Most people would generally tend to pinpoint Joss Whedon’s disastrous Justice League as the moment the original iteration of the DCU came off the rails to an irreparable degree, but if we’re being honest, Zack Snyder’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was the first indicator that things weren’t exactly going to work out according to plan.
In an effort to catch up to Marvel Studios as soon as possible, a direct sequel to Man of Steel was cast aside in favor of an all-star epic roping in Ben Affleck’s Dark Knight, Jesse Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor, the entirety of the Justice League through GIF form, an excruciating volume of exposition and world-building, all crammed into a crossover that simply wasn’t very good.
Dawn of Justice was roundly trashed by critics, and despite earning $873 million at the box office was deemed as a commercial disappointment, which is fair enough when having DC’s two biggest icons going head-to-head in a live-action epic for the first time ever should have sailed past a billion dollars at the very least.
While the theatrical edition of Justice League is undoubtedly a turd that cannot be polished in any form, Batman v Superman is no great shakes, either. It can’t be a coincidence that Snyder admitted Warner Bros. hated the film, while writer Chris Terrio fired several shots of his own at the studio. The Ultimate Edition is vastly superior, no doubt, but the initial cut is still a 152-minute slog that literally weaponizes a jar of pee as a major plot point.
If you think about it, the DCU was on a downhill slope before Snyder even departed Justice League, with the infamous container of urine regularly brought up alongside the dreaded Martha exchange as barometers of how the franchise was doomed to fail in its pursuit of catching up to Marvel. The original architect dropped out, Whedon stepped in, the entire SnyderVerse fell apart, and now we’ve ended up with James Gunn and Peter Safran steering the ship.
In an even more insane twist of fate you couldn’t make up, if Kevin Feige hadn’t fired Gunn from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 to send him scurrying across town to DC in the first place, then we wouldn’t be in this situation either. Remarkably, then, you could realistically state that if it wasn’t for a $300 million disappointment boasting a jar of pee in a major supporting role or unsavory tweets from a decade prior made by someone who’d never worked with DC before being brought to light, then we wouldn’t be in the position we are now with Chapter 1 – Gods & Monsters on the cards. Only in Hollywood.