James Gunn spent four years trying to reboot DC. Skydance's new owners needed just five weeks to give him the boot.
On October 5, Skydance chief David Ellison and co-CEO Ynon Kreiz named Gunn and Peter Safran as DC Studios co-chairmen in their incoming leadership team. The Warner Bros. Discovery takeover closed the following day. The pair were not simply holdovers from the previous regime. Skydance's new owners had explicitly endorsed their continued leadership.
On November 9, Skydance named former Marvel executive Jeremy Latcham to replace them from December 1. It seems the owners have pulled the trigger and ended Gunn's executive reign at DC. For now, Gunn can still make its films; he just no longer gets to call the shots.
The official language was polite. The circumstances, less so. According to The Hollywood Reporter, Ellison and Kreiz visited Gunn and Safran on November 6 and informed them their leadership roles were ending. Sources described tensions over who controlled DC Studios and whom its executives should answer to. Previously, Gunn and Safran reported directly to the Warner Bros. Discovery chief executive. Their replacement, however, will answer to Skydance film bosses Dana Goldberg and Josh Greenstein, placing DC more firmly under the parent company's film division.
There was also the awkward business of business. Gunn's Superman earned US$618.7 million worldwide against a reported US$225 million production budget. The Hollywood Reporter says it made money, but disappointed Skydance's expectations for a franchise-defining relaunch. Superman could fly, just not high enough.
Supergirl was another matter entirely. Its US$126.5 million worldwide gross did not even match its reported US$170 million production budget, before cinemas took their share or marketing bills arrived. TheWrap projected theatrical losses exceeding US$85 million, and given the film's eventual box-office performance, even that estimate may have been generous. Quite a financial crater for a franchise supposedly finding its feet.
The record was not uniformly disastrous. Clayface, directed by James Watkins and produced by Gunn and Safran, has grossed around US$109 million on a reported US$40–44 million budget. HBO's Lanterns averaged a reported 19.3 million global viewers, although its 67% Rotten Tomatoes audience score suggests viewers were considerably less enthusiastic than critics.
Online, some SnyderVerse loyalists celebrated Gunn's departure as a firing, renewing calls for Zack Snyder's return. Other DC fans lamented yet another shake-up. Neither camp speaks for the entire audience, but Gunn's exit has certainly given his detractors something to cheer about.
In an Instagram statement, Gunn acknowledged disliking the "at-times corporate nature of the job" and said he was "incredibly relieved and excited to get back to pure filmmaking". He remains writer-director of Man of Tomorrow, due July 9, 2027.
Gunn was supposed to be the man who rescued DC from its box-office troubles. Instead, his executive reign has ended with a new owner demanding a different direction. Perhaps the real kryptonite was a balance sheet that failed to impress the people signing the cheques.
