James Gunn’s Superman has kickstarted the new DC movie universe in earnest, and now its follow-up, Man of Tomorrow, is ready to bring in the big guns: a new report suggests that Superman and Lex Luthor will team up in the 2027 movie to battle one of DC Comics’ most famous superfoes.
The Wrap reports that Brainiac will be the major threat that forces Lex Luthor (who, after his imprisonment in Superman‘s climax, finds himself in much more gracious confinement when he teams up with Rick Flag, Sr.) and Superman to put aside their animosities in the new movie. Introduced in the comics during the Silver Age in 1958’s Action Comics #242, Brainiac is a Coluan, a hyperintelligent, green-skinned alien race capable of living for centuries, who was first introduced as a curious collector, utilizing advanced technology to shrink down and capture whole cities for his research and collection—including the capital of Krypton itself, Kandor, before the planet was destroyed.
Although Brainiac has been extensively reworked over the years since his introduction as a techno-organic, mentally advanced despot, he has been a mainstay of Superman comics and other adaptations but has yet to have a major appearance in live-action DC films.
io9 has reached out to DC Studios for comment on the Wrap’s report and will update this post when or if we hear back.
It’s perhaps not too surprising that Gunn is purportedly shaping Brainiac as a new major villain for the still-nascent DCU. The director and DC Studios co-runner recently pondered that Darkseid, who had played a major role in the DC cinematic universe previously envisioned by Zack Snyder, was not something he was interested in revisiting yet, leaving plenty of room for other major threats (like Brainiac) to emerge in future movies. Furthermore, fans speculated that Brainiac could be Man of Tomorrow‘s villain after Gunn shared the front page of the movie’s screenplay on social media back in September, featuring an anatomical cross-section of a human head… of course, featuring a prominent image of the brain:
As the year comes to a close, it just means less time having to wait until 2026 for DC Studios’Lanterns show after Warner Bros.’ solid Peacemaker and Superman run.
The next phase of James Gunn and Peter Safran’s take on the DCU is the series showrun by Chris Mundy (True Detective) and starring Aaron Pierre as John Stewart.
In a new profile of the actor in Men’s Health, Mundy and Pierre spoke about the show, with Mundy explaining that their take on the Green Lantern’s heroic mantle is “as much of a buddy cop show as a superhero show.”
Centering on a seasoned Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) and on-the-rise John Stewart, Lanterns will explore their dueling schools of thought when it comes to superhero legacies.
“Our show is in a lot of ways about replacement—when should someone step aside and when is it time for the next person to take the reins?” Mundy told the magazine. “That push and pull between those two characters is really important. So much of the power that John has is by not taking the bait, understanding that you lose your power if you’re yelling and screaming. That’s what we’re trying to convey: he knows he belongs, so he doesn’t have to overcompensate. There’s a real balance there that’s just innately inside of Aaron. He’s big. He’s an intimidating presence just physically. But there’s a softness to him too. There’s a thoughtfulness. You can’t teach that.”
For Pierre, “the character just radiates strength and fortitude … That hunger to be the best version of yourself, which also holds you accountable when you’re not.”
Lanterns will be the first time fans see John Stewart as a live-action character, and the duo understands the importance of that.
“Aaron felt a responsibility, especially as a Black man playing this particular role, to make sure he really understood him and brought him to life,” the showrunner said. “I think fans will see the reverence he has for it, and that goes a long way.”
In the aftermath of the Peacemaker finale, DC Studios head James Gunn has faced an intense line of questioning regarding John Cena’s very much not meta-human anti-hero, who became the guinea pig to test out ARGUS’ Salvation prison dimension. Fans want to know about Darkseid, whose parademons can be heard in the trees and seen only by Peacemaker as the credits roll.
In a conversation with Screen Crush, the filmmaker revealed that the different universe his version of Salvation exists in does not stick to the script that DC Comics fans might expect in regard to Darkseid, who was featured in the Snyderverse Justice League.
“I don’t expect that to be exactly what it is,” he said bluntly, explaining that he loved the idea of the “Salvation Run,” the 2007 Bill Willingham/Lilah Sturges limited series (that was, fun fact, inspired by a pitch from Game of Thrones scribe George R. R. Martin!). “I liked the idea of supervillains building a society in this other dimension. And I liked the way that it was a very practical way that Amanda Waller and Rick Flag Jr., in that instance, were trying to deal with the problem of meta-humans who continuously escaped from prison in a way that I think a fed-up government might. Those were the things that interested me.”
But where “Salvation Run” and the DCU differ is on the origins of the world: in the comics, the planet was revealed to be a training world used by the New Gods of Apokolips, overseen by Darkseid’s right-hand man, DeSaad. In the DCU, there’ll be no New Gods connection to DeSaad or his master.
“You gotta remember the first and foremost thing is that I’m building a world, okay? And in that world, an aspect of that world is now obviously ARGUS, who are in charge of meta-human activities, have taken upon themselves to start sending meta-human prisoners to Salvation,” Gunn continued. “That’s the plan, at least. And then we’ll have to see how that affects and touches everything else.”
So don’t expect Peacemaker to bump into Darkseid despite the parademons of it all. But not just to make something original inspired by the comics, but because Gunn thinks that Darkseid shouldn’t be touched yet after both the prior DC movieverse and Marvel’s own Ominous Cosmic Big Bad Guy in the form of Thanos. After his MCU run with the Guardians of the Galaxy, featuring Gamora’s connection as Thanos’ daughter and how that tied that larger universe together, Gunn plans to stay away from that sort of territory for now.
“There are aspects of Darkseid and Thanos, [who] are obviously very similar. They look very similar,” Gunn concluded. “Using Darkseid as the big bad right now is not necessarily the thing, for a lot of reasons: because Zack [Snyder] did it so cool in his way. And because [of] Thanos in Marvel.”
After eight weekly episodes, Peacemaker season two has finally come to an end. James Gunn’s sophomore effort with the John Cena-led show, which exists in canon limbo between the DCUs of old and new, had a lot of hype around it. That hype became even more fever-pitched as the show was positioned as a direct follow-up to Superman. So without further ado, here are all the peaks and valleys from Peacemaker season two.
We here at io9 have made it our top priority to glaze Eagly, the best Peacemaker character (edging out Adrian by the narrowest of margins), at every given opportunity. He’s simply a delight. There’s just something about the Muppet kayfabe of its cast of actors having to pantomime (or better yet, act with a mocapped actor like in Superman) for all of Eagly’s silly little moments.
Whether it was Eagly indignantly ignoring the team to chase down some baloney or soaring into the fray for his big hero moment, the fact that CGI and motion capture turned a damn bird into a cherished character—and made viewers search “does the bird die” every week—is proof of how good Gunn is at weaponizing cute animals to pull at our heartstrings. Thankfully, the bird survived this season. Big shout-out to Dee Bradley Baker, whose wild career arc led to voicing the show’s undisputed best boy.
Peacemaker‘s second season felt distinctly sillier than its first. Maybe something was in the water with the show sharing a streaming service with Looney Tunes (before Warner Bros., in its infinite wisdom, got rid of the show) because this season had big Looney Tunes energy. No element emphasized that more than Michael Rooker’s Elmer Fudd-ass subplot as Red St. Wild, who hunted Eagly while toting a comedically oversized rifle. It’s always a good sign when a comic book show isn’t afraid of being goofy, and this whole bit was peak. No notes.
Liked: That big (albeit predictable) Earth X twist
Although viewers predicted that Peacemaker‘s alternate dimension was Earth X weeks in advance of when Gunn thought they would catch on, the punch of the reveal wasn’t any less effective as a huge “uh-oh” moment of the season. Kudos to Gunn for deliberately choosing background characters in Earth X to be of the mayonnaise complexion variety, while rapidly cutting back to our world—set in Atlanta, mind you—with very visible and, dare we say, drop-dead gorgeous extras turning the heads of the main cast. It was a clever twist made all the more poignant for fans sitting in anticipation for how that shoe would drop, and it dropped in the most hilarious way possible.
