Will You Miss The DCEU?

[Angleman70]

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 a 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 a 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 a 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 James Gunn early in the year announced the new slate of movies of the DCU reboot, and where DC-on-film arguably had its worst year ever with failures of Shazam 2 and The Flash, and underperformance of Blue Beetle, the inevitable failure of Aquaman 2 it seems the steam has finally run out so I just have to ask will you miss the DCEU?

I believe that the general public are sick of superhero movies in general. Henry Cavill and Gal Gadot were great but, there lies rub when the scripts, directors and WB continue to destroy what the characters could be if they were allowed to shine better. Marvel didn’t help matters.
R.I.P. DCU!

[Stanlos]

I don't pay the DCEU any mind. I am more concerned about the comics recovering from the last regime and the staggering blunders of Flashturd and New Poopy-2.

[Thor-Ul]

There ever was a DCEU? (Retoric question).

[Frontier]

There ever was a DCEU? (Retoric question).

Admittedly it wasn't even really the official name .

[Dr. Poison]

I will miss the DCEU but I'm also excited for Gunn's new take.

[Android 17]

The only thing I'll miss is the cast and team behind Birds of Prey. They truly deserved a sequel.

[Doctor Know]

No. After he badly WB mismanaged the franchise after 2018; chasing fads, pandering for awards, and green lighting every CBM nobody asked for, while ignoring fan demand projects.

The DCEU ends with a whimper. Like the Fox X-Men movies before them. At the rate the MCU is declining, it’ll be put out to pasture as well.

[Adekis]

Of course I will miss it.

I like most of its movies, and I thoroughly enjoyed how different the various series were from each other. Maybe we'll see a tad of a revival one day. I'm not holding my breath.

In the meantime, I'm content to look toward the future, and treasure the movies the DCEU gave us. I just wish more people saw their appeal.

[Adekis]

The only thing I'll miss is the cast and team behind Birds of Prey. They truly deserved a sequel.

This is absolutely correct. No film was a bigger beneficiary of WB's scattershot approach to tone and worldbuilding than Cathy Yan and the Birds of Prey team!

Definitely my favorite movie of the lot, by a huge margin - and I liked many of them!

[DochaDocha]

In a nutshell, no. The DCEU lost me as soon as they announced BvS as their second movie. However, that's not to say there weren't a handful of things I liked. Henry Cavill wasn't a bad Superman. Gal Gadot and Jason Momoa were great casting. I despise modern-day Harley Quinn, but Margot Robbie is great in the role. The first Shazam was surprisingly enjoyable, and even though I don't like how thematically similar Gunn's Suicide Squad is to his GotG, I still can't complain about them too much. I didn't think it was fair that each series pretty much got discontinued after one poor box office outing. That said, I also get some sense of schadenfreude knowing how many stupid ideas WB had tossed around, with by far the stupidest being Hamada's insistence to continue the DCEU franchise without Superman and Batman. I think Star Wars is being badly mismanaged, but at least a disappointing main-line movie for them could still get a billion dollars in spite of their disorganization, awful writing, and all-around incompetence.

But really, the DCEU franchise was sunk from day one due to poor direction and too many corporate people dictating this and that. I'd be more willing to say "Good riddance" if I had more faith that DCEU 2.0 would be in better hands. It probably is with James Gunn, but now I'm the one with no patience. If Legacy is no good, I'm going to be a skeptic going forward.

[Triniking1234]

I voted indifferent. I prefer good movies rather than good "cinematic universes". I liked:
- Man of Steel
- Wonder Woman
- Both Suicide Squads
- Shazam
- Aquaman

[Baggie_Saiyan]

Stopped caring after WW84, it was clear MoS wasn't meant to springboard a new universe nor I think BvS which then coincidentally got delayed and then the DoJ title was revealed. Which explains why ZS went the old Batman route clearly it wasn't meant to springboard a whole universe. ZS is not a safe film maker so I think letting him have the keys was also a bad idea (I loved MoS, BvS & ZSJL but his ideas post JL were pretty bad) that said the theatrical cut of JL as messy as it was gave a WB a clean slate they got rid of all ZS plot points but they just failed to plan anything at this point it was salvageable they just needed to get someone in and plan a new direction

I will continue to enjoy ZS trilogy, WW1, Aquaman & maybe Blue Beetle but the rest can go in the bin!

[Gaius]

Liked:
Wonder Woman
Shazam
Aquaman

Mixed:
MoS

Bad:
BvS

One of the worst films I've ever seen:
Suicide Squad

Didn't see the rest, so not really.

[Goldrake]

Will miss
WW 1
Aquaman 1
Shazam
The rest average to mediocre.

Gunn's new slate if superhero fatigue is real its DOA

The one thing I will miss is Jason Momoa as Aquaman. Even with the "all he does is talk to the fish", jokes, he made Aquaman a legitimate badass.

I miss the Jason Momoa as Aquaman of the first movie, the one in JL, Peacemaker but not the one in Aquaman and the lost Kingdom.

BTW Arthur was always badass

[Ascended]

No, I won't miss it. But I 'will' miss a lot of the cast. I support a fresh start, I don't even want to keep the stuff Gunn is, but Cav-El deserved better. Losing Gadot is tragic. The actors were rarely the problem with DC and a lot of the casting was fucking inspired. I still think we needed a clean break and reboot but I weep for the movies we *should* have gotten with these people.

I still want Marvel Studios to cast Cavill, Gadot, Affleck and Fisher as Hyperion and the Squadron Supreme. I think it'd be hilarious.

I really enjoyed some of the DCEU. I think MoS was an excellent film and it's easily my favorite "S" movie, and WW is largely better (until the third act). Peacemaker is one of the best things we've ever gotten out of the genre. And Aquaman and Shazam are fun (Beetle too, if we're counting it). It wasn't "all" bad. Just bad enough that it all needed to go. Which is sad, but I'm not gonna miss it.