It's not easy being DC. Sure, Superman and Batman are pop culture icons recognised the world over, but when it comes to movies they have found themselves stuck in the shadow of their Marvel counterparts.

Warner Bros clearly set itself on the path to building a rival to the MCU, but their plans for the 'DCEU' (an unofficial tag which we're sticking with, even if it did start as a joke) struggled through the Batmen, Supermen and Suicide Squad and hit a major bump with the little-loved Justice League.

Since then the rumours have been flying. More spin-offs and sequels have been reported than the studio could hope to deliver, with a series of totally unrelated movies apparently in development too. Then there's the problem with Batfleck.

What exactly is going on at DC?

The trouble with the DCEU

preview for Justice League 'Thunder' trailer

To give Warner their due, they tried to do things right, emulating Marvel Studios by introducing a handful of heroes and building up to the Justice League team-up. But the foundations turned out to be shaky, thanks to the divisive Man of Steel followed by the little-loved Batman v Superman and Suicide Squad.

Wonder Woman received a much more glowing reception, but it was clear that Zack Snyder – who was ostensibly running the show – did not have the magic touch that Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige brought to the MCU. Rather than building on successes as Marvel did in Avengers, Justice League was a mess that tried to learn from the mistakes of BvS and the popularity of its rival, but ended up as a film that felt as if it had been made for no one – and it seriously underperformed at the box office.

Jason Momoa's Aquaman is coming at the end of 2018, and although spin-offs for The Flash (Ezra Miller) and Cyborg (Ray Fisher) have been promised, Warner has been unusually quiet about what is actually going on with those movies.

Standalones

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DC Comics

The loss of confidence in the DCEU project is nowhere clearer than in the news that Warner Bros is working on a series of films that has no connection to its recent movies. Working under a 'DC Dark' or 'DC Black' banner, a Joker origin movie set in the '80s is reportedly in the works from The Hangover director Todd Phillips, with Martin Scorsese producing and Joaquin Phoenix potentially starring.

Yes, Joaquin Phoenix – Jared Leto (who played the Joker in Suicide Squad) will not feature in this film. Indeed, it will have nothing to do with the worldbuilding they have invested in over recent years. Could this be the beginning of the end for the DCEU project?

Another new Batman?

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Warner Bros.

The MCU has Robert Downey Jr (for now, at least, but they got a good decade out of him), and his DCEU counterpart is arguably Ben Affleck. Affleck's take on an older, grizzled Batman has both its fans and detractors, but Warner was surely trying to hang the franchise on his star power, much as Marvel did with Downey as they worked on establishing lesser-known actors like Chris Hemsworth and Chris Evans around him.

But Downey found himself surrounded by well-liked MCU blockbusters, while Affleck's films have received a far shakier reception. Affleck hasn't seemed very pleased by the state of the DCEU, and while initially signing up to direct a solo Batman movie, he eventually stepped down in favour of Cloverfield's Matt Reeves.

Rumours continue to circulate that Affleck will be replaced for Reeves' movie, which, like the Joker film, could be completely standalone without any ties to the current continuity. And if Affleck leaves the DCEU, can it continue without him at this relatively early stage?

The DCEU lives!

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Twitter / @GalGadot//Warner Bros.

But this doesn't mean that Warner has canned the DCEU yet. We've already mentioned Aquaman, Patty Jenkins and Gal Gadot are working on Wonder Woman 2, and Miller's Flash movie seems to be slowly grinding into gear.

Then there's Shazam! which stars Zachary Levi as the magically-powered Superman analogue. It's unclear whether the 2019 movie will be connected to the DCEU or not at this point, although it's worth noting that director David F Sandberg seems to be taking the film in a kid-friendly direction not seen so far in the franchise, and could be considered at odds with it.

There are lots of other movies reportedly in development. Some have obvious connections to the DCEU, chiefly the Suicide Squad spin-offs including Suicide Squad 2, Birds of Prey, a Joker and Harley Quinn team-up movie and a solo Joker movie starring Jared Leto.

Other rumoured projects (and there are loads of them) could easily be wrapped into the DCEU or not at this stage – Batgirl, Nightwing, Green Lantern Corps and Stephen Spielberg's Blackhawk to name but a few.

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Warner Bros.

If all the reports are to be believed, Warner seems to be hedging its bets at this uncertain stage. If the DCEU can be salvaged after Justice League, we could be in for more stories of Gadot's Princess Diana and Margot Robbie's Harley Quinn for years to come – with some unrelated standalones thrown in for good measure.

But if it collapses – and Affleck's departure would surely help speed up that process – they could just leave the complicated cinematic interconnectedness to Marvel, dialling back on the DCEU project and focusing on telling superhero stories for their own sake. You just have to look at Christopher Reeve's Superman or Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy to see that that approach has been very profitable for them in the past.

With all the changes going on at DC Entertainment lately (including the departure of president Diane Nelson), we wonder whether this will be a time for the company to assess their business plan and make some big decisions. They already have a strong new mantra: "good movies work better". Now is the time to put that into practice.


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Headshot of Hugh Armitage
Hugh Armitage
Hugh Armitage is Movies Editor at Digital Spy.