What’s more, it managed to make its entire Nazi world ride the line between being outwardly comedic and deeply upsetting, highlighting the danger Judomaster and Adebayo were in. We know Gunn tries not to make his works analogues for real life events (cough cough Superman), but letting Adebayo say the quiet part out loud about our current political climate not being so different from Earth X was some good shit. Robert Patrick’s character can keep his fence-sitting centrist hero speech, though.
From the moment Gunn became publicly cagey about where the rest of the season would head, it was clear the DC boss had big plans and cameos in mind. While it was a bit of a shame that, despite all the secrecy, he ended up scooping himself in the director’s commentary of Superman‘s expedited digital release, it didn’t make Nicholas Hoult‘s cameo as Lex Luthor any less huge.
Considering Gunn’s misgivings about his Peacemaker characters haphazardly making cameos in other DC projects without his prior knowledge, it was neat to see Gunn make Peacemaker feel less like a property stripped for parts to elevate shakier projects and instead act as an essential lynchpin. It can afford to have cameos that aren’t silhouettes, and big marquee players in the DC Universe can come play around in Peacemaker‘s toy box.
Gunn’s really good at making an ensemble cast of characters who are otherwise assholes feel like the most endearing, compelling, tight-knit group of pals. Peacemaker‘s cast is to DC what the Guardians of the Galaxy misfits were to Marvel, and that sentiment is made even more true in season two.
With every development where the gang was on their own splintered adventure, the thought of “I wonder what X would think/say about this” was all but impossible to ignore. And, not missing a beat, the show would deliver those moments. Seeing the gang’s reunion teased out was super effective because the show felt like its heart was made whole whenever the group got together and tried to overcome whatever harrowing situation they were in. Witnessing the gang giving each other shit from a place of love and dropping the pretenses of their joking relationships to get real was one of the best bits from the show.
Liked: John Cena’s evolution from wrestler to bona fide actor
Among wrestlers turned actors, the hierarchy of talent is still ironclad, with John Cena behind Dave Bautista and leaps ahead of Dwayne Johnson. However, Cena’s performance this season was his best yet; with his uncanny comedic timing, physical acting, and emotional depth, Cena was firing on all cylinders. You can always tell when an actor is just phoning it in compared to when they’re deeply in their element, playing off their costars and acting like a sponge, squeezing out every action and reaction they can from a scene. And Cena did that shit.
Watching him play a man with a silly helmet who bawls his eyes out when he’s seen as a joke—and later realizes his weirdo assortment of a found family is willing to kill his alternate dimension family to save him—was genuinely emotionally stirring. Sure, solid scripts lay the groundwork for exceptional stories—but the raw vulnerability and versatility Cena brought this season truly earned him the title of actor.
One of the strong points of Peacemaker‘s first season was its comedy. Much of it was Donnie Darko-esque, delivering terminally online asides about fandoms, niche factoids, or observations that would otherwise fit right at home on r/ShowerThoughts subreddit. But what made them work was that they weren’t throwaway quips to fill time. Some were overly long but worked because they were the rare, drawn-out, improvised bits in a sea of short-jab punchy jokes.
We didn’t get much of that this season. Instead, the humor hovered somewhere between “drawn-out Family Guy prelude to a cutaway gag that never comes” and Ghostbusters-reboot levels of “oops—all improvisations.” The end result was a lot of long-walked bits that weren’t worth their flimsy punchlines. Unfortunately, much of this was divvied up to Economos, making him a character one would reflexively brace themselves for in preparation for a ramble that didn’t go anywhere, much less effectively distract the bad guys while the rest of the gang engages in sneaky subterfuge.
It’s no secret that James Gunn loves his needle drops. And to his credit, he does it better than most. Much of his deep pulls are leagues preferable to the overplayed tunes other directors employ, which become more distracting to the scenes they’re tied to than a stellar underscoring.
That being said, Gunn got a bit too overzealous this time around. While yes, Foxy Shazam’s “Oh Lord” is a bop, its inclusion as one of three needle drops in montages in the show’s finale felt more like padding out a limp ending to a show whose penultimate episode ended on a stronger note than its own finale. What’s worse, many of the finale’s musical sequences felt like they would’ve been leagues more interesting as actual scenes. Speaking of…
Much of Peacemaker‘s thrust as a show felt like it petered out by the time its eighth episode and final episode rolled around. Sure, we got to see what happened between Harcourt and Chris on that boat. Sure, we got to see the gang have an emotional climax that deepened their bonds. But the whole episode felt like multiple epilogues stitched together to signpost where the DC Universe was going with portal dimensions, leaving the 11th Street kids in the dust.
And that sucked. Especially since its heavy-handed musical montages flattened moments when it felt like we were building up to the gang thwarting ARGUS’ plans with Planet Salvation, only to putz around with Judomaster, Fleury, and Bordeaux (who just show up as new members of the group without any real justification for why), setting up their own base of operations.
Having the legs cut under what felt like a way to get back at ARGUS made it seem like the show didn’t really know what to do with them. Plus, Chris getting black bagged and sequestered in Planet Salvation felt like a cop-out after that rah-rah speech about fighting back—and a bit of a waste of time with a show that’s otherwise been lean and to-the-point.
Ultimately, “Full Nelson” felt more like an empty punt toward the rest of the DC Universe that left its characters in a lurch. Placing Chris in a proverbial box and filing him away was certainly not a cathartic touchdown. We spent the whole season liking these characters. Having the finale set up other shows while shelving the 11th Street kids didn’t instill excitement for how Lanterns—or any future DC project—will “yes, and” with Peacemaker as an expansive connected universe.
Peacemaker season two is now streaming on HBO Max.
If you watched the latest episode of the HBO Max original and DC Studios series Peacemaker,the question on every Superman fan’s mind has been answered by James Gunn. We finally know who shows up to help Rick Flag Sr. and ARGUS course-correct Peacemaker’s whole portal door to Earth X (Nazi America) ordeal, leading into the show’s finale.
However, if you haven’t watched, a spoiler warning is ahead!
When it came down to who to get help from with finding the 11th Street Kids and where they took the portal, ARGUS director Rick Flag Sr. went to the most powerful villain they have in their pocket (jail cell). And that, of course, is Lex Luthor (Nicholas Hoult), who has a big price to use his tech to track down Peacemaker and friends.
In an interview with Variety, director and DC head James Gunn discussed the cameo that many thought would be David Corenswet as Superman and why it’s not (despite a certain Peacemaker x Supes selfie). Gunn even went as far as squashing our hopes to see an Earth X or Earth-1 Man of Steel, telling the trade, “No,” to the possibility: “In fact, David was very upset that Nick got to be on the show, and he didn’t. It just didn’t work.”
So no Nazi Superman, which in a way is a relief because we don’t want to tarnish the feel-good way Corenswet opened his era as the hero.
Gunn continued to explain why he needed Hoult back: “I needed Lex in the show to serve a specific purpose. And actually, what Lex and Rick Flag are up to affects very much what happens in an aspect of Man of Tomorrow. So all of that is connected. But this relationship between Rick Flag and Lex Luthor is a potentially negative thing for Superman and all meta-humans.”
He also discussed that it has all been in alignment with his plans for DC Studios as part of his universe reset pitch from the get-go. “I didn’t know some things about it, but I knew what the overall story of the DCU was. That was something I pitched to [Warner Bros. Discovery CEO] David Zaslav before we even took the job. I’m like, here’s the story. There’s going to be this movie, this show, this movie, this show, and those things all fit in in different ways. Some things came, like Clayface, that we didn’t expect, and other things have been a harder road to travel. But the general outline of that overall story is what we are following through Superman, Peacemaker,Man of Tomorrow, and beyond.”
