James Gunn has once again turned to Threads to defend his DC Universe, and this time he’s clarifying his previously proposed eight-to-ten-year roadmap for the fictional world and clarifying each character’s position within it.
“You can check out my quotes from January 23rd when we started and I said we were going to do exactly what we’re doing,” the DC Studios co-head wrote in response to a now-deleted post. “I said that some stories would be self-contained like the Guardians films were (which is what Clayface is) and that some stories would be part of a larger narrative structure, which is what the Superman saga is. That said, each element of the larger story should work on its own with or without having to see everything else.”
He continued in a second post: “ALSO, some things are getting mixed up here. The oft-cited “8-10 year road map” originally wasn’t just story points (although that was part of it), but also the plan for DC as a whole, including the focus on diamond characters (Superman, Batman, WW) as well as smaller characters we could turn into diamonds (Krypto, John Stewart, Peacemaker), how we would encourage the freedom of the filmmaker and allowing multiple tones and notes, influences from Star Wars and George RR Martin, and much more.
Gunn’s note on the “8-10 year roadmap” references his 2022 co-director Peter Safran’s remarks during a Warner Bros. virtual town hall. Discovery, during which he said they had developed an 8-10 year plan for DC. In a third post, he added: “It’s exciting to see things STARTING to come together and all of this makes me even more excited for what we have in store for everyone in Man of Tomorrow.”
On Saturday, Gunn took to social media to defend his decision to expand the DC Universe with “individual stories,” amid criticism that his films are not heading toward a major crossover event.
Responding to a commenter who pointed out that Gunn didn’t necessarily need to lay the groundwork for a fully interconnected universe, he wrote, “I couldn’t agree more.” “DCU is just an alternate universe; we can come in anywhere at any time and tell THIS story. I don’t like the idea that individual stories only make sense if they lead to something else. People who don’t understand that seem strange to me, because ‘Star Wars’ has essentially been doing this for 50 years through movies, shows, games and books, admittedly without the tonal variety,” he wrote.
Gunn’s next film, “Superman: Man of Tomorrow,” will hit theaters on July 9, 2027.
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