Buckle up DC fans; can be the end of the Snyderverse as we know it.
DC Studios has been in the midst of a major shakeup for months now, as new leadership at Warner Bros. looks to change the future of DC content. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the studio could be undergoing another drastic change: the final closure of the Snyderverse.
This week, the studio’s new heads, James Gunn and Peter Safran, will outline their ten-year plan to Warner Bros. Discovery boss David Zaslav. His plan, which is still in flux, will serve as a blueprint for what DC will be, possibly ushering in an entirely new vision for the franchise. What will that new vision look like? We don’t really know, but it looks like it won’t include Wonder Woman 3. The movie will reportedly not go ahead under Gunn and Safran’s DC.
Wonder Woman’s move signals the possibility of a complete shutdown of Zack Snyder’s Snyderverse. That means DC could be without all the heroes that Snyder included in his Justice League movie. No more Iron Man 2 with Henry Cavill, and no more Aquaman with Jason Momoa.
Both Cavill’s Superman and Momoa’s Aquaman are already known to make cameo appearances in the upcoming The Flash movie, which hits theaters on June 16, 2023. Cavill is said to have filmed his cameo in September, but The Hollywood Reporter claims that there is a debate within the studio about whether or not to keep the cameo; if your inclusion promises something that the studio has no plans to deliver on, it won’t be seen by the public.
The decision is already a bit precarious, as Cavill recently made his triumphant return to screens as Superman in Black Adam back in October. Cavill himself confirmed that he would play Superman again. At the time, it was guaranteed that he would return for a sequel; now, apparently, it is in the air.
Gunn has responded with a lengthy thread in which he confirms that “some of that is true” but also says that “some of that is half true, some of that is not true, and some of that I haven’t decided yet whether it’s true or not.” Here is the full statement from him:
As for the story that appeared yesterday in The Hollywood Reporter, part of it is true, part of it is half true, part of it is not true, and part of it we still haven’t decided if it’s true or not. While this first month in DC has been fruitful, building the next ten years of history takes time, and we’re still getting started. Peter and I chose to run DC Studios knowing that we were arriving at a fractious environment, both in the stories being told and in the audiences themselves, and that there would be an inevitable transition period as we moved forward in telling a cohesive story on film. , television, animation and video games.
But in the end, the drawbacks of that transition period were dwarfed by the creative possibilities and the opportunity to build on what has worked at DC thus far and help rectify what hasn’t. We know we’re not going to please everyone every step of the way, but we can promise that everything we do is in service of the DC STORY and CHARACTERS we know you love and have loved all our lives.
As for more answers on the future of the DCU, I will unfortunately have to ask you to wait. We are giving these characters and their stories the time and attention they deserve, and we ourselves still have many more questions to ask and answer.
So. As for the story yesterday in the Hollywood Reporter, some of it is true, some of it is half-true, some of it is not true, & some of it we haven’t decided yet whether it’s true or not.
— James Gunn (@JamesGunn) December 8, 2022
Although the plans are still up in the air, there are several possibilities, such as Momoa reincarnating another DC character. Meanwhile, Black Adam 2 may not happen after its lackluster theatrical release.
In any case, the Snyderverse has been the backbone of DC for years now, and Zack Snyder has explosive fan support. Thanks to the outpouring of love for Snyder and his creative vision, Warners allowed the four-hour-long Zack Snyder’s Justice League to hit HBO Max. But that was under another direction.
What will happen to the Snyderverse now that Zaslav is in charge of Warner? How does Snyder fit into Gunn and Safran’s master plan? Will we see these heroes again? Right now, nobody knows.
