After final 12 months’s The Flash featured each Ben Affleck and Michael Keaton’s variations of Batman (together with George Clooney in a shocking cameo), we’re about to enter an period the place there might be two live-action takes on the Caped Crusader present in separate realities. In a single nook, we’ve Robert Pattinson’s Bruce Wayne, who debuted in 2022’s The Batman and resides inside the shared universe referred to as the “Batman Epic Crime Saga.” In one other nook, Gotham Metropolis’s protector can even exist inside the new DC Universe franchise and make his debut in The Courageous and the Daring. Nonetheless, it’d take some time for this upcoming DC film to get produced, and whereas DC Studios co-head James Gunn has defined why that is, as a Batman fan, I really feel conflicted about it.
Batman followers needn’t fear about not understanding when Robert Pattinson will placed on the cape and cowl subsequent, as The Batman: Half II is about for late 2026. However so far as The Courageous and the Daring goes, Gunn, who’s co-chairman and co-CEO of DC Studios with Peter Safran, knowledgeable Collider that they don’t really feel the necessity to rush introducing the DCU’s Batman as a result of it’s necessary to ensure that the story is price telling first. As he defined:
There’s no set timeline for something. The one factor that I’ve tried to clarify to individuals from the start, in the best way that I hope we’re totally different, is that every thing in DC goes to be primarily based on the writers. Till we’ve a screenplay that I’m completely pleased with, that film just isn’t going to get made , it doesn’t matter what it’s. So, we’ve been actually lucky with some screenplays. You already know, ‘Supergirl’ got here in and simply, wow Ana [Nogueria] did such an incredible job, the ‘Lanterns’ pilot got here in, and now the entire ‘Lanterns’ sequence got here in, and it is like ‘Wow that is fantastic, fantastic work.’ And there is a few different issues that folks do not learn about, a few films and TV reveals which are greenlit or close to greenlit. However it may be primarily based all the time on that, on the story, as a result of on the finish of the day if we’re pleased with the story that we’re telling, that is what issues most. And as soon as ‘The Courageous and the Daring’ will get to that time, then we’ll make the film.
On the one hand, I fully agree that storytelling ought to be prioritized above all else. Too usually we’ve seen superhero films be given a launch date despite the fact that the script haven’t been written or a narrative hasn’t even been discovered. That results in the filmmaking course of being rushed so as to meet the studio-mandated date, and as a rule, this ends in a subpar product. James Gunn doesn’t need that to occur to The Courageous and the Daring or every other DC Universe venture, so it received’t be till a finalized script is approve of till issues get rolling, and I respect that.
Nonetheless, I’m a tad dissatisfied that it may very well be a few years till The Courageous and the Daring is launched, as a result of I like the overall premise. When the DC Universe was introduced in early 2023, James Gunn and Peter Safran shared that this franchise’s Batman film will comply with Bruce Wayne teaming up along with his son Damian, who might be Robin.
Don’t get me unsuitable, I’ve loved what’s been offered within the Batman Epic Crime Saga up to now throughout The Batman and The Penguin (which may be streamed in its entirety with a Max subscription), however The Courageous and the Daring is providing one thing new by highlighting this father/son dynamic, and I’m desirous to see the way it will look. Plus, as a result of The Courageous and the Daring is about in a world already full of superheroes and metahumans, meaning it might lean into the fantastical components that Pattinson’s Batman films cant’t.
The one different main element that’s been shared about The Courageous and the Daring is that The Flash’s Andy Muschietti will direct it, however as quickly as extra main updates are available, together with when it will likely be launched, we’ll let you understand. For now, the DC Universe will kick off subsequent month with the discharge of the animated sequence Creature Commandos on Max, then Superman will debut in theaters July 11 on the 2025 films schedule.