James Gunn and Peter Safran DC exit: why were they fired?

James Gunn and Peter Safran are no longer leading DC Studios, and Jeremy Latcham has been brought in to replace them. Gunn has described it as a mutual decision, but I think this is one of the most transparent firings in Hollywood history, and I've mentally accepted that the DCU will never be the same.

Not long before this, Gunn was on a podcast about what counts as canon from The Suicide Squad, talking about getting ready to cast Batman and building the pillars of the DCU. Now he and Safran have been pushed out in one of the biggest industry shakeups of the decade. New DC, same as the old DC. A new report from The Hollywood Reporter goes through what allegedly happened, and much of it lines up with what I expected.

Why Paramount Skydance acted before Man of Tomorrow

The biggest surprise for me is that this happened before Man of Tomorrow. I expected them to wait until that film was out, but I think they moved now for a specific reason. Paramount clearly wants to give Gunn notes and change things in that movie. Acting now means they can order reshoots, change things and take the film in a different direction.

If they had waited, the movie would already have been released with Gunn holding full creative control. Considering he was behind Supergirl, I think they're avoiding that possibility. None of this makes me some kind of fortune teller. Hollywood is ruthless with this stuff. It's called show business, not show friendsness.

Superman, Supergirl and Clayface: the money behind the DC Studios ouster

The simple answer to why this is happening is money. The Hollywood Reporter piece is titled "James Gunn, Peter Safran DC ouster, execs tension and a fateful David Ellison visit," and it is the story behind the story. It says the movies released were not great for business, while "Supergirl was just a disaster in the eyes of the new regime." It adds that "Even Superman, which grossed $618 million worldwide and was profitable, did not net out or have the kind of pop culture impact in the way that kind of movie should have," according to the thinking of the Skydance regime.

The fandom has been trying to convince people Superman was a big success, but I think it was a very minor one, if that. It made about the same amount as Man of Steel did 13 years ago, without the DVD, Blu-ray and TV syndication deals that were commonplace back then. Everything is streaming now, and that secondary revenue stream is gone, so it would definitely have struggled to match the money.

Then there's Supergirl, which by all accounts is estimated to lose the studio between $200 and $250 million. That puts them in a massive hole on their second movie. Clayface was made for $40 million or thereabouts, and it has taken three weeks to hit the $100 million mark. I took heat on Twitter for saying it does nothing to lift them out of that hole, but it's clear the strategy wasn't working. The profit on Clayface probably won't even cover the executives' salaries, and you'd have to make around ten Clayface, all successful, to recoup what Supergirl lost.

I think the writing was on the wall. Gunn's choices in general aren't built for mass appeal, and with a Gorilla Grodd and Jimmy Olsen show coming next, I think that's what made them realize they'd be burning money by letting them pick the projects. This is the same industry that had Batgirl made with Michael Keaton's Batman in it and still shelved it.

Was James Gunn fully fired? Probably not outright

Do I think he was fully fired? Probably not outright. Based on what has been said, he can continue to work with them, but with heavy corporate oversight. Reading between the lines, I imagine he was called into the office and told that the new owners paid billions for DC, they want bankable IP, they want Batman, and if he isn't going to deliver that, he can leave.

Gunn being Gunn, I can't see him wanting to do the big names when his whole career has been built on choosing the oddballs. I even feel he probably didn't want to do Superman, but making a Man of Steel movie is a prerequisite for starting a DC universe. When he announced that the animated Creature Commandos series was the first DCU project, I think it was very clear where his sensibilities lay.

Marvel is probably going to make two billion dollar movies this year, and Paramount isn't going to spend billions buying Warner Bros. to be happy with 10 to 20 million in profit on Clayface, if it even makes that. They fired Pam Abdy and Mike De Luca a couple of weeks back, and this is another move to show the Ellisons are serious. It's wild to do this right out of the gate, but they aren't pulling punches.

How Gunn and Safran got the DC job, and how they lost it

Their hiring four years ago came around the release of Black Adam, when Henry Cavill was announced as back as Superman. When Black Adam didn't perform to expectations, Gunn was hired, and the week after, Cavill was out along with most of the DCU, apart from Gunn's friends and family. There's an old saying that you lose it how you got it, and this feels similar.

Gunn and Safran seemed to be mapping out a multiyear plan, and the projects they announced killed interest in what was still coming from the studio. Shazam 2, Blue Beetle, The Flash and Aquaman 2 were still awaiting release, and although Gunn said they'd be worked into the upcoming story, it felt like they weren't worth seeing. They all performed poorly. Gunn also said they were building the greatest story ever told across TV, games and movies, with actors playing the same part across all three. That fizzled out, and even the initial slate didn't get made.

They did push ahead with Superman, and even if it didn't hit the box office highs people expected, I think no one can argue there wasn't at least a fan base. The Peacemaker season 2 finale dipped in views, then came Supergirl, Lanterns and Clayface, which was a modest commercial win for body horror. Gunn and Safran had been outspoken that the Ellisons were on board and that a set visit showed they were happy with where things were going.

Why I believe it was a firing, not a mutual exit

According to The Hollywood Reporter, they were pulled into the office on Friday, November 6, and told they were out and that Jeremy Latcham was now in charge. As of December 1, they're no longer the creative leads at the studio. The fact that the replacement was already lined up is very telling to me. Jobs like this take months of headhunting and negotiations, so this has clearly been in the works for a while.