The writer-director appeared onThe Howard Stern Showwhere he offered an update on the recently announcedSuperman follow-up. He explained that instead of merely spotlighting David Corenswet’s Clark Kent, the movie will also focus on Nicholas Hoult’s Lex Luthor.
“It is a story about Lex Luthor and Superman having to work together to a certain degree against a much, much bigger threat,” he said. “And it’s more complicated than that. It’s as much a Lex movie as it is a Superman movie. I relate to the character of Lex, sadly.”
When later discussing the ever-growing DCU slate and the writing process he went through for Peacemaker, Gunn offered a teaser of when the sequel will begin filming, stating, “That was at the beginning when I took on DC and I promised myself I’m slowing down at least a tiny bit. Although I am creating the Superman sequel that we’re starting to shoot in April or so.… I’m done writing that for the most part.”
Gunn teased the future of his self-titled Superman Saga in conversation with The Hollywood Reporter at the season two premiere of Peacemaker, where he revealed, “I’ve already finished the treatment for the next story in what I’ll call the ‘Superman Saga.’ The treatment is done, which means a very, very worked-out treatment. I’m working on that and hopefully going into production on that not too far away from today.”
Man of Tomorrow is set to hit theaters July 9, 2027. It’s safe to say Gunn’s slate is jam-packed, as DC Studios will next see the release of Craig Gillespie’s Supergirl on June 26, 2026, while James Watkins’ Clayface will arrive Sept. 11, 2026.
A new batch of set photos for DC Studios‘ highly anticipated body horror movie led by Kandahar’s Tom Rhys Harries, Clayface, has arrived online. Like James Gunn’s recently released Superman movie, the live-action Clayface movie is also a part of the DC Universe’s Chapter One: Gods and Monsters saga, which was first announced back in January 2023.
What is shown in the new Clayface set photos?
Shared on X, the behind-the-scenes photos continue to give fans a glimpse of the DCU’s version of Gotham City. Most of the set photos show a nightclub called Club Vesuvius. In the comics, the club is owned by a former mobster named Johnny Sabatino.
In addition, one of the pictured set props was a protest poster, which urges people to fight against corruption by joining the Joker. This would be the second time that the fan-favorite DC villain’s existence in the DCU was teased on the set of Clayface. At the moment, it remains unknown if these Joker easter eggs would be significant to the upcoming movie’s story.
Have fun with these! This was took yesterday by myself as the set was getting put together pic.twitter.com/vo0Zu99Ibf
The Clayface movie is being directed by James Watkins, who is known for his work on Speak No Evil. The screenplay was written by Mike Flanagan. Based on the character created by Bill Finger and Bob Kane for DC Comics, the titular DC character is best known as a fan-favorite Batman villain who has shapeshifting abilities. Described as a body horror thriller, the adaptation will reportedly feature “a Hollywood horror tale centering on a B-movie actor who injects himself with a substance to keep himself relevant.”
According to DC Studios co-CEO James Gunn, he and Matt Reeves were blown away by Harries’s audition. Before landing his high-profile project as the lead, the Welsh actor had supporting roles in movies like 2019’s The Gentlemen and 2023’s Kandahar. He also appeared in British shows such as Suspicion, The Split, and Doctor Who.
The movie will debut in theaters on September 11, 2026.
Originally reported by Maggie Dela Paz on SuperHeroHype.
With the season two premiere behind us, it’s time to see what new debaucherous misadventures await John Cena’s Christopher Smith in the second episode of DC Studios’ Peacemaker. Given the explosive finale of the first episode, we’re in for a lot of explanations from our silver-helmeted would-be hero.
Episode two, “A Man Is Only as Good as His Bird,” jumps back eight months before the show’s premiere, providing context for why Chris was being surveilled by his ginger-bearded buddy, John Economos (Steve Agee). Turns out it was all the machinations of ARGUS figurehead Flag Sr. (Frank Grillo). While Flag Sr. and Economos’ work relationship is tenable at best, Flag Sr. does pull rank by having Economos spill the beans over his son’s death. Apparently, Amanda Waller ordered that the details for everything that happened in The Suicide Squad (James Gunn’s version) be covered up, as she’s wont to do.
However, Economos hands over a file about Flag to Flag Sr., and he learns the gory details about his son’s death at the hands of Chris. And with that, the inevitable clash between the two has gotten even more anticipation boiling under the surface of Peacemaker‘s second season.
We then return to Chris in the present, and he is still in a bit of a pickle, having killed himself from an alternate dimension. Ever the galaxy-brained genius, Chris’ first attempt to hide the evidence of his Kafkaesque homicide is to sweep it under the rug, literally. But it turns out not even Chris can employ the “You Can’t C Me” approach to covering up a murder. After justifiably crashing out a wee bit, taking a shower, and having a bit of a cry, he phones a friend to aid in sawing himself into pieces.
While Economos is still surveilling Chris mid-lunch break, noshing on some McDonald’s, we’re introduced to a new Peacemaker character, Fleury (Tim Meadows). After some dressing down of Economos’ gun safety faux pas (he tried to pull his firearm on Fleury while his weapon was still in its holster), Fleury informs Economos that he was sent by Sasha Bordeaux (Sol Rodriguez) to serve as backup, since it’s clear Economos can’t in good faith objectively surveil Chris, given their history as bros.
Serendipitously, Leota Adebayo (Danielle Brooks) shows up on Chris’ doorstep, and he tells her about his pocket dimension. In the spirit of sharing, Adebayo tells him about the whole Rick Flag Sr. situation. She then advises Chris to stop using his pocket universe because ARGUS is alerted whenever he does. She also says he should surrender it to them so they can’t hang it over his head, should something go wrong, as a reason to send him back to prison.
Soon after, Adrian Chase (Freddie Stroma), aka Vigilante, shows up. It turns out he was the friend Chris phoned earlier. Apropos, Adrian shows up with cleaning supplies in hand to help Chris deal with his Weekend at Bernie’s pocket dimension whoopsies. Underscored by Foxy Shazam’s “Evil Thoughts,” Chris and Adrian get to hacking away at the cadaverous doppelganger.
With the doppelganger Peacemaker properly charcoaled in the pocket universe incinerator, Chris, understandably fucked up by the whole situation, peeks through the photo gallery of his double’s phone to see if life really was greener on the other side. The first album he clicks on is a 158-picture album dedicated to Milla Harcourt (Jennifer Holland). After thumbing through candid photos of them snuggled up in bed and other Hallmark-worthy candid moments, the gears begin to turn in his square skull to ditch his life in our dimension for the newly Chris-less one, proving men will literally waltz through pocket dimensions instead of going to therapy. Meanwhile, Fleury’s assortment of fratbro ARGUS militia task force, charged with surveilling Chris, is chomping at the bit to bumrush his house.
Speaking of Harcourt, we then cut to her attempting to nurse her barroom brawl scars from the previous episode to host their rooftop going-away party for Economos. That’s right, the gang is finally getting back together. As Economos notes, the impromptu venue looks really lovely. It features a whole string of overhead vintage lights that fancy restaurants use to create a cozy ambiance for their dining experience. Only their get-together exclusively features chips and dip, music from a dingy music speaker, and Bud Light brewskies. But hey, what more can a viewer ask than to see the gang back together finally?
But because we can’t have nice things, the ARGUS task force springs into action, raiding Chris’ house while the proverbial papa bird was away from his nest, partying. During their sweep, an ARGUS grunt drops a little DC Universe lore tidbit, saying that they’re equipped with scanners to detect extraterrestrial beings, which, as noted, is a major “dimensional discrepancy.” If you can forgive the above bird pun, know that it was all in service of setting up the Smith abode guard dog, Eagly, foiling ARGUS’ plans. We love an episode title that perfectly encapsulates the money-shot moments of its episode.
