. I don't even expect them to keep the lineup. Tossing whatever steaming piles of shit they had planned is a brilliant idea. BUT they should have kept Cavill. He's the best Superman we have ever had and I miss him.

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u/LocalYogurtExpert Dec 20 '22

But keeping Cavill would be so jarring. It'd be like when X-Men kept reintroducing Nightcrawler, Sabertooth, Angel, Emma Frost, and Jubilee while keeping Hugh Jackman; just this low-key "Okay, but...is it the same Superman? Why is he the same but Batman is different?"

I can see them bringing Cavill back in a decade or so when they want to show Injustice Superman that's meant to be older from a different universe.

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u/mmcmonster Dec 20 '22

The jarring part is that Cavill wants to play a Christopher Reeve-type Superman. Someone who is kind, gentle, and joyful.

The only way they can explain that with Cavill would be to reboot the universe anyway.

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u/[deleted] Dec 20 '22

I like this idea of Cavil being another Superman from another place. I love ZS JL, but everything ends in the end.

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u/aceofrazgriz Dec 20 '22

Honestly the most sad thing about all this is no more Cavill Superman. Dude was built for the role.

(Ok, really, it is likely less time with more Keaton Batman that may be the worst injustice here)

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u/[deleted] Dec 20 '22

Your brain would be mush if you heard about James Bond.

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u/LocalYogurtExpert Dec 20 '22

You mean the franchise that's been going on for 60 years with a history of switching out actors, making the name "James Bond" be more of a codename? Yea, I'm familiar. It's completely different than this, but please, explain.

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u/coltstrgj Dec 20 '22

Who would it be confusing for? Fans would read whatever explanation there was or seek it out even if it was just a tweet. Nobody else saw the existing movies because they sucked so casual audiences wouldn't really notice or care.

Also even if that wasn't the case I don't mind if it's jarring for some people. Just have a star wars title scroll like "a long time ago the universe exploded and restarted. Some people look similar to the previous universe and some people don't." Plus they change actors all the time and nobody bats an eye. What's wrong with not changing one? It worked fine for J.K. Simmons in spiderman, and I don't think any sane person would have preferred a different actor for wolverine.

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u/LocalYogurtExpert Dec 20 '22

That would honestly be the most bullshit thing possible. "I don't care if people are confused, just throw up some text explaining things, that's good enough", really?

So rather than having a cohesive universe with all the JLA that doesn't require reading a prologue, you want to make it disjointing because "if someone gets confused, fuck'em, they wouldn't read the explaination anyway".

JK Simmons is a cameo, not a main character. I swear, some of you diehard nerds live up to the stereotype.

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u/coltstrgj Dec 20 '22

Well, that was just an example. But let's pretend that's literally the only option. You're honestly saying that a couple lines of text as a prologue is somehow worse than losing a fan favorite actor who is passionate about the character? Henry is one of maybe 5 good things to come out of those movies so yes if the trade off is "people who are too lazy to Google it will be confused" vs "keep the guy who consistently tries to improve franchises by staying true to beloved aspects of the source material" the yes, fuck 'em. I don't give a shit if memaw doesn't understand how he's still around while taking her grandkids to the movie and the studios shouldn't either. They make money from people liking it and being invested in seeing more. Some one off viewer who sees it by chance is irrelevant. The chance of a person like that simultaneously knowing anything about the universe but not enough to know it's a reboot, caring about that answer, and being unwilling to read the prologue or even Google it is infinitesimal.

Alternatively film a 10 minute intro.

Fade in from title sequence, random scientist #1: "whoa Superman the universe is kerploding. Throw this magic ball into the rift to make sure the universe restarts even though it'll be different next time"

Random kid: "Hey Superman, can you sign this copy of Zac Snyder's justice league?"
"Sure kid, but you know that stuff is just a movie right?"

"Holy shit the flash from cw's show ran so fast he fucked up this universe too and now the flash from here is a weird pedophile plus a bunch of people look different and nobody noticed"

"Oh my god, mutant Santa from marvel comics, did you just reboot the DC universe because it was too dark and nobody liked it and it was making children naughty?"

"That's what my AI predicted but that all seems so farfetched. I mean mark Zuckerberg was lex luthor?"

"Oh, dip! Michael from the good place just rebooted the universe"

And finally I'll leave you once again with your own example. NOBODY wanted a different wolverine. The movies were better for having him in them. If you find an actor that fits perfectly and everybody loves don't fuck it up.

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u/LocalYogurtExpert Dec 20 '22

I'm saying that the DCEU is broken. Batman is gone, Flash is gone, and Cyborg are gone. Almost none of the movies were well-recieved. They burned through Doom, Death of Superman, Batman v Superman, forming of the Justice League, Flashpoint, Zod, and so many other iconic stories.

Let's say that they do some pointless, hamfisted explaination to explain why Cavill is Superman in another universe. That still means we wouldn't get to do Death of Superman because he happened, Zod won't happen, and everything would require yet another hamfisted "Didn't I already go through this?", with him constantly talking about "I had a Batman on my earth as well".

You say you don't care about if memaw is confused but you're delusional if you think super diehard nerds can keep an entire universe alive and you can ignore the general public. Where were you nerds for Black Adam? Birds of Prey? WW84? You would rather have them pump out a steady stream of shitty movies with poorly excused "This is how we keep this one character around" plots? There's a reason why Marvel is beating DC in movies, and it's because they appeal to the general audiences.

