Remember when the DC Universe was in trouble? One needn’t look back very far to dredge up that memory — depending on who you ask, the franchise is still teetering on the brink. But just five years ago, circumstances were infinitely more dire. In 2021, DC’s Extended Universe was only just crawling out from the rubble of the Justice League debacle, and a so-so reception to its second Wonder Woman movie wasn’t raising its stock, either. Nothing since Aquaman was really moving the needle, and though you could blame plenty of external circumstances — from a lockdown-induced drought at the box office to the rise of superhero fatigue — nothing changes the fact that DC needed a win... bad.
The franchise found its lifeline in the unlikeliest of places. When James Gunn was ousted from Marvel’s inner circle (after the resurfacing of old, offensive tweets) in 2018, DC immediately scooped the director up. He would write and direct a sequel to the franchise’s much-derided Suicide Squad, redeeming the troubled team with his trademark irreverence and love for the deep cuts in DC’s catalogue. It was the same tactic that elevated the Guardians of the Galaxy to the upper echelons of fandom with two great Marvel films, and it was arguably perfected with The Suicide Squad. The result is arguably DCEU’s most successful film; sure, Aquaman grossed $1 billion at the box office, but Gunn inadvertently permitted DC to blow its failed universe to smithereens and rebuild it all in the director’s own image.
