DC Cinematic Universe: Re-Reboot in Progress

[Jaxom 1974]

18 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

DC has mostly gotten Batman right, it's the other stuff that's more miss than hit. I just finished Superman For All Seasons and am just beginning All-Star Superman and it's honestly better than any Superman movie I recall seeing. 

 

For the record, All-Star Superman is an excellent take, as I recall... however All-Star Batman is one of the worst stories ever committed to paper...

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

4 hours ago, Tywin et al. said:

What has DC done that's generated much energy these days? I've been getting into their comics over the last year and Idk why they can't make some better shit.

Outside of Batman, not much. Like I said before, Super Pets wasn't trending on google or twitter 10 days before it hit theaters, and it's a great IP with a pretty stacked cast. That movie is probably going to need $200-$250 million world wide to break even and that's looking pretty questionable right now. For some insane reason, I visited Rotten Tomatoes and looked through the review blurbs. With a few exceptions, the positive reviews were all middling and the negative reviews were kind of brutal.

All the Batgirl and Blue Beetle news seems to fall down the memory hole within a day. And the sense I'm getting is that neither Shazam 2 or Black Adam are generating much hype. I could be wrong. The Rock's star power will likely carry Back Adam more than love or recognition of the character. But I'd be very worried for Shazam 2; given that it opens after a year of superhero content and a week after what is likely to be the highest grossing film of the year. 

ETA: the one recent thing that stands out most to me in terms of generating buzz were reports that Henry Cavill was going to show up at Comic-Con. Take that for what it's worth. 

3 hours ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

Conversely, no one was talking about this film (most DC projects in general) was there ever any indication that there was issues with the Batgirl movie?  

DC just can't find people who can do their material justice...no pun intended...

This is not new. They screwed up Batman in the '90's. WB was trying to get a superman reboot off the ground since they got the rights back from Cannon films in the early '90's. McG and JJ Abrams were both attached at one point, with one McG project getting *that close* to starting production when it was cancelled.  Ryan Reynolds' Green Lantern film was in development for 15 years, and was going to star Jack Black at one point. Plus look at the dozen or so projects they've announced in the last decade that never saw the light of day. This is a huge topic.

3 hours ago, Rhom said:

I never got around to watching the Justice League… but the only reason I want to watch Flash is to see Keaton as Batman again.

That's the thing that turned me off it. I loved the two Burton/Keaton films. I still love them. Batman Returns blew me away when I first saw it. But Keatons return is an expression of nostalgia in CBM's that just rubs me wrong. It's yet another thing that suggests to me the genre is creatively tapped out...

...ETA...

And this is the endgame.  "We demand shitty movies." I'm not commenting on the reports about the film being good or bad or whatever, but "we don't care if it sucks just give us content."; yeah, I'm out. 

Also, I'm not a corporate so-and-so, but if you're a studio trying to build a streaming service, you don't want that service to be seen as, "the place where one dumps things". The CW is where one does the dumping.  

 

[sifth]

So are they going to cancel the Flash movie? Miller is looking more and more like a pedo these days. Heck he might still be on the run from the law, I've not heard about any major updates from him, since early July.

[Jaxom 1974]

Yet the DC animated department is usually great...

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

23 minutes ago, sifth said:

So are they going to cancel the Flash movie? Miller is looking more and more like a pedo these days. Heck he might still be on the run from the law, I've not heard about any major updates from him, since early July.

The most recent thing I heard about him was a police report that proves at least some of the stuff that was reported about him in the press was bullshit. Truthfully there was so much I got confused by it all. 

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

25 minutes ago, sifth said:

So are they going to cancel the Flash movie? Miller is looking more and more like a pedo these days. Heck he might still be on the run from the law, I've not heard about any major updates from him, since early July.

I just spoke with my step-brother who works in this specific part of the industry and he thinks it will eventually be released. That's all I will say about what he said, and it entirely hinges on if Miller can fix his image, but so much money has been sunk into that project that they need to try to recoup some of those losses. 

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

1 hour ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

Yet the DC animated department is usually great...

If I was retroactively elected Emperor of the universe, I'd use my time machine to go back and re-cast the super pets movie with the voice actors from Justice League unlimited. That would have generated buzz. 

No offense to the other actors who have voiced those roles over the years, or the A listers they cast in the film, but there is only one animated Batman: Kevin Conroy. There is only one animated Superman, Wonder Woman, etc.

Maybe I'm showing my age, but this isn't a nostalgia trip. Those are the voices I have seared in my brain when I think of those characters. Anyone else just sounds wrong.

That said, Peter Weller for TDKR was an inspired choice. I also really liked the voice cast for Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths and Justice League: The New Frontier. 

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

 

[Heartofice]

Cancelling the Batgirl movie is pretty hilarious, it seems like the studio is going to take it as a tax write down to offset the massive overshoot on the budget. If the Batgirl costume I saw is anything to go by, never releasing it seems a good idea.. but the question is could it actually be worse than the Batwoman tv show, and how much did that crapfest's lack of success influence the decision. 

2 hours ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

Maybe I'm showing my age, but this isn't a nostalgia trip. Those are the voices I have seared in my brain when I think of those characters. Anyone else just sounds wrong.

That said, Peter Weller for TDKR was an inspired choice. I also really liked the voice cast for Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths and Justice League: The New Frontier. 

I haven't really kept up with the DC animated outings for a few years, but certainly there was a period where everything they did was absolute gold. Sure they were mostly adapting classic stories like Flashpoint and All Star Superman which helped. I tuned out when they seemed to just be throwing out as much content as possible, of varying quality. I quite liked Dark Night Returns, it was.. ok. Killing Joke however is an absolute travesty, it still blows my mind how they managed to screw that up so badly. Add in some pretty mediocre outings like Batman vs Robin and I just don't have much enthusiasm for it any more. 

