James Gunn's Superman Coming In 2025

[Mantis-Ray]

I would say the first SS was very popular. You don’t make $750 million WW with bad reviews, and not have some sort of audience backing you.

What I noticed at the time, was the first SS had managed to catch the interest of the Fast and Furious fans. I travelled between NYC, Miami and LA for work back in 2016. People I connected with really dug the film. The anti-hero angle, the take no prisoners attitude and that Fast and Furious delivery was what they enjoyed. The hyper stylized nature of the film is something else I heard repeated. They had never seen anything like that in a CBM. Plus, the bits of Batman and Joker certainly inflated people’s interest in the film.


Gunn’s Suicide Squad doesn’t have that Fast and Furious appeal. We’re still watching anti-heroes, still have a take no prisoners attitude, we have a R-Rating and Gunn’s own style for murder and mayhem. But no octane go get ‘em action, no Batman, and no Joker. Gunn wanted to put Superman in his film. As an opposing force to dealing with the Starro situation, but WB shut him. I imagine Superman in TSS would’ve done for it, what Batman did for SS 2016.

Now Marvel has their Suicide Squad team, the Thunderbolts set to clash against the Superman clone Hyperion in the upcoming Thunderbolts movie. Leave it to WB to mess up a chance for a good idea.

Suicide Squad 1's relative success was a case more of pre-hype.

Like Batman v Superman there was a lot of hype, people were invested in it and came out in droves to check out. So the opening weeks were decent, but once people actually saw the movie died because they realized it was awful. So the movie wasn't as successful as they expected.

Its negative word of mouth. Its exactly what happened to Ant-Man Quantummania. Lot of hype but once the actual movie came out the hype stopped dead and the profits trickled down quickly.

[Yohei72]

Yes, I was referring to the characters.

Btw, I too liked the movie and the "Z-listers" in it.

Aha, thanks for clarifying.

[Yohei72]

Kind of off topic, but in case no one has mentioned it previously in the thread, I have to put in a plug here for Gunn's first film, SLITHER (2006), an outrageously gross and witty splatter horror/comedy with a well-deserved cult reputation. It's a bit odd to imagine the guy who made that being in charge of a cycle of blockbuster superhero franchises. THE SUICIDE SQUAD is similar in spirit, but more tamed. I'd rather see him do more stuff like that.

[DochaDocha]

Suicide Squad 1's relative success was a case more of pre-hype.

Like Batman v Superman there was a lot of hype, people were invested in it and came out in droves to check out. So the opening weeks were decent, but once people actually saw the movie died because they realized it was awful. So the movie wasn't as successful as they expected.

Its negative word of mouth. Its exactly what happened to Ant-Man Quantummania. Lot of hype but once the actual movie came out the hype stopped dead and the profits trickled down quickly.

SS1's box office is kind of like BvS'. It had a smaller overseas and smaller opening few weeks, but it didn't decay as fast (though part of the slower decay may have something to do with less competition at the box office during the end of summer.

2016 seems so long ago, but it apparently was a time when a mediocre or worse movie could make $750 million. A lot of flops this year would've loved to have made $750 million worldwide.

[Doctor Know]

Suicide Squad 1's relative success was a case more of pre-hype.

Like Batman v Superman there was a lot of hype, people were invested in it and came out in droves to check out. So the opening weeks were decent, but once people actually saw the movie died because they realized it was awful. So the movie wasn't as successful as they expected.

Its negative word of mouth. Its exactly what happened to Ant-Man Quantummania. Lot of hype but once the actual movie came out the hype stopped dead and the profits trickled down quickly.

I would say SS had decent legs to reach its final tally.

2016 was a wild time. We had 6 CBM released that year and their final totals surprised everyone.

1. Captain America: Civil War - $1,155,046,416
2. Batman v Superman: - $874,362,803
3. Deadpool - $782,836,791
4. Suicide Squad - $749,200,054
5. Doctor Strange - $677,796,076
6. X-Men: Apocalypse - $543,934,105

BvS and X-Men Apocalypse underperformed. While Deadpool and Suicide Squad overperformed. X-Men Apocalypse’s BO wad uniquely bad. Domestically, Apocalypse made $155,442,489. Compared to X-Men 1 from 2000; that film made $157,299,718 domestically. X1’s domestic gross being unadjusted for inflation.

Now that’s embarrassing. Bad word of mouth certainly hurt Apocalypse. Despite everything Fox did to make JLaw the face of the IP. Nobody was showing up for her.

2016 was truly a different time.

[Last Son of Krypton]

Was that really Gunn's plan? This is the first I've heard of Supes being mind controlled by Starro to fight the Squad. I was under the impression Superman was running his own parallel investigation and was going to shut down both the SS and Project Starfish himself.

Mind controlled Superman again though...
Insert exasperated sigh.
Insert yawn.
Insert forehead slap.

I get that it makes sense Starro's history post 1982 when he started face hugging. And with the experiments run by the Thinker in TSS, but c'mon Gunn. That's extremely tired at this point.

Gunn briefly considered Superman as the antagonist for his TSS but discarded the idea due to Superman's status at that time (Cavill was fired in 2018 and WB started discussing with MBJ to play an alt. Clark Kent).

