“Listen, I love bigass shared universes in movies, as well as huge franchises. But I’m a little worried about the numerous shared universes being planned by the studios,” “Guardian of The Galaxy” director James Gunn said late last month. Yep, it’s getting a little ridiculous, but it’s not going to stop. Everyone is hot to copy Marvel’s model, and so every studio is going to put all their eggs in one basket and assume the shared cinematic universe is the only way forward.
So we know the-always-juggling-many-projects director Guillermo del Toro is developing a “Justice League Dark” for Warner Bros. and he recently said he’s finished the script. But many of us assumed it would be something fairly different from the DC Comics universe currently being put together by WB. Well, it turns out it is and isn’t. Evidently, it’s “totally different,” but still part of the same shared universe and includes DC Comics super heroes, some of whom were actually in the Justice League in DC’s comics at one time or another.
In an interview with Collider, del Toro was asked about “Frankenstein” and whether it’s connected to Universal’s intended Monsters Cinematic Universe (see?). The answer is that it’s not and it’s likely that del Toro isn’t making his version now. “I haven’t followed up with ‘Frankenstein’ so I really have very little to add to that,” he said tersely. But about his “Justice League Dark” or “Dark Universe” movie he was able to reveal a few more details.
“Right now, the only sort of shared universe project I’m working on is Dark Universe for Warners, you know, for DC, which is Swamp Thing, Demon, Deadman, Zatanna. It’s a very different universe. As to the plans to the other one, I wish I had an inside track right now,” he said.
This would obviously be a more supernatural and mystic thread to the DC Comics Universe, akin to the world Marvel is hoping to open up with “Dr. Strange.” Will it get made? Will it get slotted in the WB queue which is already decided up until 2020? Time will tell. Del Toro does develop a lot of projects, and not all of them see the light of day, but yesterday’s bold and big “Suicide Squad” casting announcements clearly demonstrate that not only is WB not afraid to greenlight big movies involving obscure comic-book characters, they’re also getting aggressive about it and going for broke with the stars they secure in these roles. Don’t count out “Justice League Dark” for now.
“Today, the completed screenplay for ‘Dark Universe’ officially went to weekend reads at Warner Bros,” Forbes wrote earlier this week. “The studio’s reactions to the script will be coming back in a few days, and the film could take another step toward production if Warner has a favorable opinion of what they see on the page.” Fingers crossed for those that want to see this movie happen.