Oh Look, a DCEU Delay: ‘Aquaman’ & ‘Shazam’ Sequels Pushed Back, Again
It’s been a real wild ride the past few weeks for projects taking place in the DCEU. Now yet another round of film delays has been announced.
Today, several DC productions announced the shifting of release dates, meaning fans will have to wait even longer for some of their favorites to hit the screen. These films have already seen a whole round of delays and plenty of celebrity drama to boot. Against the landscape of the chaos going down in the wake of the Warner Bros. Discovery merger, fans have had just about all the bad news from the DCEU they can handle.
With all the bad news floating around about the DCEU, I now have to wait even longer to see this adorable jellybean and all his friends in theaters.
Batgirl and the Future of the DCEU
Last year, Warner Bros. and Discovery merged together, and proverbial heads have been rolling ever since. The merger has seen a slew of cancellations, but the most notable was the almost-finished $90M direct-to-streaming feature Batgirl. The film, alongside the theater-released Flash movie, was supposed to turn the DCEU’s universal continuity on its head. Late-80s iconic Batman Michael Keaton was set to reappear after more than 30 years, and it looked like the DC cinematic universe was finally getting its ducks in a row, narratively speaking.
This week, DC fans learned that HBO Max was also canceling the Batman: The Animated Series follow-up show Batman: Caped Crusader from Batman royalty Bruce Timm, J.J. Abrams, and Matt Reeves. Creatives from all corners of Hollywood are bristling at Warner-Discovery’s recent ruthlessness when it comes to cancellations. For Batgirl‘s team, there are reported “secret funeral screenings” before the film is locked away for good. And internally, the company is rumored to be expecting mass layoffs to further cut down costs. Yeah. It’s a mess.
I refuse to just write “courtesy of Warner Bros” here without being salty. This movie deserved better.
The Flash‘s Ezra Miller Debacle
The Batgirl news hit harder given WBD’s insistence on making a Flash movie – starring the problematic actor Ezra Miller. Their increasingly erratic behavior has left Warner Bros. Discovery with a limited number of options
Miller joined the DC Extended Universe in 2014, which also saw the announcement a Flash solo movie. They’ve been Barry Allen/The Flash in three movies since – Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Suicide Squad, and both Justice League cuts. A lot has changed at DC in eight years. Walter Hamada took over and reorganized the studio’s theatrical releases after Zack Snyder was unceremoniously pushed out. Then CEO David Zaslav came on and handled the merger with an even heavier hand. But it appears that no matter what they do, as much leeway as can be managed will be given to Miller (and their title film).
After reports that the studio was considering three options for The Flash, one of which included canning the film entirely, Miller released a statement apologizing for their volatile behavior. Still, Barry Allen’s first solo film in the DCEU still feels like a little tenuous. So today when the studio released an announcement that two major DCEU titles were being delayed, we were all surprised to see that Flash wasn’t one of them.
Aquaman & Shazam Sequels Delayed
Now it appears that Aquaman 2 will be pushed from March of 2023 to later than December. The film will come out just after Disney’s newest Star Wars feature Rogue Squadron, which is bold but not entirely risky. Meanwhile, Shazam 2: Fure of the Gods has moved from a premiere this December to March 2023. The follow-up to the slow-burn fan-favorite story about Billy Batson and his magically heroic friends may be able to swing the box office numbers that the first film deserved – but now we’ll have to wait for March 2023 to find out.
Aquaman fans just having a drink waiting for the damn movie to come out already.