Eagly kicks tons of ass, taking out every task force member one by one. And because of Fleury’s bird blindness, he can’t take the shot and save his team because he “can’t tell how big this thing is.” For everyone furiously Googling “Does Eagly die?”, the answer is no. After handing the team their generous asses, the winged symbol of America struts back into the house.
Unfortunately, the bow on this wonderfully Eagly-filled episode sees Chris and Harcourt finally kind of talk at the party about what they are. Things don’t go well. While Chris tries to voice his concern for Harcourt since Task Force X broke up, she rebuffs, saying she doesn’t want to be seen as some damaged bird he can fix. So after stumbling back home sauced AF, Chris decides to go back into the hugbox of his pocket universe to see if things were as great with alternate dimension Harcourt as they seemed in the pictures.
But while Chris settles into the house, we overhear inquisitive questions from his not-racist alt-dimension dad, Auggie Smith (Robert Patrick), wondering where his son went. During Auggie’s out-loud questioning—assumedly toward Chris’ alternate-dimension brother, Keith Smith (David Denman)—we get hints that shit ain’t so sweet in the alternate universe for Chris after all. Apparently, his dead doppelganger had a pill problem and might’ve been messing around with another woman that wasn’t Harcourt. Chris, too blitzed to care, texts a risky “Hey” message to alt-dimension Harcourt and receives a “Hey” with a broken heart emoji in turn. Hopefully, our nails won’t have been gnawed to the bone in anxious anticipation of how Chris’ man-pain will lead to even more cosmic problems for everyone and himself.
Peaceful Peacemaker Pontifications
Adebayo reveals that she and her ex had plans to move to Gotham. In retrospect, they’re probably better off staying their broken-up selves, given how the low rent in either Matt Reeves’ Elseworld or a Creature Commandos‘ iteration of the city can’t be worth moving to.
The aftermath of Chris’ orgy reminds us that he’s a bisexual icon, even when he’s not taking the Justice Gang’s LinkedIn-ass interview well.
Vigilante’s surprisingly insightful diatribe about liking sex, despite Chris’ assumption that he wasn’t into it because of how freaky sex can be, feels like an act of bonding with his friends.
Fleury is another oddball addition to the cast. Notably, his bird blindness and lack of workplace decorum, as well as his whole Mean Girls try-hard act of name-calling to seem cool
Economos puts to bed that the plural of Pokémon is Pokémon, not Pokémon.
With Superman in the books, the time has finally come to see how DC Studios’ rebooted universe will continue with the second season of James Gunn’s John Cena-led TV series, Peacemaker. Even before the show’s release, Peacemaker existed in a unique transitional phase between the old and new DC Universes, leading fans to wonder which elements would carry over and which would be left behind.
The answer to that, as gleaned from trailers and the occasional Gunn interview about its premiere being not safe for work, will have something to do with pocket universes and Peacemaker contending with himself in some capacity. So without further ado, let’s see what Gunn and DC Studios have been cooking up.
During a season one recap that brings us up to speed, noting Christopher Smith, (a.k.a. Peacemaker)’s relatively normal upbringing with his racist father, Auggie Smith (Robert Patrick), we’re reminded that his dear old dad has a pocket dimension in his house. Unlike Lex Luthor’s pocket dimension, which he uses as a prison for those who slight him, Auggie (a.k.a. the White Dragon), utilizes it as a storage facility for all his gadgets, including Chris’ many Inspector Gadget-coded helmets. The explosive finale of season one saw Auggie killed, yet still present as a ghost haunting Chris in his pursuit of being recognized as a legitimate superhero. Surely, the show’s focus on pocket dimensions will prove to be a valuable narrative device later this season.
Why focus on the recap, you ask? Well, it’s already done some retconning on the season one finale. Famously, the finale saw the Justice League’s Wonder Woman, Superman, the Flash, and Aquaman show up late as hell to the party. However, Peacemaker season two’s recap is already showing its hand in taking creative liberties, changing how it incorporates its superhero cameos. Now, instead of the Justice League showing up, it’s silhouettes of the Justice Gang’s Mister Terrific, Hawkgirl, and Green Lantern, with Superman and Supergirl in tow.
Just like the Peacemaker finale, the recap only features Hawkgirl and Green Lantern actors Isabela Merced and Nathan Fillion. Appropriately, they barb back at Chris, with Hawkgirl calling him a meathead and Fillion’s Guy Gardner taking issue with Peacemaker spreading rumors that he’s a puke freak.
From here, the first episode, “The Ties That Grind,” begins with Chris rolling out of bed, awakened by Eagly on a cold winter night. After a reflective glance out his window, Chris quickly punches in a code and stands at the threshold of a pocket dimension doorway, wearing nothing but a shirt and his tighty whities, as he witnesses an aurora borealis light show as whatever cosmic mumbo jumbo morphs into his Peacemaker lair.
Peacemaker’s lair apparently doubles as a communal garbage incinerator; a “crypt-keeping looking” alien guy appears, shrugs off Chris’ “good morning,” incinerates a giant rat, and then waltzes back through another interdimensional door like he strolled right out of Rick and Morty. But we’ve no time for interdimensional pleasantries, because Eagly discovers there’s another door, equipped with the same keypad, as Chris’ inside the pocket universe. What’s more, just outside of it is a pile of off-brand-looking Peacemaker helmets.
After punching in the same door code as his own, Chris stumbles into a well-furnished trophy room with eerie villain music, and something is amiss. This adversarial alternate reality has a newspaper clipping of Chris, his father, and what can only be assumed is his brother in the Evergreen Sentinel, showing them being awarded them the key to the city for being a top superhero trio. To add more credence to his strange discovery, Chris is greeted by an alt-version of his father, who wonders if he’s been sleepwalking again. Chris, overwhelmed by this reunion not being a ghostly haunting of his father like in the season one finale, runs away in terror.
There’s a pocket dimension inside Chris’ home, and it leads to a world where he didn’t kill his dad and wasn’t a raging racist and homophobe (as far as we know). All things weighing on Chris’ mind that he’s, like a man, trying to push down as he drives on the passenger’s side of Leota Adebayo (Danielle Brooks)’s ride as she tells him about her apparent breakup with her girlfriend.
Instead of blindly parroting Adebayo, he suggests that her ex was probably concerned about her safety. Adebayo counters this by pointing out that Chris seems to think he’s invincible and immune to danger during their missions, despite her concerns about his bravado. Their conversation steers into Chris asking about his crush, Emilia Harcourt (Jennifer Holland), and whether she has spoken with Adebayo since the season one finale, which saw her hospitalized. Naturally, Chris is only concerned with whether or not Harcourt has talked about him, which she hasn’t. Womp womp.
Romantic pining aside, Chris gets vulnerable about his own insecurities, admitting that metahumans have apparently been bullying him, saying they make fun of him for his Jersey Shore haircut and “wearing a disco ball” on his head—conveniently forgetting he’s also said some not-so-nice things about Aquaman sleeping with the fishes.
“I know it’s cause my muscles are bigger than theirs, but jeez, right?” Chris remarks.
Adebayo reminds Chris that, despite the online trash talk, Peacemaker is a superhero who saved the world from a hivemind of alien bugs. Still, Chris seeks validation from his would-be peers as well, saying he no longer wants to be taken as a joke. This brings us to our first trial in legitimizing Peacemaker as a superhero: his job interview for the Justice Gang in a derelict strip mall. Things didn’t go so well for a lady ahead of him, storming out in a huff, clad in a full bunny get-up, but she’s not played by 17-time WWE world heavyweight champion John Cena, so Chris’s luck might be better.
