James Gunn Takes DC Studios

James Gunn and Peter Safran completed their eighteenth month as co-chairmen of DC Studios this week, and the unit has now announced enough of its forward slate for the industry to read their strategic intent with some confidence. The short version: DC Studios under Gunn and Safran is attempting a staged reboot of the entire DC cinematic universe, rebuilding continuity from scratch, and accepting the commercial risk that a reset of this scale implies.

What Warner bought

Warner Bros. Discovery hired Gunn and Safran in October 2022, months after David Zaslav became the merged company’s chief executive and shortly after the “Batgirl” cancellation incident made clear that the previous DC Films leadership had lost the confidence of the holding company.

The mandate given to Gunn and Safran was broad. They were asked to unify the DC cinematic and television output under a single editorial vision, to develop a multi-year slate comparable to Marvel’s Phase structure, and to decide what to do with the existing DC Extended Universe continuity that had been built between Man of Steel (2013) and Black Adam (2022).

The slate, as announced

DC Studios’ initial slate, announced in January 2023 and expanded across 2024, includes the following theatrical productions:

• Superman (released 2025, directed by Gunn, starring David Corenswet)
• Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow (in post-production)
• The Authority (in pre-production)
• Swamp Thing (in pre-production)
• The Brave and the Bold (Batman, in development, director Andy Muschietti previously attached)
• Paradise Lost (Wonder Woman origin, in development)

Television productions include:

• Waller (Amanda Waller, Max)
• Creature Commandos (animated, currently airing)
• Booster Gold (Max, in development)
• Lanterns (Max, in pre-production)

The slate is specifically structured to introduce the new DC Universe (DCU) through a sequence of linked films and television series, rather than through a single franchise-launching event film. The strategy is a deliberate rejection of the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s specific rollout pattern, which relied heavily on individual superhero origin films to build toward large-scale team-ups.

What is not continuing

The pre-reset DC Extended Universe is being wound down. Most of the previous cast is not returning to their roles. Henry Cavill is not the new Superman. Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman will not continue. Jason Momoa’s Aquaman is not part of the DCU continuity, though Momoa has been cast as the DC character Lobo in the new continuity.

A handful of prior productions are being allowed to complete independently of the new DCU. Matt Reeves’ The Batman series (starring Robert Pattinson) has been designated an “Elseworlds” production that exists outside the main DCU continuity. Joker: Folie à Deux (2024) was similarly outside the new continuity. The Peacemaker television series (starring John Cena, created by Gunn himself) is continuing but being partly recontextualised inside the new DCU.

The Warner context

The strategic question DC Studios is trying to answer is whether Warner Bros. Discovery can, under current corporate conditions, sustain the investment required for a staged cinematic universe reboot.

Warner Bros. Discovery’s current financial position is structurally constrained. The merger-era debt remains substantial. The DC films of 2023 (Shazam! Fury of the Gods, The Flash, Blue Beetle, Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom) all underperformed. The theatrical market for superhero films has contracted substantially from its 2019 peak.

Against this backdrop, Gunn and Safran are being asked to rebuild DC’s theatrical business with specifically limited budgets. Superman (2025) was produced for approximately $225 million, which is substantial but not at the Marvel-peak level. Subsequent DCU productions are, by industry reports, being budgeted at similar or slightly lower levels.

The Superman verdict

Superman (2025) opened in July 2025 to a domestic opening weekend of $125 million and worldwide gross of approximately $220 million across its first ten days. Industry reception has been mixed but leaning positive: the film has held Week 2 better than most recent superhero releases, suggesting reasonable word of mouth.

The question for DC Studios is whether Superman’s performance is strong enough to validate the broader slate. A worldwide gross of roughly $650 million (the industry’s consensus breakeven estimate for the film) would provide the commercial foundation for sustained investment in subsequent DCU productions. As of this writing, the film is on pace to reach roughly that figure.

What Gunn and Safran have to prove

Three specific things over the next twenty-four months.

First, they need Superman to hold commercially long enough to justify continued theatrical investment. If the film ends its run below $600 million worldwide, the strategic case for the larger slate weakens.

Second, they need the television component of the DCU to work. Max’s Creature Commandos and the forthcoming Peacemaker Season 2 need to generate the kind of audience engagement that DC television has not reliably produced. Without a working television base, the film-only DCU strategy is structurally fragile.

Third, they need to avoid the creative congestion that slowed Marvel after Phase Three. Too many productions, too many characters, too much interconnection will create the same audience-fatigue problem the MCU is currently experiencing.

Gunn has a reasonable track record as a filmmaker. Safran has a reasonable track record as a producer. Their partnership has operated, for the first eighteen months, with a disciplined public communications strategy. The deliverables are now arriving. The next two years will tell us whether the strategy holds.