James Gunn’s recent comments offer an interesting look at DC’s film plans. He announced that the DC Universe will begin in 2025 with Superman: Man of Tomorrow, but the film will not retell Superman’s origin. Gunn said, “Everyone knows the origin stories of Batman and Superman.” While these comments may have generated mixed reactions from audiences, Gunn’s thinking is spot on. Especially since characters like Superman and Batman have already become well-known to audiences through multiple films and television series. At a time like this, rehashing an origin story can be a bit of a cliché.
Audiences are already familiar with these heroes, so rehashing new stories can be a bit of a drag. In this way, it’s better to create a new story and action with an old introduction rather than just showing his origin in a new Superman film. Similarly, DC Studios taking this approach can be very useful in achieving the goal of giving a new perspective on the stories in a way. This approach clearly gives the audience a perspective, but combined with the plan of taking a new approach without retelling old stories, it brings a new twist.
Spider-Man’s history and its importance in the Marvel Cinematic Universe
The Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) has also used this approach, but this time it has adopted a better approach to showing the character of Spider-Man. Peter Parker, played by Tom Holland, entered the current MCU in 2016 in “Captain America: Civil War”. At that time, he did not fully show his basic stories, but he became a familiar character to fans.
After that, the Spider-Man films in the MCU also did not show his origin story as a priority. This is also like James Gunn said, the stories have become old and the audience already knows them. The important thing here is that new characters are important to the audience, but even if they are not completely new, the important elements are enough for their introduction.
Following this approach, similar to the MCU, by only showing the progression of the characters without missing the main points of the story, is more conducive to connecting with users. In this way, the character of Spider-Man has also become a beloved and well-known character. That is why the subsequent films in the MCU will connect with fans more consciously. There may be many changes when making each U-turn, but the MCU’s approach is more effective in showing this somewhat impressive character as a story.
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Audience opinions on DC Studios’ approach
Audience opinions on the approach taken by Gunn in the DC Universe have shown concerns. DC’s multi-faceted characters have been shown in the old films, among which Superman and Batman are important. Since these characters are well-known to the audience, many feel that it is better to spend more time introducing them to the audience in the future and to go in another direction if there is no need to repeat the stories for them. But there may be beneficial strategies in giving this approach a constant response, in some special situations. So, it is interesting to see the approach taken by Gunn.
Of course, there are some significant challenges to this approach. Until now, DC didn’t have the opportunity to experiment with many stories, but now with these latest changes, they have the opportunity to build trust with audiences and introduce old acquaintances to new stories. If so, DC’s new films could still be successful.
Source: @shubhang.fearless