Now That it’s Ending: Will You Miss The DCEU?

[Amadeus Arkham]

This week marks the end of the old DCEU that we know and love(or hate) that started with Man Of Steel with the release of Aquaman 2. Man Of Steel kicked the universe off on a somewhat divisive note with criticisms levied against ranging from its questionable depiction of Jonathan Kent to its disturbing portrayal of collateral damage in its third act. Nevertheless MOS was a success, albeit not exactly the success they were looking for, but instead of green-lighting a sequel to MOS, they decided to use the movie to kickstart a new cinematic universe and instead opted to have the first ever Superman and Batman face-off film Batman V Superman: Dawn Of Justice which faced even more backlash for its tone and its portrayal of the titular characters.

BvS was a turning point that had major ripple effects on the Suicide Squad and JL, which both suffered from studio meddling. SS was critically panned but was a financial success, meanwhile JL was an unmitigated disaster, losing millions of dollars. Ten years before it would’ve been unthinkable that a major superhero film that had Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman would not only bomb, but make less than a movie about a talking raccoon. You’d think it’d be an easy slam-dunk billion dollar movie, but we live in a crazy world.

Conventional wisdom would’ve had WB reboot the whole universe after a massive JL movie event movie you’re betting flopped, but oddly enough they elected to do a soft reboot of sorts. Likely because of WW’s massive success showed their was still some gas left in the tank, as well as Aquaman being in production. And for awhile it seemed the soft reboot approach worked with Aquaman being an unequivocal success story and Shazam being a modest hit but DC still wasn’t as successful as they could’ve been. With Marvel able to make billion dollar movies out of lesser known characters like Black Panther and Captain Marvel, while DC couldn’t with Superman.

Fast-forward to 2023 where know DC is finally getting a hard reboot(more or less) James Gunn early in the year announced the new slate of movies of the DCU reboot, where DC-on-film arguably had its worst year ever with failures of Shazam 2 and The Flash, and underperformance of Blue Beetle, and inevitable failure of Aquaman 2 I just have to ask will you miss the DCEU?

[Vegeta]

Not really, I only really liked Gunn's "the Suicide Squad" and "Wonder Woman." (The first "Shazam" was ok) I didn't like any of the other films.

[Godzilla2099]

I'll definitely miss it. I'm still p*ssed off at Cavil's Treatment.

Absolutely loved Cavil as Superman. First Flight was one of my favorite Superman scenes and I loved how he arrived to fight Stephenwolf in the JL Movie. I personally like Superman used as the Deus Ex Machina. I grew up with Superfriends as Reeve. He's the Hero that saves the day when things are at the darkest and bad guys know they're screwed when he arrives.

Also giving major props for Batfleck. I watch the Warehouse Rescue at least once a week. His Batman was primal and brutal, but at the same time experienced and frighteningly skilled. By far the best live Batman fights we got were from him.

I also like Mamoa's Aquaman.

As for the rest. It ranged from Mediocre to Didn't like.

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

Not really.

I lost interest after Whedon's JL so I'm cool with the upcoming reboot.

[BeastieRunner]

I liked Cavill.

The extended editions of BvS and JL were better but still... Lacking.

Batman was a huge a miss with a great actor.

Flash was decent.

Wonder Woman was perfect.

Aquaman was good.

Shazam was good in the first one but went backwards IMHO.

Suicide Squad would've been better without Harley but the second movie was good.

I enjoyed the Harley movie but if you're gonna call something BoP ... Included the BoP in more than INO.

Am I forgetting anything?

I'm good with new stuff.

[j9ac9k]

I feel bad for Cavill that he got saddled with "angsty, sooo burdened by my greatness" Superman. He showed glimpses that he could've been great, but we'll never really know.

Glad Zachary Levi can stop embarassing himself.

I don't think there's one movie in the DCEU I would rewatch other than Gunn's "The Suicide Squad."

[Styles]

MOS was the 1st Superman that I've seen and I really liked it. Too bad we never got a MOS2. I’ll also miss Affleck’s Batman. I was really looking forward to his Batman movie with him fighting Deathstroke.

Some of the DCEU was good but most was really mediocre to trash. It’s time to move on from it.

[Scott Taylor]

No, but I was a misfit for it because the only parts of it I really liked were by and large the movies people hated the most - BvS, SS (2016) and Flash. Also with few exceptions I felt it was a sea of miscasts for the oddly cynical vibe the DCEU was going for.

