Man of Steel Writer thought DC was “crazy” for building their own MCU

❘ Published: 2023-09-23T21:05:24

Warner Bros.

Man of Steel writer thought the idea of DC building their own universe to rival the Marvel Cinematic Universe was “crazy.”

When it comes to superhero universes, it’s pretty safe to say Marvel has dominated the genre since Iron Man first debuted in 2008.

However, that’s not to say that their main contemporary — DC Comics — hasn’t tried to create a universe of their own with various team up and solo movies, but it hasn’t reached the same level of prominence that Marvel has achieved.

And it seems like one of DC’s film writers believes that the studio never should have attempted to create a DC Universe as it was a “crazy” thought.

Man of Steel writer thinks DC Universe is a “crazy” idea

David S. Goyer, Man of Steel’s screenwriter, went onto Joshua Horowitz’s Happy Sad Confused podcast, where he agreed with the idea that DC should’ve produced a standalone Superman movie with Henry Cavill instead of trying to use it to create a cinematic universe with Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.

“I know the pressure we were getting from Warner Bros., which was, ‘We need our MCU! We need our MCU!’ And I was like let’s not run before we walk,” Goyer explained, “The other thing that was difficult at the time was there was this revolving door of executives at Warner Bros. and DC. Every 18 months someone new would come in. We were just getting whiplash. Every new person was like, ‘We’re going to go bigger!’”

Goyer went on to say, “I remember at one point the person running Warner Bros. at the time had this release that pitched the next 20 movies over the next 10 years. But none of them had been written yet! It was crazy how much architecture was being built on air… This is not how you build a house.”

Goyer wrote not only Man of Steel, but the follow-up team up film Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, which brought together Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman with brief cameos from The Flash, Aquaman, and Cyborg.

The original idea was to have all six of the characters team up in a large scale film to rival The Avengers and solidify a live-action Justice League.

However, that dream never truly came to be as Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice received poor ratings, and the eventual 2017 Justice League film was plagued with production issues with two different cuts of the film being released under two directors.

DC Studios is now under new management with the likes of James Gunn and Peter Safran taking the reigns, so only time will tell if they’ll manage to create a Marvel-like universe.

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