Chris’ interview is officiated by Hawkgirl, Gardner, and LordTech owner and Justice Gang financier, Maxwell Lord (Sean Gunn). After some mic issues, Chris overhears Hawkgirl and Gardner shit talk him between asking questions. But instead of popping a lid like he usually does, Chris swallows his pride and recites his bona fides as one of the best marksmen in the world with virtually any weapon and his hand-to-hand prowess. All of which only translates to Gardner as Chris being a violent dude who kills first and asks questions later.
Ironically, Lord emphasizes that the Justice Gang does not kill—this prompts Hawkgirl to scrunch her face as she recalls her act of pancaking a genocidal world leader who allied himself with Luthor in Superman. Regardless, the events of Superman have raised doubts about trusting metahumans, so they’d like to be extra cautious with screening who gets to be part of the team.
Lord cuts to the chase, bringing up Chris’ background check, noting he’s served time for first-degree murder and his killing of “dozens of people”—all of whom Chris says were for good reason. But Lord wonders which ones weren’t. While spilling his guts metaphorically about reckoning with his indiscriminate violence from the trauma his father gave him and the death of his brother, he overhears Hawkgirl and Gardner babble on about butts and how Peacemaker sucks. Instead of being embarassed that the mute function on their microphones isn’t working, Gardner laughs in Chris’ face—despite being the guy in charge of this not happening all day with every other interivewee.
By the time Lord looks up to apologize, Chris has already stormed out of the building in a similar huff as the bunny lady, telling Adebayo that his only talent, according to the Justice Gang, is “sucking dick.” Incensed, Chris retorts, saying sucking dick isn’t a put-down, but a compliment. All the same, Chris is fully disenchanted with the idea of joining the Justice Gang.
Turns out Chris wasn’t the only person getting a harsh grilling. While he was getting the worst superhero interview of his life, Harcourt was receiving hard truths from an interviewer from the NSA, saying that despite her “having a vagina,” she suffers from toxic masculinity. Proving his point, Harcourt has a shouting match with the interviewer about her “maintaining a hard appearance” and burying he feelings. After trying to walk back and calling him a “see you next Tuesday,” Harcourt claims her black-balling is a result of Amanda Waller’s own wrath.
After punching the dashboard of her car in a rage, Harcourt meets up with Chris, who asks about all the bruises, which she candidly admits to having caused by bashing her fists against it.
While nursing her bloody hands and remarking about how virtually every intelligence agency rejected her, Chris plays housekeeper, wrapping ice in a towel to place on Harcourt’s knuckles, all while noticing her pile of overdue bills. The romantic sparks between Chris and Harcourt are pretty undeniable in this touching scene, but they’re trying their damndest to keep things strictly business. And what better way to do that than airing out their grievances with Amanda Waller?
As they’re commiserating, Chris inquires if Harcourt wants to talk about something that happened “the other night on the boat.” Harcourt doesn’t seem to remember much beyond it being a party boat and not wanting to be on it, but Chris begs to differ. Apparently, the two got drunk and bumped uglies, but Harcourt quantified their tryst as a fuckup. Chris, pained by her waving off whatever happened that night, tries to at least have Harcourt acquiesce to it being a fun mistake, but she leaves him out to dry.
In full mourning territory, Chris returns home, loads up his bong, and starts snorting lines of coke like he was listening to the new Clipse album instead of the diegetic musings of “Guestlist” by Swedish rock band Hardcore Superstar. Which then cuts to Chris throwing a nude orgy rager at his apartment, full of all the adult private parts danging about on screen with reckless abandon that would make any parent rush to cover their children’s eyes had they dove straight into Peacemaker after watching Superman, expecting the same kind of general audience camp.
While everyone is having sex around Chris, some fist-bumping him mid-act, it’s clear he’s not having a good time (but he does give a little smirk when being kissed by male and female participants simultaneously—a bi icon!). Still, Chris is having the definition of a bad trip, rubbing at his face in a dizzying sequence. At the same time, appropriately bisexual lighting of his living room goes full kaleidoscope as everyone at his party either dances or sexes their night away.
In a stupor, Chris decides now’s the perfect time to bail on his party into the recesses of his pocket dimension. The camera then moves through space outside of his house to show John Economos (Steve Agee) has been outside in an ice cream truck, surveilling Peacemaker. Economos then answers a call from Adrian Chase (Freddie Stroma), a.k.a. Vigilante. Evidently, they’ve become close enough buddies since the last time we saw them that Vigilante will cold-call him, requesting Economos to quiz him on owl facts.
Echoing Chris’ question to Adebayo about Harcourt, Vigilante asks Economos if he has spoken to Peacemaker lately. It’s very sweet that everyone, despite not checking in on one another, seems to worry about how Chris is handling the whole not being accepted as a genuine hero thing. Just after Vigilante reluctantly returns to his restaurant job, one of the screens on Economos’ ice cream stakeout set up alerts him to something being missed.
Economos then gets a call from a newcomer to Peacemaker season two, Sasha Bordeaux (Sol Rodriguez). In the comics, Bordeux served as the bodyguard of Bruce Wayne—who we’ve yet to see in the new DC outside his appearance in Creature Commandos—and later served as the Black Queen of Checkmate. Here, her role seems to be that of a member of Belle Reve, which employed Economos at the end of season one, and she asks him to investigate. After hanging up on Economos, Bordeaux storms into the office of Rick Flag Sr. (Frank Grillo), who’s busy massaging the bridge of his nose, watching the newscaster complain about Arkham and Belle Reve metahuman escapees.
Here, we get the most consequential conversation in the episode that viewers have been wondering about since its opening. Apparently, in January, a “Christopher Smith” glitch similar to Luthor’s pocket dimension incident—which nearly consumed Metropolis in the final act of Superman—occured. This glitch has been happening more frequently at Chris’ humble abode, hence why Economos was stationed to surveil his house.
Flag Sr. and Bordeaux phone Economos, who spots Chris standing in front of his pocket dimension doorway. Flag Sr. decides to classify the situation as a priority one threat until they determine whether the Chris glitch results in another dimensional rift. Inside the portal dimension, Chris drunkenly stumbles through the room and punches the code back into the alt dimension as Foxy Shazam’s “Dreamer” plays in the background.
Inside the room once again, Chris gawks at the life his alternate dimension self appears to be having as a celebrated hero who, at one point, saved Gotham from an “ultra-humanite.” Unlike before, Chris’s window shopping of his alternate dimension self extends beyond the trophy room as he starts galavanting about the rest of the house, which looks more like a lavish mansion than the humble suburban house he currently lives in.
After making his way to the front yard, Chris gawks at a pickup truck in the driveway; Chris’ brother, Keith Smith (David Denman), emerges. Bewildered, Keith asks what Chris is doing home, inquiring if his matters at Blüdhaven have been sorted out. Seeing one’s dead brother all grown up would send anyone, much less Chris, into a tizzy. But after the two hug it out, and are joined by dear old dad, also wondering why Chris is home, and the dudes decide to throw a party.
At this point, the idea of leaving his old world behind for a second chance with his brother and father—who, in this version, don’t seem to be raging white supremacists (unless you’re a “knee-high imp”)—is as tempting to Chris as kryptonite is deadly to Superman. Elsewhere, Harcourt is getting harassed by dudes at a bar and shutting them down in typical Harcourt style. Beer bottles get smashed over some generous foreheads, balls get punched, and it’s safe to say feelings and orbital bones get hurt. Unfortunately for Harcourt, the numbers in her barroom brawl get the better of her, leading to her getting punted in the face and thrown outside.
