What was planned for Warner Bros. Discovery’s DCEU franchise and what has happened are two very different things. That has been further emphasized by reports that a Crisis on Infinite Earths storyline was considered to attempt to reset the IP after things became messy following the chaos surrounding the original release of Justice League and what has followed it. Justice League was almost a franchise killer when it was released in 2017, but the subsequent Aquaman movie managed to turn things around by taking over $1 billion at the box office. However, things have been anything other than a roaring success since, and that almost led to DC Films' head Walter Hamada causing a shake-up.
For some time now, there have been rumors that plans were being discussed to completely reset the DCEU and start the franchise from scratch. While this still seems to be a possibility following the release of The Flash next year, at least in a soft reboot way, The Hollywood Reporter has revealed that Hamada was planning on bringing the Crisis on Infinite Earths storyline to the DCEU in order to get the franchise back on a level footing to try and turn around the uncertain fortunes of what should be the studio’s biggest money spinner.
The report suggests that as well as adapting the Crisis on Infinite Earths story, which has previously been used in The CW’s Arrowverse, Hamada also had several plans to bring the Secret Six into the DCEU universe, as well as pushing ahead with Supergirl, Green Lantern Corps, Static Shock and J.J. Abrams’ Superman reboot. With the recent spate of cancelations and realignment of DC Films’ future by Warner Bros. Discovery, it still looks like it will be some time before we truly know what the plan for the DCEU now is.
Warner Bros. Discovery’s DCEU Plan is Unclear
David Zaslav has laid out some sketchy plans for the DCEU’s long-term future, revealing in the last week that the franchise will be now focusing on movies for cinema and not streaming, and a ten-year plan, similar to the one Marvel Studios has followed to make the MCU into the success the DCEU could have been. However, there is still a lot of uncertainty around exactly what the plan for the franchise is.
The cancelation of Batgirl was unexpected and almost unbelievable when news broke of the film’s demise, but what has made it even more peculiar is that other movies such as Black Canary are allegedly still going ahead along with the Green Lantern Corps series and James Gunn’s DC projects such as Peacemaker season 2, but other previously announced projects like Strange Adventures have been canceled, and some like Supergirl may be going the same way.
For now, all that seems to be certain is that Black Adam, Shazam! Fury of the Gods, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom and The Flash will all be released as planned, even with Erza Miller’s personal life continuing to put The Flash’s success in jeopardy. Where the franchise goes beyond that is something that we will seemingly have to wait a little longer to find out with any certainty.