Why the DCEU Failed

Hey guys, I’ve been receiving a lot of comments asking me to make a video on “why the MCU failed” and I already kind of did. This video, “Marvel’s Never Ending Identity Crisis” discusses the narrative issue a lot of MCU movies have, in particular with their final acts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuxBrtnEBUs&ab_channel=Shayne%2CPleaseShutUp And this video, “Bigger Isn’t Always Better… and The Art of Narrative De-Escalation” touches briefly on Marvel’s oversaturation of the genre as well as their constant belittling of prior movie threats: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-IAG7yCjJM&t=366s&ab_channel=Shayne%2CPleaseShutUp These are more about writing rather than the drama behind the scenes but if it interests any of you, you should definitely check it out Thanks for all the love and support, yall are the best.

Let’s be honest, before the reboot, this was the state of things: - Ben Affleck turned 50, started a new company and grew tired of superhero films. - Ezra Miller turned up to be a mess of a human being. - The whole Ray Fisher case. - The literal Amber Heard case. - The release of Aquaman and Shazam, two films with a different tone but located in the same universe. - The failure of the first Suicide Squad movie. - The problematic release of the second Suicide Squad movie, which failed in theaters but succeded in HBO Max due to the pandemic and the decision to release it in the plataform at the same time. - An immense amount of cancelled proyects. - The Flash being constantly edited depending on the current path. - Wonder Woman 1984 having nothing to do with the canon of the DCEU, when she was supoosed to stay away from humanity till BvS, not to mention that time the world almost went into war because of a loser Trump-esque entrepreneur with superpowers but no one remembers that. - Zack Snyder flipped the page and was already doing his own projects. - The late production and content of Black Adam, in which Amanda Waller’s career seems to be alright after Peacemaker’s finale and she works with the Justice League, and there’s also the fact that the movie introduced a team that somehow was present in the DCEU from day one (despite MOS stating that no human has ever seen powers like Clark Kent’s), and Dwayne Johnson being more concerned with fighting Superman rather than his true archenemy Shazam. - Box Office failure after box office failure, with the exception of Joker and The Batman, while dealing with expensive actors. I can see the reasoning behind the reboot, this universe was cursed.

Imagine if they killed off iron man in iron man 2.

When a justice league film flopped at the box office that should’ve been a clear cut indication to reboot

"No one is having sex or killing each other." Sounds like the perfect man to direct Superman, said the WB board.

So clear that Snyder doesn't like these characters. He likes their powers

Snyder: Batman didn't kill those guys, the box he threw did. ah yes, the murderer didn't kill the victim, the weapon did.

Basically Snyder on batman killing: Batman: *Pushes bad guy off a building*, "I didn't kill him the gravity did"

I feel like it failed because they rushed things to catch up with the MCU. They rushed the justice League movie, without enough build up to the movie because they hadn't released enough solo super hero movies first. I know rushing things to play catch up with the MCU wasn't the only cause of their failure but I think it was a big contributing factor

The Death Of Superman was an Ace In The Hole. It was used in comics to revive the waning popularity of Superman. DCEU used it in the second hand.

What makes this more frustrating is that WB did do a Shared Universe back in the 90s-Early 2000's really well. The DCAU was a shared universe of DC Cartoons that began with Batman: The Animated Series and ended with Justice League: Unlimited. It was widely praised and still a favorite of many fans. They absolutely can do good DC Shared Universes, they just chose not to. . .

DC spent 6 years trying to fix the damage that BvS caused, eventually they had to get the memo that starting over was the only solution.

Seeing the Justice Society in Black Adam was particularly baffling, because the whole time I was thinking “where have these guys been all this time??” Obviously there’s A LOT going on behind the scenes that we never witness (in Suicide Squad 2 when Waller says that Bloodsport put Superman in the hospital with a Kryptonite bullet, I also said “when the hell did THAT happen????”)

Just remember, WB were asking how will superman be able to return back to krypton after him and the military used the rocketship to create a wormhole to send the other kryptonians back to the phantom zone. David Goyer and the writers had to remind them that not only was the pod a baby sized pod, but krypton blew up in the beginning of the movie. Considering this is the level of idiocy the creators were dealing with in 2013 itself, it is a miracle the universe lasted this long.

I grew up watching the Bruce Timm cartoons as a kid in Nigeria. One thing I will never understand is why DC and WB didn't use the Justice League animated series or the Batman and Superman animated series as inspiration or basis for the live action movies. They were widely popular, even among non-comic readers. Why didn't they use that?!

The harsh truth is that Snyder moved on but his fanbase didn’t

Iron Man made a mint at the box office considering the property was not well known outside comic book fans. Iron Man was a huge gamble for Marvel Studios and Paramount Pictures. It didn't make a billion dollars, but no one expected it to make the money it did. Merchandise sales were also spectacular. Reviews for it were also spectacular for a first outing of a comic book film featuring a B-list superhero. Justice League was doomed to fail because it was following Batman v Superman which bombed at the box office. It had the highest drop off rate for any superhero film, and the opening in November was seen as a death knell, by audiences who knew how bad something had to be if it couldn't compete with the summer blockbusters.

Imagine if they killed off iron man in iron man 2.. The harsh truth is that Snyder moved on but his fanbase didn’t.

It’s honestly quite sad really. The groundwork was pretty much already laid out for them with The DCAU, they didn’t even need to try and copy Marvel’s formula. All they had to do was follow the template The DCAU had already set up for them. Or simply had just hired Bruce Timm to be in charge of their live-action cinematic universe

Snyder is about shock and awe not about character. Even in the so called bad MCU movie they are all good characters.