Man Of Steel Scribe Blasts WB's DCEU Strategy: 'This Is Not How You Build A House'

The reign of the DC Extended Universe is about to come to a close. With James Gunn and Peter Safran now leading the charge, DC's cinematic era will be rebooted starting with "Superman: Legacy." But for the man who wrote "Man of Steel," the writing was on the wall from the very beginning.

David S. Goyer knows a thing or two about crafting superhero stories on the big screen, having worked on both the "Blade" and "Dark Knight" trilogies. He also wrote "Man of Steel" and "Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, and he appeared on the "Happy Sad Confused" podcast hosted by Joshua Horowitz to talk at length about how DC and Warner Bros. were only really interested in chasing the Marvel bandwagon and developing their own cinematic universe. Goyer explained, "I know the pressure we were getting from Warner Bros., which was, 'We need our MCU! We need our MCU!' And I was one of the people that was just saying let's not run before we walk."

This meant diving into a big team-up film with "Batman v. Superman" rather than giving "Man of Steel" a standalone sequel. Henry Cavill's iteration of the character would never get a chance to lead a movie again, only getting to appear in other characters' projects. According to Goyer, this haphazard approach ultimately led to the demise of the DCEU, dooming it from the start.

A major criticism about the DCEU is that it all felt like too much, too fast. Marvel built their films up with some solo projects, an "Iron Man" sequel, which eventually led to "The Avengers," creating a cohesive narrative that resulted in big box office bucks. DC and Warner Bros. never really got that together, which David S. Goyer also places the blame on always having to deal with new executives. 

He elaborated on some of the behind-the-scenes drama, "The other thing that was really difficult at the time was there was this revolving door of executives at Warner Bros. and DC. Every 18 months, someone new would come in. We were just getting whiplash. Every new person was like, 'We're going to go bigger!" Hollywood learning the wrong lessons from movies isn't anything new, but it resulted in DC movies flaming out before they even really had a chance. He concluded, "I remember at one point the person running Warner Bros. at the time had this release that pitched the next 20 movies over the next 10 years. But none of them had been written yet! It was crazy how much architecture was being built on air... This is not how you build a house."

"Man of Steel" already had a shaky reception when it came out. Setting up a few more solo films and a sequel could've given audiences more confidence that Warner Bros. actually wanted to invest in these characters rather than simply cash the money. Hopefully, James Gunn and Peter Safran learn a lesson from the DCEU's failings.