‘Wonder Woman 3’ Axed, More Characters From Current DC Roster Could Follow Soon
According to a new blockbuster story from The Hollywood Reporter, newly installed DC co-heads James Gunn and Peter Safran have decided to put a hold to Gal Gadot’s iteration of Wonder Woman, including the making of the third movie by director Patty Jenkins.
Moreover, according to the report, the future is uncertain for the entire lineup of characters/actors that Gunn and Safran are inheriting from the Zack Snyder era, including Henry Cavill’s Superman. Cavill made a cameo in the post-credits scene of Black Adam, which is now available on PVOD, and announced on social media that he was back for good as Superman shortly after the theatrical release of that film. At the time, he’d just shot a cameo for The Flash in September, and was getting ready to put on the cape again, as Warner Bros. was in the initial stages of developing their first solo Superman movie since 2013. A search for writers was in place, and Cavill exited his Netflix series The Witcher (this may or may not have been related to his DC return), which was to begin production on the fourth season in the coming months.
Things are very much in motion at the moment, and Cavill may still have a future at Warner Bros. Only Gunn and Safran know what the future holds for the DC lineup — the duo is now back in Los Angeles from a creative retreat in Colorado, and will soon meet with Warner Bros. Discovery CEO David Zaslav to get the final approval on their roadmap. This plan does not include Patty Jenkins’ Wonder Woman 3, as the filmmaker recently found out. The director can’t really catch a breath — it was announced shortly before the release of Wonder Woman 1984 in December 2020 that she’d be directing Cleopatra, starring Gal Gadot, and the next Star Wars film, titled Rogue Squadron. It was then announced that WB was fast-tracking Wonder Woman 3, which forced her exit from Cleopatra a few months later. Development on Rogue Squadron then stalled, and after she started to focus on Diana Prince’s next story, and apparently turned in a treatment for the new script, that movie is now also dead. It’s unclear what she’ll do next.
Lead actress Gal Gadot also posted a cryptic message on social media earlier this week, thanking the fans and saying “Can’t wait to share her next chapter with you”. Gadot is also reportedly making a cameo in at least one upcoming DC project. Or is she?
Word got out recently that Ben Affleck, who was announced to be a small part of the upcoming Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, is not in the cut of the sequel that was screened to audiences just this week. This may be because they are hiding the scene for now, or because they are not planning to include it, as it may set up a future that will no longer happen. According to THR, studio executives are debating over including Henry Cavill’s cameo in The Flash for similar reasons. If Gadot is in that movie too, discussions about it could be happening as well.
If The Lost Kingdom is the last time Momoa will be underwater as Arthur Curry, Gunn and Safran could potentially give him a new franchise to headline. There has been talk of Lobo recently, which THR acknowledged — the classic Superman villain was also teased by James Gunn on social media over the past few weeks.
The future is also uncertain for Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam. A Deadline report on the film’s financials first stated that Seven Bucks Productions have plans for a sequel to this year’s film as well as a Hawkman-led spin-off. References to both projects were suspiciously removed shortly after it was posted. The financials of the film are very much unclear at the moment. A report by Variety suggested it could lose the studio at least $50 million, while producer and lead actor Dwayne Johnson clarified on social media that it will turn up a profit of at least $50 million. He also compared it to the MCU’s Captain America: The First Avenger, which grossed $370 million back in 2011, in that both movies will be pivotal installments to building their respective universes moving forward. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the current co-heads of DC Studios may not think the world of the actor after he’s essentially acting as the head of the company on social media.
Two more unknowns at the moment include Shazam! Fury of the Gods, which Safran is a producer on, and next August’s Blue Beetle. The former is a sequel to the 2019 beloved film that featured vague references to the DC universe at large, and could manage to move forward within a newly installed DC continuity untouched, while the latter does not have any ties to the rest of the universe that we know of. Zaslav has insisted that the studio believes in the film and that it will be released theatrically.
Plans beyond Dec. 31, 2023, for the DC universe are a complete mystery. A report from The Wrap a few weeks ago, which already previewed some of the updates regarding Henry Cavill’s future as Superman, mentioned that Gunn and Safran could be ready to announce their plans in a couple of months. Things are moving quite fast at the DC camp right now, but the company could wait for San Diego Comic-Con next July to finally make a splash with their announcements. By that time, The Flash, which could hold the key to rebooting the entire storyline, will have opened and answered many questions.
Miguel Fernández is a Spanish student that has movies as his second passion in life. His favorite movie of all time is The Lord of the Rings, but he is also a huge Star Wars fan. However, fantasy movies are not his only cup of tea, as authors like Scorsese, Fincher, Kubrick or Hitchcock have been an obsession for him since he started to understand the language of filmmaking. He is that guy who will watch a black and white movie, just because it is in black and white.