Checking back in on Chris, the Smith patriarch stuns his befuddled son with an “I love you” before retreating to bed, leaving Chris and his brother alone while Chris is no doubt running the numbers on whether or not he should pull a page out of the doppleganger playbook of Jordan Peele’s Us and stay in the alternate dimension. Before he can think any further, Keith asks how things were with his ex. Reading the room, it’s clear that Harcourt is the ex, so at least we can figure that the grass isn’t as green on the other side of the pocket dimension either, at least when it comes to Chris’ love life. Still, Keith says Chris should try to win her back, whoever this (totally Harcourt) lady is, even if she’s with “some jarhead.”
Still keeping up the ruse that he’s this dimension’s Chris, Peacemaker nearly breaks down when he tells his brother he loves him, which his brother shrugs off with a laugh that he’s being too sentimental while drunk—not knowing all 251 pounds of Peacemaker can pack a lot of soft boy energy. While Chris is left weeping, we cut back to our dimension, where Economos is debriefing Adebayo about Peacemaker’s pocket dimension being a high-priority threat under the surveillance of Flag Sr. and his organization ARGUS (finally, a name, linking us back to Creature Commandos!).
And yes, Flag Sr. knows Chris killed his son, Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman), in The Suicide Squad. Since the end of season one, Economos says Flag Sr. has been watching Chris in the hopes that he will mess up on a grand scale, so he’d have a reason to arrest him (or worse) for the betterment of humanity. Which brings us back to the anomaly inside Chris’s house, likely triggered by his dimension hopping and whatever is going on with his doppleganger, who is using their room as a shared storage closet.
After accidentally airdropping a dick pic to Adebayo, they hatch a plan to have her ask Chris what’s up with his pocket dimension instead of ratting him out to Flag Sr. Back in the alternate dimension, Chris is walking around the decadent Smith house once more and gawking at his bedroom and posters of bands like Hanoi Rocks (spelled Hanoi Roxx) on his walls. I’m sure someone more tapped into music tastes can note whether it’s in character with Chris’ raucous rotation.
Here, it’s confirmed that alt-dimension Chris’ ex is, in fact, Harcourt, with the reveal of a vacation photo of them all booed up. But before Chris can continue to romanticize over how nice his life is here, he pulls a gun on himself. Or rather, the alt-dimension Chris finally shows up and threatens to exercise his Second Amendment right on the back of our Chris’s head.
Fortunately, or unfortunately for our Chris, this alt-dimension Chris is also a bit dense, wondering if our Chris is a shapeshifter. Alt-dimension Chris gives chase to our Chris, who tries to book it back to his dimension. Alt-dimension Chris activates “magic stars,” prompting the wings of his helmet to track Chris like heat-seeking missiles, scaring up his back as he tries to put the code back into their pocket dimension, where they do battle. After some rocket tackles into some expensive-looking columns, Alt-dimension Chris beats the brakes off our Chris. But before he can deliver the finishing blow, Chris activates Alt-Chris’ jetpack, causing him to get impaled on a spike in the ceiling, thus freeing me from having to type alt-dimension Chris ever again.
We’re left with a shot of Chris holding the limp body of himself, wondering whether he should continue the charade in the alternate dimension or leave it be. Chances are, he won’t, and we’ll have more fun witnessing how he handles trying to pull double duty in his dimension or if he’ll leave it all behind to continue the chicanery in the alternate dimension.
Season two of Peacemaker will finally have Rick Flag Sr. (Frank Grillo) coming in hot for Chris Smith (John Cena) to exact revenge over the death of his son. Killing his squad leader, Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman), in James Gunn’s The Suicide Squad was a moment that made Peacemaker irredeemable before being hilariously unpacked in season one of the HBO Max show, which centered the antihero’s mistake as something that broke him—that and the bullet Bloodsport (Idris Elba) put through his neck.
In an interview with GQ, Peacemaker star John Cena discussed how Smith viewed his action in the moment: “To know that Peacemaker is willing to kill for peace is important because he does. And he kills a person who he looks up to and who he’s developed a friendship with. What we know about Chris Smith through the film is he doesn’t have many friends. And when he falls in with this ragtag group of people, there’s a scene at the cantina where everyone is having drinks and sharing and getting along, and like, you can see him leaning into having friends for the first time.”
Cena continued, “We don’t know any of the backstory from season one. We don’t know about how he’s brought up. We don’t know about his brother. We don’t know any of that stuff.” This is backstory viewers become privy to when they see multitudes in Chris he’s not even aware of on Peacemaker, but the killing in Suicide Squad makes it hard to overcome based on what’s given.
“You can give a note about [how] this guy’s kind of a social outcast, and that can stick. He’s found somebody in lockstep like Rick Flag, where he admires this person. It’s everything he wants to be. And then when Flag gets a different perspective on what truth is and what virtue is, Peacemaker does what he usually does. And that’s just kill for peace. And this is the first time you probably see that armor wear thin.” Deserving any sort of redemption is the last thing on anyone’s mind when he kills Flag.
In season one of Peacemaker, we begin to see that he might be deserving of forgiveness despite the red on his ledger, because Flag’s final words to him resonate: “Peacemaker…what a joke.”
The trauma of the mistake sets in motion the identity crisis at the core of the show when you see he’s afraid to kill. Cena described the moment when Murn (Chukwudi Iwuji) calls him out over it as “Peacemaker’s first chance to kind of get back on the horse after the Rick Flag trauma, and you can see he’s not over it.”
He’s seen by the 11th Street kids as vulnerable: “This hard-nosed killer who talks amongst his peers like the biggest badass when he’s hit with the moment of truth to do things that he wouldn’t even think twice about. He starts to question if what he’s doing is right.”
Eventually Peacemaker had a breakthrough by killing his bigoted fascist father, but now, of course, in season two, another dad is on the way to get even. He continued to describe how Chris’ evolution might change a well-deserved amount of payback when Flag Sr. shows up: “[You] want to root for the flawed character, and I think that’s what’s important about all the characters in Peacemaker. They all have their setbacks and flaws, but you all want to root for them because they’re all trying to do better.”
The DC Universe is back down to only two confirmed canon projects following DC Studios co-CEO James Gunn‘s latest update on the franchise.
Are the new Superman shorts starring Krypto canon to the DCU?
Earlier today, Gunn responded to a fan on the social media platform Threads who asked if the animated Krypto the Superdog short films were canon to the DCU.
“No. I love ’em tho,” Gunn wrote back, confirming that the recently released Krypto Saves the Day! was not part of the DCU, even though the character designs are clearly inspired by the DC head’s Superman reboot.
Krypto Saves the Day!, the first of at least four animated short films that will be released over the next year, was included on the digital release of Superman as one of its bonus features. Gunn’s canon clarification means that the only released projects so far that are part of the DCU are Creature Commandos and Superman, with the next set to be the second season of Peacemaker.
Looking further ahead, fans have Lanterns, Supergirl, and Clayface to look forward to, with all three DCU projects set to be released in 2026. Krypto the Superdog will appear in Supergirl, which will be headlined by Milly Alcock, who made her DCU debut as the Girl of Steel at the end of Superman, where she swung by the Fortress of Solitude to retrieve Krypto from her cousin Kal-El/Superman.
Next year will also see production beginning on Gunn’s Superman follow-up movie as well as a mystery show that “nobody knows about.” The Batman Part II is also expected to begin filming in early 2026, although, like Krypto Saves the Day!, the movie is not part of the DCU. Robert Pattinson will be back as Bruce Wayne/Batman for The Batman Part II, with Matt Reeves returning to the director’s chair after helming the first installment in his The Batman Epic Crime Saga.
The first Krypto short, Krypto Saves the Day!, is currently available on the digital release of Superman, but will also be included in the upcoming home video releases of the DCU movie, which arrive on September 23, 2025.
John Cena‘s Peacemaker has gone from the big screen to the small screen, and many have questioned if the anti-hero could potentially have his own feature film.