But yes, Kevin Conroy will always be Batman.

[Takiedevushkikakzvezdy]

On 7/21/2022 at 3:11 PM, Rhom said:

Kinda makes me wonder what the larger implications are for this.  If bots drove (or at least fanned the flames of) the entire Snyder Cut campaign... something that was essentially inconsequential in the big picture.

I'm sure (or would like to hope) that WarnerMedia used other sources than Twitter to see how much demand there was before deciding to release the Snyder Cut.

[Werthead]

2 hours ago, Takiedevushkikakzvezdy said:

I'm sure (or would like to hope) that WarnerMedia used other sources than Twitter to see how much demand there was before deciding to release the Snyder Cut.

Given that it didn't really do that well on HBO Max, even after some surprisingly positive reviews (although most of them were more like, "well the theatrical release was shit, and this is somewhat less shit but also twice as long, so go figure,"), I'm actually really not sure about this.

[sifth]

7 hours ago, Jaxom 1974 said:

Yet the DC animated department is usually great...

Yea, Young Justice season 4 was amazing.

[DaveSumm]

6 hours ago, Deadlines? What Deadlines? said:

There is only one animated Superman

When I went from Superman: The Animated Series to Justice League, I was gutted that Tim Daly didn’t still voice him anymore. But I know the new guy had fans to. Tim Daly was just perfect as both Clark and Superman for me.

[Myrddin]

My question is: Was the test screening of Batgirl Justice League bad, Birds of Prey bad, WW84 bad, or Catwoman bad?

FFS I didn't plan that list to be all female-led movies, but they really can't seem to get female superhero movies right.

How hard is it really???

 

[Rhom]

27 minutes ago, Myrddin said:

My question is: Was the test screening of Batgirl Justice League bad, Birds of Prey bad, WW84 bad, or Catwoman bad?

FFS I didn't plan that list to be all female-led movies, but they really can't seem to get female superhero movies right.

How hard is it really???

 

Oh there's always Elektra...

[Heartofice]

34 minutes ago, Myrddin said:

My question is: Was the test screening of Batgirl Justice League bad, Birds of Prey bad, WW84 bad, or Catwoman bad?

FFS I didn't plan that list to be all female-led movies, but they really can't seem to get female superhero movies right.

How hard is it really???

 

Maybe it was Batwoman tv show bad.

Anyway, I think the major issue was that it was just this weird mid range size movie that WB don't know what to do with right now, as they want to create more tentpole big screen releases and less on streaming. That they could just write this down for tax purposes is kind of sad, though I'm more sad they have cancelled the latest Scooby Doo movie as well.

[Jaxom 1974]

The Batwoman show wasn't that bad. It wasn't the strongest Arrowverse show, but it ultimately suffered from the miscasting of Ruby Rose and having to climb out from that...oh and having a show about the Batman mythos and not being able to use Batman in any way...by the end of the third season, they seemed to be onto something in any case...

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

3 hours ago, DaveSumm said:

When I went from Superman: The Animated Series to Justice League, I was gutted that Tim Daly didn’t still voice him anymore. But I know the new guy had fans to. Tim Daly was just perfect as both Clark and Superman for me.

TBH, I didn't even notice. Newburn and Daly sound reeeeeealy similar. Daly did return for a few of the animated films.  

35 minutes ago, Heartofice said:

Anyway, I think the major issue was that it was just this weird mid range size movie that WB don't know what to do with right now, as they want to create more tentpole big screen releases and less on streaming. That they could just write this down for tax purposes is kind of sad, though I'm more sad they have cancelled the latest Scooby Doo movie as well.

...and after Birds of Prey failed and WW84...happened. 

This might also be Zaslav putting his foot down. I speculated (and I don't think I'm the only one) that the reason several DC projects were being developed right before the spinoff/merger was because WB execs were concerened about justifying their jobs to their news bosses a year down the road.  Maybe this is his way of saying he refuses to be pot-committed because of decisions made by the previous regime. He's like Jack Kennedy at the Bay of Pigs, he is. 

[Corvinus85]

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/speculation-fire-around-hbo-max-182322390.html

It seems there's a lot of fear that HBO Max is going to get gutted and they'll be doing less original content. So the canning of Batgirl may just be the beginning. I worry that we're going to lose some pretty decent to good shows like Peacemaker, Doom Patrol and Superman & Lois. I think Peacemaker did well enough and benefits from enough star power to go another season at least, but not sure about the other two. Doom Patrol has filmed its 4th season (I don't know if they actually wrapped) but apparently that doesn't mean a lot.

[Deadlines? What Deadlines?]

 

41 minutes ago, Corvinus85 said:

It seems there's a lot of fear that HBO Max is going to get gutted and they'll be doing less original content. So the canning of Batgirl may just be the beginning. I worry that we're going to lose some pretty decent to good shows like Peacemaker, Doom Patrol and Superman & Lois. I think Peacemaker did well enough and benefits from enough star power to go another season at least, but not sure about the other two. Doom Patrol has filmed its 4th season (I don't know if they actually wrapped) but apparently that doesn't mean a lot.

It's always a compromise between budget and ratings. S&L is doing somewhat better than recent Arrowverse shows but the production values are also somewhat better. That suggests the level beneath which it's not viable is higher.

According to Nielsen ratings, there was a slight decline in season 2, but not enough to be really concerned. However, if that decline continues in the established arrowverse pattern, I wouldn't expect it to last beyond season 3 or 4. 

And yes, I realize what's shown on that chart is not comprehensive, but it's probably not an outlier either. There's a reason why Batwoman was cancelled. Note the decline in 18-49 demo viewers from season 2.