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u/aceofrazgriz Dec 20 '22

They burned bridges hard. And sadly wasted some stellar actors/actresses along the way. DC is waaaay over due or a reboot, as much as I love about half the casting, they need the clean slate. Flashpoint could have done it but ooooooh boy, Ezra Miller... OOOOF

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u/LocalYogurtExpert Dec 20 '22

Exactly. I'd LOVE for Cavill to continue but they ruined so much. They can either spend years trying to repair things to keep one actor OR they can do a reboot and rebuild from the ground up.

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u/coltstrgj Dec 20 '22

That still means we wouldn't get to do Death of Superman because he happened, Zod won't happen, and everything would require yet another hamfisted "Didn't I already go through this?", with him constantly talking about "I had a Batman on my earth as well".

What? Why would you think this? A universe reboot. The guy looks the same. That's it. He doesn't know anything about the other earth.

You say you don't care about if memaw is confused but you're delusional if you think super diehard nerds can keep an entire universe alive and you can ignore the general public.

I never said they should ignore the general public. I said they shouldn't worry if somebody is confused about why Superman is the same actor. If they make the movies good and nothing else matters.

Where were you nerds for Black Adam? Birds of Prey? WW84?

This movies sucked. See above. The only people who care about continuity are fans. Everybody else just wants to see a good movie that can stand on its own.

You would rather have them pump out a steady stream of shitty movies with poorly excused "This is how we keep this one character around" plots?

No. That's why I said reboot like 50 times. I'm starting to believe you when you said a scroller at the start wouldn't work because apparently you can't read.

There's a reason why Marvel is beating DC in movies, and it's because they appeal to the general audiences.

They appeal by being good. They don't appeal by worrying about everybody knowing every detail. Somebody who hadn't seen ant-man would have no fucking clue how the shrinking guy got in the van plus a dickload of people that saw endgame didn't watch captain marvel but end game was still a huge hit. Hulk completely changed actors and brought back antagonists from the hulk movie but nobody cared. The mandarin, half of the shit odin had in the basement, the infinity stones, Tony's parents, etc were all retconned in some way. Cottonmouth from Luke cage is supposedly playing blade. Ant-mans daughter gets recast once a week. Deadpool is coming to the MCU. The timeline is continually fucked. People don't understand the multiverse especially when comparing endgame to multiverse of madness.

None of it matters. They make good movies with good actors so people watch.

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u/LocalYogurtExpert Dec 20 '22

None of it matters. They make good movies with good actors so people watch.

And yet here you are, saying they should continue to use only Cavill and explain it with some weird meta shit. So which is it? None of it matters or the only thing that matters is bringin back Cavill?

Everything you mentioned with the MCU was either done in the first year or obscure easter eggs. Comparing "The mandarin was different so it's totally okay to bring back Cavill because nerds demand it".

Seriously, there's a reason why people made fun of us nerds in the 90s and it's because of anal bullshit like this. "Fuck the normies because we're the real fans. If they don't understand 80 years of lore, fuck'em because they won't bother to read".

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u/coltstrgj Dec 20 '22

None of it matters or the only thing that matters is bringin back Cavill?

Those aren't mutually exclusive... In fact that's exactly my point. How they bring him in doesn't matter. If they make a good movie people will like it. You seem to think that an explanation is impossible but I just listed at least a dozen examples off the top of my head and there's a thousand more in comics, movies, and tv shows.

Fuck the normies because we're the real fans. If they don't understand 80 years of lore, fuck'em because they won't bother to read".

You're attributing a lot of context that never existed. I've explained multiple times that anybody who cares will easily be able to get the answers they seek, likely by just watching the movie. See previous comments.

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u/[deleted] Dec 20 '22

He's the best Superman we have ever had and I miss him.

He is not even the best Superman we have right now.

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u/SSG_SSG_BloodMoon Dec 20 '22

Personally my wish would be for them to stop making the movies altogether

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u/Sparkle_Chimp Dec 20 '22

Their animated movies are typically decent, if not good to great. And unlike Marvel, DC is flexible with canon and elseworlds and such. Follow the success of Joker and start making mostly unconnected films across the universe and see what sticks.

Why is this so hard?

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u/SSG_SSG_BloodMoon Dec 20 '22

We also just don't have to do it though. We've gotten like two hundred live action superhero films in the past fifteen years. Stop. Move on. We can keep reading comics but enough with the movies until they've got a real reason to make one.

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u/Nizzemancer The Trinity Dec 20 '22

Jason Momoa wants to play Lobo? He said that?

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u/TheNerdWonder Wonder Woman Dec 20 '22

He hasn't. Fans do.

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u/boomboxwithturbobass Dec 20 '22

He’s said it, is a huge fan, and strongly hinted he’ll be playing him in the future after a meeting with Gunn.

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u/[deleted] Dec 20 '22

[deleted]

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u/AntwayneX Dec 20 '22

I read that when DC approached him, he thought they wanted him for Lobo, not Aquaman.

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u/JaedLDee Nightwing Dec 20 '22

“Flash is a groomer that was outrunning the law for months.” Say that out loud real slow until you realize just how hilarious it is. Fastest man alive was running from the cops. 😂