James Gunn and the New Departure DC Films
DC Films made a new start by appointing James Gun as co-chairman and CEO. The company also changed its name to DC Studio. With rival Marvel Studios performing poorly, expectations are high on whether it will be able to succeed in rebounding through this opportunity.
In the meantime, DC Films has introduced various works such as “Man of Steel,” “Sour Side Squad,” “Batman vs Superman: The Beginning of Justice,” and “Shazam!” based on the powerful DC Comics IP, but has not achieved any significant results. Only “Wonder Woman” and “Aqua Man” succeeded You can see it, but the batting average is less than 10%.
The biggest reason for the slump was that there was no director like Kevin Feige of Marvel Studios who could draw a big picture. The solid road map was one of the keys to Marvel Studios being loved. Starting with Iron Man, the audience felt more moved and delighted as soon as the stories and rice cakes piled up in Thor and Captain America fused and unraveled in the Avengers series, and naturally became Marvel fans. This is why 13.97 million viewers could all cheer when Captain America (Chris Evans) shouted “Avengers Assembly” in “Avengers: Endgame.”
DC Films, on the other hand, missed something important while chasing Marvel Studios. Rather than drawing a big picture with ease, they paid attention to the work in a hurry, so even though they were in the same worldview, they brought in famous directors such as Jos Wedden of “Avengers” and Jack Snyder of “300,” but they couldn’t make a big impact because they were only talking about different things.
While even the original fans were turning their backs on the continuous disappointing results, DC Films, who could not wait and see, eventually came up with a secret move. First, DC Films’ mission was changed to DC Studio, and director James Gunn and producer Peter Safran were appointed as co-chairman and CEO. The two are scheduled to begin their strict observations at the DC Studio on November 1.
Later, James Gunn and Peter Safran said, “It’s an honor to be the caretakers of DC characters we’ve loved since we were young. “We will revitalize the theatrical experience around the world with the biggest, most beautiful, and grandest story,” he said.
Director James Gunn has experience in producing films for both rivals Marvel and DC. At Marvel Studio, he completed the first and second episodes of the Space Opera genre “Guardians of Galaxy” with his own B-class sensibility, and thanks to his popularity, he was in charge of directing up to three episodes. The results of the DC studio are also good. It succeeded in rebooting the “Suicide Squad (2015),” which received harsh reviews in terms of completeness, and even produced a spin-off “Peacemaker” with excellent results in both evaluation and box office success.
Peter Safran worked with DC’s Aquaman and Shazam! series. The two series have something in common that they are very successful, which is rare in DC. DC fans’ expectations are also rising as directors with unique directing skills and producers with excellent production skills have met.
In particular, the fact that Marvel Studio has been suffering from a slump recently is making DC fans more excited. Marvel Studios has been on the decline since Phase 3’s “Avengers: Endgame” and “Spider-Man: Far From Home.” There are various reasons for the decline. First of all, the worldview is expanding rapidly. The concept of multi-bus (multi-dimensional) has emerged, and even stories that cannot be understood without watching the Disney+ original series are confusing fans. It is also contributing to the fact that new characters are not attractive enough to surpass existing popular characters. Currently, Iron Man and Captain America have dropped out of Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU), and a large number of new heroes such as Shanchi, Eternals, Moonnight, Ms. Marvel, and Shehulk have appeared, but they are not attracting much attention. The third reason is that Marvel Studios is busy creating new works, ignoring the big picture like DC in the past. Rather than having a connection with each other, each work is playing separately and not winning the hearts of fans.
Currently, DC Studio is making good results by earning $67 million (W95 billion) in just three days after its release in North America with “Black Adam,” and is also preparing a sequel to “Man of Steel,” which has a thick fan base. It is expected that the two rival producers will be able to take advantage of this opportunity to succeed in reversing DC, which ranked second in later years behind Marvel.