The DC Studios co-head James Gunn was recently asked if Peacemaker would jump back into the big screen following Season 2 of the HBO series.
“I actually know the answer to that question,” he said (via ComicBook). “And I am not at liberty to say under penalty of the Safran punishment, which is a loss of my knuckle. Every time I give away something, Peter Safran will take away another joint of my finger. It’s very painful. He uses a cigar cutter.”
Cena first played Christopher Smith in the Gunn-directed film The Suicide Squad (2021). The actor reprised the role in the HBO Max series Peacemaker in 2022. Cena made a brief cameo in Superman earlier this year, and his adventures will continue in Season 2 of the HBO series, which premieres August 21.
Gunn has been selective in what stories and characters are canon in the DC Universe he’s creating alongside Safran. Cena’s Peacemaker survived from the previous universe, and Gunn also recently opined about what the future holds for Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn, given her role in The Suicide Squad.
“That will be revealed down the line,” he recently told EW about Robbie’s role as Harley Quinn.
Another character from the old universe Gunn is trying to bring over to the new universe is Bloodsport, played by Idris Elba.
“I definitely am always looking for a place to put Bloodsport and figuring that out,” Gunn told the publication. “So we’ll see what happens.”
Gunn recently said he was busy working on a new script, which would be the follow-up to his Superman film. The filmmaker made it clear it’s not a direct sequel to the David Corenswet movie, but Superman would be heavily featured.
James Gunn’s Superman is gearing up for a digital release on Friday, and the director says there’s a reason behind its quick virtual arrival.
The DCU film hit theaters on July 11, with the film being out for only a little over a month before it was available to buy/rent on Friday via Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV and Fandango at Home, among other platforms. When speaking with Screen Rant, Gunn said the film had such a quick streaming turnaround due to the release of Peacemakerseason two.
“Well, it’s very complicated, but the truth is it is because of Peacemaker,” he said when asked what drove the “mindset” of releasing the film on streaming so “soon after” Superman’s theatrical release.
“I originally thought Peacemaker was going to be coming out next month,” Gunn added. “There was a lot of things that are beyond our control, so that Peacemaker is coming out now, and, at the end of the day, I wanted everyone to be able to see Superman that wanted to, even those people who couldn’t get to a theater before Peacemaker. And that’s really the reason for it.”
At the Wednesday night New York premiere of the DCU series, the showrunner told The Hollywood Reporter that his David Corenswet-led superhero movie “leads directly into Peacemaker” while the second season of the TV show will end up “setting up all of the rest of the DCU.”
“It’s a big part, definitely Superman leads directly into Peacemaker,” he explained. “It should be noted that this is for adults, not for children, but Superman leads into this show and then we have the setting up of all of the rest of the DCU in this season of Peacemaker, it’s incredibly important.”
Of what to expect in season two, Gunn added, “Lots of guest stars coming up, lots of characters that are showing up that we’ve already met in Superman. I don’t think there’s anything that I’ve ever done that I love more than this season of Peacemaker, so I’m so excited for people to see it.”
John Cena, who stars in the show, reiterated Gunn’s sentiments, telling THR that season two “is about furthering the narrative. Instead of stand-alone properties, all of the DCU is now connected, as you saw Peacemaker show up in Superman. I think what you see in season two is just a forward of that narrative. That whole DCU throughline — it takes the 11th Street Kids through their next adventure, but it also has a lot to do with the DCU going forward.”
Matt Reeves started to create a whole universe with the release of 2022’s The Batman, starring Robert Pattinson as the Caped Crusader.
The filmmaker is expanding the world with The Penguin, an HBO original series centered on Colin Farrell’s Oz Cobb, which will premiere on the premium cable network and Max in September.
In a new interview with Entertainment Weekly, Reeves explains why two series he had been developing, set in what he calls the Batman Epic Crime Saga, had been canceled for now.
“As we were writing the movie [The Batman], I was like, ‘Hey, you know what? I think there are some cool shows that we could do,” Reeves told EW. “It was actually why I wanted to make our deal at Warner Bros.”
Reeves and producing partner Dylan Clark had been working on a couple of series, one focusing on the Gotham Police Department and a second set in the Arkham Asylum. HBO executives gave Reeves notes and the filmmaker said that some elements will be making it into The Penguin.
“They were like, ‘We like what you’re doing, and we want to lean harder into the marquee characters,’” Reeves said.
He continued, “What’s interesting is that, in the movie, the big red herring of the story is it seems like the person they’re looking for, that the Riddler’s pointing to must be the Penguin, some kind of informant. This movie creates a power vacuum, and because Penguin is so underestimated, people don’t really see who he is.”
Reeves said he “wanted it to be, not in a grandiose way, but in a mythic Shakespearean way, this kind of great tale.”
Warner Bros. Animation, Cartoon Network Studios and Hanna-Barbera Studios Europe shared their plans Monday for the annual animation fest held June 9-15 in Annecy, France.
Among the planned events include Andy Serkis hosting a filmmaker conversation and extended look at The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim, the anime feature that hails from New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. Animation. Director Kenji Kamiyama and producers Philippa Boyens, Joseph Chou and Jason DeMarco will take part in the discussion and present the first footage from the movie that Warner Bros. is set to release theatrically on Dec. 13.
The animation process is currently underway for The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim, which centers on the fortress of Helm’s Deep and its founder, Helm Hammerhand, the King of Rohan. (Images from the project can be seen above and below.) Last week, Warner Bros. announced that a live-action Lord of the Rings film from director Serkis is in early development and eyeing a 2026 release.
The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim
Courtesy of Warner Bros.
Other programming highlights at Annecy from the studio include a making-of session for Creature Commandos, which marks the first DC Studios project from bosses Gunn and Peter Safran. Gunn serves as executive producer and writer for the Max animated series that hails from DC Studios and Warner Bros. Animation and does not yet have a premiere date.
At the Annecy presentation, Creature Commandos supervising producer Rick Morales and supervising director Balak Yves will share an in-depth look at the artistic process behind the series that focuses on Amanda Waller (Viola Davis) forming a military group comprised of monstrous villains.
Also set for Annecy is a panel sharing an inside look at the return of the Cartoon Network series The Amazing World of Gumball, in addition to a world-premiere screening of the forthcoming animated feature The Day the Earth Blew Up: A Looney Tunes Movie.
Get ready to see Todd Phillips send in the clownsin Joker: Folie à Deux—the jukebox musical! Though we’ve long heard the DC Studios film starring Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn and Joaquin Phoenix as the Joker will be a musical, we now know a bit more about the off-kilter romantic showdown.
Spoilers of the Week | June 17th
Variety cites insider sources as revealing Joker 2 will be “mostly a jukebox musical,” with at least 15 covers of “very well-known” songs with room for original music. I mean they have Lady Gaga so one would hope some original music will be in the mix. Composer Hildur Guðnadóttir, who won an Oscar for Best Original Score for 2019’s Joker, is also aboard the sequel, and Variety’s source notes her “haunting” musical cues will have a presence once more.
Among the cover songs is “That’s Entertainment” from The Band Wagon, a 1953 musical starring Judy Garland (which just so happens to open with the lyric “A clown with his pants falling down”). We can imagine that the music will harken mostly to old Broadway showtunes as opposed to a broader playlist of classic and modern hits like Baz Luhrmann’s Moulin Rouge. There’s definitely an old Hollywood romance vibe to all the imagery we’ve seen of the duo in their dreamlike mad love story.
Joker: Folie à Deux from DC Studios Elseworlds is set for release October 4.
Warner Bros.‘ Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow is taking flight with House of the Dragon star Milly Alcock, The Hollywood Reporter has confirmed. She will star in the feature as Kara Zor-El, the cousin of Superman.