"When I started writing The Suicide Squad, one idea was that they would fight Superman," Gunn said. "The Suicide Squad has to catch Superman for some reason. This was all, just a vague idea. It's gotten out of hand or is being controlled by someone. And then this group of lousy super villains has to face the most powerful hero in the world."

https://comicbook.com/dc/news/why-ja...an-justice-le/

In a new interview with Script Apart, writer and director James Gunn deep-dived into his film and revealed that "there was a time when I thought The Suicide Squad should fight Superman." But alas, it was only a passing thought — because Starro was an option, and Gunn couldn't pass up the idea of having one of his favorite villains in his movie.

"He's a character I love from the comics. I think he's a perfect comic book character because he's absolutely ludicrous but also very scary in his own way. What he does is scary," Gunn explained. "He used to scare the crap out of me when I was a child, putting those facehuggers on Superman and Batman. So I thought he was one of the major, major DC villains that was probably never going to be put into another movie. And if they did, it'd have been a 'black cloud' version of Starro. Not a giant walking starfish, a kaiju that's bright pink and cerulean blue, this ridiculously big, bright bad guy."

Another factor that had Gunn hesitating about including Superman in the film? The fact that the DCEU was still finding its feet in many ways, which made TPTB a little wary. "At the time, there were a lot of questions like, 'Who is Superman in the DCEU? Is this movie outside the DCEU?', and I just didn't want to deal with it all that much," Gunn admitted.

https://ew.com/movies/superman-was-a...suicide-squad/

[Jeffrey2]

Rumored upcoming castings from Reddit DCEU leaks which has been somewhat accurate. Not a surprise. Really all a given but for one and not so much a scoop. Supposedly going for unknown in the roles which I don't like. Aside from Hoult and one or two others SL is way short on star power which will hurt the film.

Rumored Superman Legacy castings

[Ascended]

Suicide Squad 1's relative success was a case more of pre-hype.

That's my understanding. It made solid money but saw very mixed reviews, at best. It wasn't fertile soil for a sequel at all.

[Vordan]

That's my understanding. It made solid money but saw very mixed reviews, at best. It wasn't fertile soil for a sequel at all.

It benefitted a lot from coming out right after Arkham Knight did. The Arkham series is what made Harley explode in popularity amongst Gen Z. And it doesn’t hurt that Joker is the second most popular DC character after Batman. Take Joker out and put some distance between the last Arkham game, and the hype had worn off in addition to the first movie being bad.

[Prime]

I honestly want to heard what David has to say.

[Primal Slayer]

Rumored upcoming castings from Reddit DCEU leaks which has been somewhat accurate. Not a surprise. Really all a given but for one and not so much a scoop. Supposedly going for unknown in the roles which I don't like. Aside from Hoult and one or two others SL is way short on star power which will hurt the film.

Rumored Superman Legacy castings

Superman has never had star power. Superman is the star and the star power. The name alone is what draws people and will make it or break it.

[daBronzeBomma]

Still think we haven't seen the true big bad of Superman Legacy even mentioned, let alone cast, yet. I don't think the big bad in SL is going to be Lex, as I think he'll be mercifully more on the sidelines this go-round.

I'm hoping we finally get a big screen Brainiac. Though I don't know for sure who I'd want cast in the role but it would definitely be a big name actor (or actress).

Also, I really hope they cast John Henry Irons, even if he isn't yet Steel in this movie. Also need a big name actor here if they do.

Any suggestions for either possible but unconfirmed role?

[Jeffrey2]

More castings rumors from Reddit-DCEUleaks/DCU Updates. Tell me this is not an ensemble film, and that Gunn is not using Superman to set up other projects like The Authority but not a Superman Legacy sequel. Some of us wanted a Superman film focused on his early years in Metropolis and his Superman family friends/foes. This bloated cast will take away from Corenswet's Superman getting enough screentime for character development/introducing him to a new generation. BTW, speculation that Bautista who recently met with Gunn will be Hawksmoor.

They are currently casting the roles of
.
1)The Doctor: "Longest in line of Shamens, member of the Authority"
2)Jack Hawksmoor,King of Cities,gains his powers from Symbiotic link with Cities he's in.
3)Steve Lombard,Pa & MA Kent and mostly minor roles from The Daily Planet,Government & Metropolitan residents.


dc456.jpg
.

[Vordan]

Still think we haven't seen the true big bad of Superman Legacy even mentioned, let alone cast, yet. I don't think the big bad in SL is going to be Lex, as I think he'll be mercifully more on the sidelines this go-round.

I'm hoping we finally get a big screen Brainiac. Though I don't know for sure who I'd want cast in the role but it would definitely be a big name actor (or actress).

Also, I really hope they cast John Henry Irons, even if he isn't yet Steel in this movie. Also need a big name actor here if they do.

Any suggestions for either possible but unconfirmed role?

Maybe Dave Bautista will be Brainiac lol.

30C2EFBB-CF84-454A-9B39-A99D41D86C17.jpg

[Ascended]

Maybe Dave Bautista will be Brainiac lol.

John Malkovich. Give him the right direction to go in and I think it'd be terrifying.