There are lots of statements about them leaving on mutual terms, but I don't think two people like Safran and Gunn get called in and then both decide to step down together, only to be replaced by someone who has clearly been waiting in the wings. That sounds like a firing to me. Jeremy Slater, one of the architects of the DCU, called it a baffling decision, which doesn't sound like something you'd say if everyone had agreed on it together.

Who is Jeremy Latcham, the new head of DC Studios

I think Latcham is someone they've worked with before. He's a former MCU producer who worked on some of the biggest hits of its earlier phases. You might remember that Paramount used to distribute Marvel's movies as well, and if you pick up any of those old Blu-rays, you'll see the Paramount logo at the start all the way up to The Avengers. So I think they already had a relationship, and he was a shoo in with a proven track record in superhero films.

Comments he made about Christianity have circulated, along with talk that he'll make films based around those values, and some people are unhappy that religion could be injected into these stories. But Superman is clearly a Moses parallel, and Man of Steel is clearly an allusion to Jesus, so I think there are probably many religious parallels in these stories anyway. I don't think it makes or breaks a story. The Odyssey is based on Greek mythology, and Seven is built around the seven deadly sins. I also know America has a big thing about church and state, and I don't claim to grasp the political or religious landscape there.

He has also said he wants to make family films, which means moving away from R rated projects. I think that's probably the smart choice. Gunn said Peacemaker was a sequel to Superman, and when I got the screeners I realized my kids weren't going to be able to see it. I think Latcham is probably coming in with a much broader mindset than the more adult work Gunn was doing with Lanterns, Peacemaker and Clayface.

The Superman and Justice League plans that ended

The report says they were building toward the Justice League. Paraphrasing, it says Gunn had essentially finished principal photography on Man of Tomorrow and was writing a third installment intended to establish an annual or biannual Superman cadence that could eventually feed into a Justice League team up. Apparently they were also exploring smaller horror films that would mimic Clayface's success. That all went up in smoke on November 6.

Reporting lines, secrecy and creative philosophy caused tension

The report says the main points of tension came from how things would be structured under Skydance. On that podcast, Gunn said: "We aren't under Warner Brothers. We aren't under Paramount. We're a studio." Because of this, according to the report, Gunn and Safran's contracts guaranteed direct access to the top executive, initially David Zaslav and, after the merger, expected to be Ellison. However, Greenstein and Goldberg wanted all motion picture production, including DC, consolidated under them. An insider noted that Ellison never intended for DC to report straight to him and preferred to avoid studio politics.

The next point is revealing. The report says Gunn and Safran were slow to share upcoming plans, slate details and material from the films. Whether that reflected protectiveness of creative control, distrust of the new regime or the practical difficulty of running a multiplatform universe while also directing, it created friction with the Skydance movie chiefs, who needed visibility. I think that's fair enough, because they've spent billions on this IP.

Third was creative and commercial philosophy, which the article calls one of the biggest points of contention. Gunn and Safran kept final say over film, television, animation and release strategy. Their approach mixed the odd tentpole with more niche projects, while Skydance prefers broader, more conventional names.

Robert Pattinson, Bond rumors and the Batman question

I think the rumors that Robert Pattinson was auditioning for Bond likely caused problems too, as it seemed the studio might lose its Batman. There's been lots of back and forth over what's happening with Matt Reeves, and I think Pattinson going off to audition for other franchises would have annoyed Paramount, which bought this expecting Batman to be part of the package. I'm surprised his contract even allows for something like Bond.

Gunn's clashes with journalists and fans

I also don't think Gunn did himself many favors with the media and fandom. He argued with journalists over scoops, debunked stories that later turned out to be true and went back and forth with fans, which was unprofessional and not something you expect from a CEO. When he debunked a report that an actress was auditioning for a role in Man of Tomorrow, the reporter was bombarded by fans calling them a liar, and about two days later she was announced as part of the film.

In his own statement, Gunn said he would miss the people around him and being a caretaker of these characters, but that he was relieved and excited to get back to pure filmmaking. I don't think he or anyone is cut out to be both a creative and an executive. Those are very different hats, and a creative with executive powers ends up with something like Supergirl, where he might as well have directed it himself. It feels like a poor imitation of his style, with lots of needle drops that feel very Guardians of the Galaxy, despite the talk of being hands off with directors.

He has said he's writing an additional project after Man of Tomorrow, but I think whether it gets greenlit will depend on how that film performs.

What comes next for DC under Latcham

I think this was very predictable if you understand anything about Hollywood. Paramount wasn't going to buy DC to make Polka Dot Man and Gorilla Grodd shows. The only surprise was how quickly it happened, and acting before Man of Tomorrow makes me think they'll be giving notes on it.

Maybe all studios should step away from shared universes and accept that no one can replicate Kevin Feige. He started when there were no expectations for what a shared universe should be and took small steps. Now everyone has seen the MCU blueprint and thinks that's what they have to do. I don't know whether fans will even want another reboot, but if there is one, I think it needs to be a hard reboot that avoids anything tied to the old universe. I think Gunn should have done that in the first place, but he didn't want to kill his own projects and characters.

Part of the fandom thinks the DCU will continue as normal, but I can't see a studio removing the people in charge if it were happy with how things were going. For Latcham, I think the big priority out of the gate will be Batman, and I imagine the Reeves universe might be ushered out too. Who knows. What is always guaranteed is that the new DC is the same as the old DC.