Also the DCEU left nothing unfinished, really. So there is no unfinished plot line I want to see play out. But then again, they barely even started anything. And the movies I enjoyed in it will continue to be replayed, streamed and on my physical media.

[Frobisher]

Nope. The films I actually enjoyed will continue to exist, and it never really pulled off any moments where the different characters crossed over in a meaningful and rewarding way, so I don’t feel like I’m losing anything there either.

[Noodle]

Not really. The bad outweighed the good, and the good was only really "good" in comparison to the bad. There wasn't any movie in it that I regularly go back and watch

[exile001]

Honestly, the DCEU died with Whedon's Justice League and it's zombie has been mindlessly shambling about ever since.

Have I enjoyed movies since? Yep. Were they hamstrung by being part of a shared universe than just being their own thing? 100%.

Gunn's now launching a new shared universe at the point where the one shared universe that has worked in recent times is starting to fail and audiences have repeatedly shown they're not interested in another. Good luck.

The Batman and Joker were great, did great business, and all without the unnecessary self-restriction of a shared universe. But artistically bankrupt corporations are always going to chase a dead trend that made money once over actually finance something with vision or quality.

I imagine we'll be having this same conversation in a couple of years, depending how far Gunn gets.

[Tuck]

Not really, I only really liked Gunn's "the Suicide Squad" and "Wonder Woman." (The first "Shazam" was ok) I didn't like any of the other films.

Pretty much the same for me (although it sounds like I enjoyed Shazam more than you did).

Haven't seen either Aquaman, the second Shazam, or Blue Beetle (yet?), though.

[Powerboy]

I think we need an option of "I will miss parts of it". I hate that there will be no Wonder Woman III or Aquaman III. Other than that, not really. I just wish two really good and successful characters were not getting thrown out with the bad. I guess DC thinks having them continue in a separate reality from the reboot would be too confusing. Yeah, DC is famous for making wise decisions in the current era. Throwing away two characters who had billion dollar successes doesn't seem very wise.

I thought Man of Steel was okay but not a great start for the franchise. Then they rushed things. I even liked Superman versus Batman but that's the kind of thing you do in a one-shot movie, not in something that's intended to get people to want to see the next movie and the next or even to go see that movie again and again.

Suicide Squad, in my opinion, dropped my interest even more.

Outside of WW and Aquaman, there were some gems. The first Shazam movie was a wonderful change of pace but the dismal showing of the second made it almost a certainty that it won't survive the end of the setting as a whole.

Outside of WW, Aquaman and Shazam, my favotite DC movie in recent times was the Legion of Super Pets and, if we can count small parts of movies without counting the movie: Michael Gray doing a cameo in Shazam 2 and calling him Captain Marvel, and the cameos of old movie and television characters in the Flash movie along with Michael Keaton and Sasha Calle playing good characters in a bad movie.

So I guess my vote would be for the reboot with a couple of exceptions.

[Tofali]

The only thing I like about DCEU is the casting of Cavill everything else was a disappointment.

[Jim Kelly]

Sorry, but I never use this "DCEU" label. It never was an official name for the Snyderverse. Also when MAN OF STEEL came out, that wasn't an extended universe, In fact, from what I've read, the germ of the idea for MAN OF STEEL was a movie that would connect with THE DARK KNIGHT. It developed away from that. It was only later that they decided to extrapolate a universe from MAN OF STEEL and thus BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE (the long title indicates how much they were trying to do in the space of one movie, to its detriment).

I think we can say that there are some movies that are integral to the Snyderverse and can't be separated out from it. But then there are lots of other movies that are tangential to the Snyderverse and could, if there was a will to do so, be separated out from it and continue on their own as singular franchises or connected to other movies. There were already differences in WONDER WOMAN and AQUAMAN that set them apart from BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE and JUSTICE LEAGUE (2017 edition). Other movies are only vaguely connected. Given the developments in THE FLASH (no spoilers), they could have continued that franchise if they had the inclination to do so.

The real end of the Snyderverse came when they kicked out Snyder and put in Joss Whedon and that movie failed to do business. Hope was revived (among the fandom, at least) when they released the Snyder Cut. But a lot of other developments, behind the scenes and in front of everyone, proved that this was a doomed enterprise. And once David Zaslav bought the company there was no hope for anyone on the payroll.