James Gunn Confirms His Superman Will Be Different From Zack Snyder’s in One Major Way

While DC Studios is keeping the lid closed on 2025’s Superman, director James Gunn has already confirmed one crucial detail about his take on the Man of Steel. In the DCU, Superman is not trying to be dark and edgy like in the Zack Snyder era. Instead, he is a “family-friendly” character who can genuinely symbolize hope.

In an interview with MovieZine (via CBM), Gunn talked about his grandiose DCU project, explaining how there won’t be a defining tone for the different movies and TV shows that populate the universe. Instead, Gunn intends to draw inspiration from comic book history to offer a wide variety of stories. As Gunn puts it, “One of the things I love about DC Comics is that they’ve always been able to tell different stories in different ways. They’ve told stories that were more family-orientated, stories that were more adult-orientated, dark stories, light stories.”

In the case of Superman, that meant going in the opposite direction of what Gunn had been doing before he took over as co-head of DC Studios. Gunn’s previous DC projects, The Suicide Squad and Peacemaker are R-rated, violence-infused comedies set in the DC universe. His next project, Creature Commandos, follows in the same vein. So, there was an understandable concern about Gunn writing and directing Superman. However, Gunn has made it quite clear that Superman is a unique beast. Gunn explained that “we have something that’s relatively serious like Superman and then something that’s relatively comedic like Peacemaker all in the same universe. Something very adult like Peacemaker [and] something pretty family-friendly like Superman.”

James Gunn Is Taking Distance from Marvel and Zack Snyder

By underlining how Superman is a family-friendly movie, Gunn has buried once and for all the influence Snyder’s DCEU could have on the current cinematic universe. Snyder aimed to present a mature and dark version of DC characters. While this approach has its merit, it also loses much of what makes DC superheroes so compelling. They are, above all, shining beacons of justice in a world filled with danger. So, presenting icons such as Superman and Batman as conflicted men who spread death and destruction is a drastic departure from DC Comics tradition.

With a family-friendly approach to Superman, Gunn ensures the Son of Krypton can become an icon to fans of all ages, as he was for many years. Plus, the most exciting aspect of how Gunn handles things is how he avoids all the traps Marvel Studios created with the MCU. For instance, instead of announcing a massive release calendar before movies and TV shows enter production, Gunn is adamant about slowly greenlighting projects only as scripts are approved. 

In addition, the DCU will take some distance from the formulaic approach the MCU took, instead letting each project have the tone it needs to tell a good story. That means Gunn is rethinking his filmmaking approach so that he can tackle more diverse projects. In his words, “I think that to be able to tell different kinds of stories is kind of what makes things fun. One of the things I’ve gotten a little sick of is all these stories being relatively the same. I’m trying to step outside of that. We at DC are trying to step outside of that.”

Superman will be released exclusively in theaters on July 11, 2025.