Alcock screen-tested for DC Studios bosses James Gunn and Peter Safran last week, along with Meg Donnelly, who was also in contention for the role. The character is expected to appear in a DC Studios project (or two) before her solo adventure, but it’s unclear if that project will be Gunn’s Superman: Legacy, which begins filming this spring, or another DC movie or show. Supergirl is moving like a speeding locomotive and it’s possible the feature could be shooting in the fall, if Warners soon finds a director. Ana Nogueira is penning the script.
Alcock broke out as the younger version of Rhaenyra Targaryen in season one of HBO’s House of the Dragon, a spinoff of Game of Thrones. Now, she enters the comic book realm, with the new feature partially inspired by the Tom King and Bilquis Evely miniseries of the same name.
“Milly is a fantastically talented young actor, and I’m incredibly excited about her being a part of the DCU,” Gunn wrote on social media Monday. “Yes, I first became aware of her in House of the Dragon but I was blown away by her varied auditions and screen tests for #Supergirl” He added that she embodied the character as envisioned by comic book writer King, comic book artist Evely and screenwriter Nogueira.
Gunn and Safran have said this is not the Supergirl audiences are used to. She will stand in contrast to her hopeful cousin, Superman. As Gunn told reporters in late January 2023: “We will see the difference between Superman, who was sent to Earth and raised by loving parents from the time he was an infant, versus Supergirl, raised on a rock, a chip off of Krypton, and who watched everyone around her die and be killed in terrible ways for the first 14 years of her life and then come to Earth.”
In the comics, Supergirl dates back to Action Comics No. 252. Created by Otto Binder and Al Plastino, the character is Superman’s cousin from Krypton. Faye Dunaway starred in the 1984 Supergirl film, while Melissa Benoist played the hero on the CW for six seasons from 2015-21. Sasha Calle starred as the character in the film The Flash.
Woman of Tomorrow is part of Chapter 1 in DC’s slate from Gunn and Safran. The slate also includes the Batman feature The Brave and the Bold and a TV series starring Viola Davis as her Suicide Squad character Amanda Waller.
Alcock is repped by CAA, Curtis Brown Group and Goodman Genow.
Peter Safran, the co-head of DC Studios, has shared that Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom could be Jason Momoa’s final appearance as the legendary comic book character.
His comment came after the actor also said that the future of the DC superhero franchise is “not looking too good.”
While recently speaking at the Aquaman sequel event at the IWC Schaffhausen boutique in Beverly Hills, Safran responded to a question about Momoa’s future at DC Studios. “When I think of Jason in this role, he is the definitive Aquaman,” he responded. “He’s redefined it. … It’s really been an 11 or 12-year journey for him — a lot of the audience doesn’t realize that he was cast so long ago. It’s kind of redefined him. When he took this role he was known as Khal Drogo, and now he’s really Aquaman.”
Heading into Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom‘s theatrical release on Friday, the movie is tracking for a soft opening at the box office, which would pale in comparison to the first installment, released in 2018. The film, directed by James Wan, has also been met with negative reviews and currently has a 38 percent critics rating on Rotten Tomatoes. In her review, The Hollywood Reporter Arts & Culture Critic Lovia Gyarkye said the sequel is “frustratingly committed to formula.”
But for Safran, he just hopes fans “will really be here to support him [Momoa] in this journey. If it’s the end of the journey, fine. If it goes on, that’s also fine, but I think it has meant so much to him. The way [director] James [Wan] crafted this second film, it feels like a very complete story when you watch the two films together.”
He added, “We’ll see what happens with him beyond it. I know that Jason will always have a home at DC, and at Warner Bros. In fact, his next movie is Minecraft.”
Safran and James Gunn took over DC Studios last year and have been open about creating their own vision for the DC cinematic universe.
Last week, Momoa talked to Entertainment Tonight about reports that Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom could be his last time playing the King of Atlantis. “I don’t necessarily want it to be the end… [but] I don’t think it’s really, like, a choice,” he said at the time.
Though the actor has greatly enjoyed playing the comic book character, he understands that Safran and James Gunn want “to start their own new thing up” at DC Studios.
“The truth of it is, I mean, if the audience loves it, then there’s a possibility,” Momoa said of the possibility to play Aquaman again. “But right now, I’m like, ‘It’s not looking too good.’”
He added, “I love this character and [I would want to] play it for a long time. I kind of see where I would want it to go. And even in the next 10 years or so, like there’s a lot of cool things they can do. And I do enjoy the role and the world. So, I mean, it just comes down to if people love it.”
At the IWC Schaffhausen event, Safran was there as the Swiss luxury watchmaker launched its Aquaman-inspired watches, the Aquatimer Perpetual Calendar Digital Date-Month, in partnership with Warner Bros. Pictures.
James Gunn is clearly excited about the highly-anticipated Superman: Legacy and has decided to share some additional insight into the movie.
The co-head of DC Studios, who is also helming the superhero project, recently took to Threads to tease the creative planning into the movie with a storyboard shot.
“Spoiler??!! Well, probably not,” he wrote in the caption. “I’m constantly drawing Superman Legacy shots and storyboards all over everything. Here’s one I just sent to my department heads to understand how tight a shot was going to be we had been discussing.”
When a fan followed up with a question, asking what was happening in the image, Gunn added, “The camera is moving back with the character. For me, the full arrows are camera movement, the thin arrows are subject movement.”
Though details surrounding the film’s plot have been kept under wraps, casting has ramped up in recent weeks following the actors strike ending. It was previously announced that David Corenswet will take on the title role as the iconic superhero, with Rachel Brosnahan as Lois Lane, Nicholas Hoult as Lex Luthor, Skyler Gisondo as Jimmy Olsen and Sara Sampaio as Eve Teschmacher. Anthony Carrigan, Isabel Merced and Nathan Fillion are also in the cast as heroes Metamorpho, Hawkgirl and Guy Gardner/Green Lantern, respectively.
Gunn also offered an update on where Superman’s costume and the film’s music score currently stand.
“The costume is mostly done but we’re still going back and forth on some elements,” the filmmaker said. “A lot of the score – maybe even most of the major themes – have already been written.”
After another fan asked why the movie’s composer hasn’t been announced publicly yet, Gunn explained that he’s not sure if a deal has closed yet.
“I have to check,” he said. “(And yes I know that sounds crazy since so much of the score has been written, but when you’re riding the waves of inspiration, what are you going to do? I wrote most of Peacemaker and all of Creature Commandos before I had a closed deal!)
Superman: Legacy is expected to arrive in theaters July 11, 2025.
Superman: Legacy’s cast has grown a bit bigger, as the roles of Jimmy Olsen and Eve Teschmacher have been cast for the DC Studios movie. The film is set to release on July 11, 2025.
The Hollywood Reporter revealed that Skyler Gisondo will be playing Superman’s best friend Jimmy Olsen while Deadline has reported that Sara Sampaio will be playing Lex Luthor’s ally and assistant Eve Teschmacher.
Gisondo has played roles in movies like 2021’s Licorice Pizza and series like The Righteous Gemstones and Curb Your Enthusiasm, while Sampaio has appeared in films like 2021’s Crisis and the hit Showtime series Billions.
Having become part of the cast of Superman: Legacy, the duo join David Corenswet — who has the titular role of Clark Kent/Superman — Rachel Brosnahan — who is playing Lois Lane — and Nicholas Hoult, who is playing the villainous Lex Luthor. Further cast members include María Gabriela De Faría, Anthony Carrigan, Nathan Fillion, Isabela Merced, Edi Gathegi, and more.
What is Superman: Legacy about?
“Superman: Legacy tells the story of Superman’s journey to reconcile his Kryptonian heritage with his human upbringing as Clark Kent of Smallville, Kansas,” reads the movie’s official synopsis. “He is the embodiment of truth, justice and the American way, guided by human kindness in a world that sees kindness as old-fashioned.”
