The DC Extended Universe has been a messy experiment over the past nine years. Though there were certainly producers and studio heads who could be described as leaders of the project, there was rarely a creator who acted as its face. At last, a hero arrives to save the heroes, and that hero is ready to chat with the fans on Twitter.
James Gunn has proven himself as one of the most beloved directors in the world of superhero movies, but he's now moved into a higher role. He's the co-chair of DC Studios, the newly constructed production studio in charge of the DCEU. That role comes with many questions, but he's ready to answer many of them and shut down some others.
A year ago, if one wanted to know everything about the upcoming DC projects, they'd constantly check the Wikipedia pages or read news articles from a website like this one. Now, everyone can just follow James Gunn on Twitter. The first look at Blue Beetle? It's on his Twitter. The hint at a Kingdom Come adaptation? Revealed on Twitter. The idea of Mr. Terrific joining the DCEU? That's on James Gunn's Twitter too. He didn't just start doing this after he took over DC Studios either. After the release of The Suicide Squad, he put out a stunningly long thread of other minor DC characters he considered adding to the ensemble cast in one role or another. In almost all of these cases, Gunn can be seen responding to fans' questions, comments, and concerns. He provides something new for franchise media; a human being to relate to.
There's this tendency to boil down creative efforts to the work of a single individual. Especially in headlines, we name one figure as the sole creator of a piece of art. Film, television, video games, and music are all almost always collaborative efforts. James Gunn did a percentage of the work necessary to create The Suicide Squad. So did Henry Braham, the film's director of photography. So did Lisa K. Sessions, the set decorator. So did dozens of painters, sound technicians, and special effects professionals. Of course Gunn's contribution is central to the art, he's the writer/director, and it would be a fundamentally different project without his hand on the reigns. But, calling it James Gunn's The Suicide Squad runs the risk of invalidating the thousands of hours of work put in by everyone else. People can't be expected to remember the name of every crew member on every film that they love, so they just credit the two or three names they do know. James Gunn is about to become that name, but for much more than a single film.
For the next few years, and quite possibly for much longer, whatever decisions are made at DC Studios will have James Gunn's name, face, and legacy attached to them. It's already started. Did James Gunn personally cancel the production of Wonder Woman 3? Probably not, or at least, he probably didn't do it all by himself. But just about every article on the subject mentions his involvement explicitly, usually within the first few words. James Gunn will be the name used to refer to an otherwise faceless cadre of creators and business execs who make the decisions. We'll never really know who said or did what, but we will all imagine that Gunn is the one calling the shots. This will sometimes lead people to misunderstand or misrepresent events, but it does give the monolithic entity something resembling a human soul. The "face of the franchise" position is often a thankless one, but Gunn is a better fit for it than others.
When a decision involving the Star Wars franchise sparks derision, that anger is directed toward Kathleen Kennedy. Does anyone complaining and cursing her name know what she actually does? Hard to say. For the record, she's a producer who entered the industry in an assistant position under 1941 producer John Milius, where she became a frequent collaborator of Stephen Spielberg. She co-founded Amblin Entertainment, became co-chair of Lucasfilm alongside George Lucas, and took over when Lucas sold the company to Disney. When YouTube changes the algorithm and hurts a bunch of people, they scream at Susan Wojcicki. She was Google's first marketing manager back in 1999, she oversaw the purchase of YouTube in 2006, and she ascended to the video platform's CEO in 2014.
The obvious comparison point for Gunn's position is Kevin Feige, the go-to face of Marvel Studios. Feige was made an associate producer on X-Men in 2000 for his encyclopedic knowledge of Marvel Comics. He manifested the cinematic universe concept a decade before he got the power to make it. Gunn has taken a spot among these figures, not by being a powerful producer with all the right connections, but by making movies out of the properties that people actually like.
The future of James Gunn's tenure with DC Studios will involve a lot of people being angry at him personally for decisions made by many people. The difference between Gunn and the many other targets of rage is that he's a creator in the universe first and an executive second. He's willing and able to talk shop with the nerds who love his work because he feels comfortable in that realm. The DCEU has a face now, but it also has a leader who can use his talents for the benefit of everyone involved. Gunn has always been the best at taking characters and concepts that no one cared about and turning them into beloved icons. He can communicate what he loves about a property better than anyone else, and that's what's going to make him such an asset to DC in the future.