DC Out of Phase
Although Warner Brothers delivered three critically acclaimed hits thanks to director Christopher Nolan’s work on a Batman trilogy that starred Christian Bale, the studio clearly desired a cinematic universe that drew in multiple franchises, similar to what Marvel had pulled off with The Avengers. Man of Steel, a dark reboot of the Superman mythology from 300 director Zack Snyder, was meant to be the first entry in this saga.
Man of Steel performed adequately at the box office, but drew sharp criticism for its muted colors, mopey tone, and lack of strong characterization. This wasn’t enough to dissuade Warner Brothers from expanding their DC franchise, as the studio quickly greenlit the quasi-sequel Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice and David Ayer’s spinoff Suicide Squad. Although the films made a profit, despite their negative reviews, DC quickly burned through any good will that it had earned with audiences. There were four DC Extended Universe films released in 2023 that led to one of the most disastrous years in the studio’s history; the underperformance of Shazam! Fury of the Gods, The Flash, Blue Beetle, and Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom brought the universe that started with Man of Steel to an abrupt closure.
DC Studios is now in an odd place, as its most successful projects have been those that are divorced from any larger worldbuilding. Damon Lindelof’s Watchmen series for HBO became the first comic book adaptation to top the Primetime Emmy Awards, and Joaquin Phoenix won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance in Joker (even if audiences sharply turned on him due to the divisive sequel). A reboot of The Batman starring Robert Pattinson was also a colossal hit, and inspired the surprisingly mature spinoff series The Penguin, which centered on Colin Farrell as Gotham City’s sinister mob boss. Each of these projects were conceived as standalone entities; they lacked the type of mid-credit “teaser” scenes that are intended to foreshadow subsequent franchise installments.
It’d be logical to assume that a deemphasized continuity would be in DC Studios’ best interest, but David Zaslav’s regime has desired a sensation on the level of what Marvel achieved with Avengers: Endgame and its $2.8 billion gross. In 2022, James Gunn and Peter Safran were hired to kickstart a new DC Universe that would tie in various films, television shows, and animated projects. Although he’d earned traction thanks to his work with Marvel on the Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy, Gunn joined DC with The Suicide Squad, a 2021 reboot of Ayer’s film that essentially rebuilt the ensemble from scratch. The Suicide Squad bombed as a result of being released simultaneously in theaters and on the Max streaming service. However, it did indicate that Gunn was able to retain his trademark stylistic sensibilities whilst working within a larger multiverse.
Gunn has shown enthusiasm for his new opportunity; in addition to serving as a producer for every DC film and television show in the foreseeable future, he’s also developed a second season of the series The Peacemaker with John Cena, and directed the upcoming Superman reboot slated for release in July. However, the first official chapter in this new era of the franchise is the adult animated series Creature Commandos, which debuted its first batch of episodes on Max in December. Gunn wrote and created the series, which features a group of supernatural criminals hired by the United States government to perform covert black ops missions.
Perhaps Gunn’s goal has been to ensure that his DC Universe doesn’t suffer the same tonal inconsistency that thwarted its predecessor. However, Warner Brothers’ decision to yield nearly the entire creative output of its DC properties to an idiosyncratic auteur has led to a different issue; Gunn’s style, once hailed as revolutionary in the wake of “superhero fatigue,” is now antiquated. Creature Commandos has indulged itself in the blackly comic side of its source material, as the series includes graphic humor, language, and sexual material. The association of adult content with superheroes may have been shocking at the dawn of the modern superhero renaissance, but the story Gunn’s chosen to tell is no longer original. Creature Commandos is aimed at a niche audience that enjoys absurd nihilism, but isn’t put off by the conventional nature of the plotting.
Gunn’s projects feature idiosyncratic needle drops, stylized action, and “found families” made up of outcasts that find one another. Despite the stark aesthetic differences from other comic book adaptations, Gunn’s work has landed with viewers because of its sincerity. Guardians of the Galaxy may have been a lot rougher around the edges than Iron Man or Thor, but it was still a largely family-friendly adventure about a group of loners that unlocked a sense of honor. Guardians of the Galaxy helped make a fairly straightforward hero’s journey more interesting; comparatively, Creature Commandos has only included its moments of earnestness to justify the rest of the erratic mayhem.
Gunn can craft memorable imagery, but the structure of Creature Commandos is surprisingly conventional; episodes focus on one of the haphazard anti-heroes (such as G.I. Robot, Weasel, or Eric Frankenstein), with some form of tragic backstory peppered within a barrage of unsettling body horror. Creature Commandos’ underdevelopment may have been more forgivable had it been an object of cult fascination, but it's a greater challenge to appreciate a series that’s intended to serve as the foundation for years of subsequent storytelling.