James Gunn Will Put Story and Script First with DC Studios to Fix "F***ed Up" Past

There are a lot of mixed reactions to James Gunn and Peter Safran’s plans for the first wave of DC film and TV projects, which is known as Chapter 1 - Gods and Monsters. There are a lot of interesting projects in development at DC Studios that I’m excited about, and I just trust that Gunn isn’t going to steer this ship in the wrong direction. Up until this point, he’s made some great films over the years and has a lot of experience with comic book projects like The Guardians of the Galaxy and The Suicide Squad, which are both awesome franchises!

One thing that I was extremely happy to hear from Gunn is that he plans on putting story and script first on these future DC projects and he will not push a film into producer until it is 100% ready to go. Gunn said:

“People have become beholden to [release] dates, to getting movies made no matter what. I’m a writer at my heart, and we’re not going to be making movies before the screenplay is finished.”

Yes, modern studios have a habit of scheduling tentpole films and sequels for theatrical release long before creative teams come together and they end up being rush jobs and the quality of the filmmaking suffers for it. Marvel Studios is guilty of this and a lot of the time they jump into production without a completed script.

Gunn will avoid this and will even push release dates back if the script is ready to go before production begins. He wants these future DC films to have a storytelling quality that a lot of studios don’t put effort into with the tentpole movies. Gunn says he is going to make the writer of these projects more important:

“I’ve seen it happen again and again — it’s a mess. It’s the primary reason for the deterioration in quality of films today, versus 20-30 years ago. The degradation of the writer in Hollywood has been a terrible story. It’s gotten much worse since I first moved here 23 years ago. Writers have been completely left out of the loop in favor of actors and directors, and making the writer more prominent and more important in this process is really important to us.”

Gunn went on to echo things that I’ve said multiple times in the past about superhero fatigue, and the reason why it’s happening is because the story suffers from the lack of care given to the writing process. He said:

“They make these movies where they don’t have third acts written, and then they start writing them during [production], you know, making them up as they’re going along. And then you’re watching a bunch of people punch each other, and there’s no flow even to the action.”

Yes! That’s what’s happening! Even with Marvel! You can see it! I’m so happy to see that Gunn and Safran actually realize this is a problem and they are setting out to fix it and make quality movies. When talking about the kinds of stories they’ll tell, Gunn explained:

“You can’t be telling the same ‘good guy, bad guy, giant thing in the sky, good guys win’ story again. You need to tell stories that are more morally complex. You need to tell stories that don’t just pretend to be different genres, but actually are different genres.”

I think that might be a thinly-veiled swipe at a plot model that Marvel has adopted. The filmmaker and co-CEO of DC Studios went on to talk about the freedom they will be giving the filmmakers of these films saying:

“It’s not the Gunn-verse. What makes it so fun is to see is to see stories that are completely different as the individual expression of the writers and the director that are making those projects … and not about me superimposing something on top of that.”

Gunn and Safran are obviously looking to get the DC Cinematic Universe in order in a way that’s never been done before. It’s always been so random and disconnected, and Gunn acknowledges that by saying how messed up it was:

“As everyone here probably knows, the history of DC is pretty messed up, it was f**ked up. No one was minding the mint. They were just giving away IP like they were party favors to any creators that smiled at them.”

Gunn also wants there to be transparency with the talent they bring on board to develop their films and he just wants to be honest with everyone moving forward:

“If somebody is doing something that isn’t working, we’re going to be honest. One of my primary focuses is being honest with everyone. Somebody brings me an idea that doesn’t work, I’m honest about it. We’re building right now the foundation for a studio that we want to last, and it just can’t last if we haven’t built on anything other than rigorous honesty.”

Well, I like it! I’m a huge fan of what Gunn and Safran are building here with DC Studios, and I think they are going to see a lot of success from it. I’m 100% on board for the ride that these guys are going to take us on with the movies they make. It seems like they are making smart decisions and taking the future of DC in the right direction.

Those projects that have been announced so far include Superman: Legacy, The Brave and the Bold, Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow, Paradise Lost, Booster Gold, Lanterns, The Authority, Creature Commandos, Waller, and Swamp Thing. You can read all of the details on those projects here.