I Have a Complicated Relationship With the DCEU (And I’m Not Alone)

I’m a huge fan of DC. My favorite comics of all time are mostly from DC. I love the Timmverse of animated series’ and the DCAU in general. I love the old Superman and Batman movies, but really only love the first two of each. Nolan’s Batman is awesome. Then, there’s the DCEU. If you go back through the timeline of my Facebook, you’ll find a lot of praise for the DCEU, even in support of movies I no longer like. However, that’s the problem with the DCEU, as well: the DCEU had a lot of good ideas and stories, but in the end, it’s hard to say it did a good job.

The DCEU has its ups and downs. There are some pretty good superhero movies in the DCEU, but there’s also some of the worst superhero movies of the 21st century. The DCEU has some rabid fans — mostly the fans of writer/director Zack Snyder — and it has a legion of haters. I think it’s way more complicated than that, though, and I have a complicated relationship with the DCEU which I think a lot of other people do as well.

The DCEU Squandered Its Potential While Making a Decent Amount of Good Movies

Let’s start with the good stuff, because there is some good stuff. Zack Snyder had problems with Superman, but Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice is actually a better movie than most people give it credit for. You can judge Snyder’s choices with the characters and the stories all you want, but it’s a stylish movie that was trying to do something different from the dominant superhero paradigm of the day. And yes, the Martha scene was cringey, but the underlying themes of it were good, it was just shoddily done. Dawn of Justice was also a ponderous movie that made a lot of shots and only landed some of them. Wonder Woman was awesome, and things were good again. Even Suicide Squad was a slightly darker Marvel-romp of a movie. It’s not perfect, but it’s pretty standard and entertaining.

Then Justice League happened, and things got bad again. Snyder understandably had to leave and Warner Bros. got Joss Whedon to finish it and he created slop. Aquaman, Shazam, and Birds of Prey were all good, at least to me. Wonder Woman 1984 was bad, but Zack Snyder’s Justice League was great. It was amazing to get to see Snyder’s full vision onscreen. It was easily the best of his three movies, and we should all be sad that he had to leave in the first place. There’s a good chance that the world would be a different place if Snyder got to finish his movie back in 2017. The Suicide Squad and Peacemaker were awesome, and Black Adam was a dud — I liked it but no one else did — and things went downhill from there. The DCEU petered out in a blaze of teases and flailing about trying to find a direction that fans would like.

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Anyone who says the DCEU doesn’t have any good movies is lying to themselves, but there are a lot of problems. The loss of Zack Snyder was a blow because he definitely had a vision and had the power to get it done; having a guiding will is what cinematic universes need. Still, the question of whether Snyder’s momentous, edgy, and violent style was right for DC is the one that should be asked. At first, I felt it was because it was the opposite of what the MCU was doing and we needed that. That darkness isn’t DC and that showed with characters like Superman. DC lives and dies by Superman; Batman is pretty easy and Snyder did a great Batman. Superman is harder because you have to capture the goodness and the power, but also the humanity. Snyder’s Superman only reached that level at the end of his trilogy, but most people weren’t happy enough with him to stick around anyway. Henry Cavill did a great job with what he was given, but what he was given wasn’t Superman.

The DCEU is like that — there’s a chance that if Snyder had stayed around, things would have gotten better. Snyder’s trilogy seemed to be the heroes becoming the versions that everyone expected them to be in the beginning. It’s cool that there was an arc, but getting to that arc did so much damage. Looking at what came next, besides the last few movies he was involved in planning and Gunn’s stuff, it might have been better than what we got. It’s hard to deny that the casting was great for most of the characters, and the acting was very good. There are a lot of strengths in the DCEU, but in the end, it just couldn’t stand up to the onslaught of the MCU. The whole situation was disappointing.

The DCEU Stumbled Before It Ran but It Didn’t Run for Long

The DCEU had all of the potential in the world. They had the greatest superheroes and supervillains at their fingertips. They had a vision. They had great actors and some pretty good filmmakers. It should have been dynamite, but it wasn’t. Early mistakes in Man of Steel ballooned, and the MCU’s action-comedy-superhero movie formula had grabbed the fandom by the throat and wouldn’t let go. Even with that, there’s still a lot to enjoy in every early DCEU film and it wasn’t really bad until Justice League. After that, it hit a rising action again and people were excited, but things quickly went downhill and it died a sad death.

The DCEU elicits a lot of feelings in DC fans. We wanted so badly to have something that could show the breadth of DC Comics, and we wanted it done in a more artistic fashion than the MCU, which was the DC way. What we got was often frustrating before it fell off a cliff, a lack of vision and corporate tomfoolery destroying any chance it had of taking advantage of its successes — Aquaman made a billion dollars and it was awesome. Even die-hard MCU fans have to admit there’s a lot of good stuff in the DCEU. People are still discussing now, so that shows the depth of feeling the DCEU left us with. The DCEU is dead. Long live the DCEU.

What did you think of the DCEU? Let us know in the comments below!