James Gunn, Peter Safran Mapping the “8 to 10 Year Plan” – The Hollywood Reporter
A week after working as the head of DC’s film, television, and animation efforts, James Gunn and Peter Safran met with Warner Bros.’s newly discovered team. Discovery at a virtual town hall with CEO David Zaslav on Thursday.
For months, Zaslav said he wanted leaders to help DC become like Marvel Studios, home to the most successful movie franchise in history, known for its overarching storylines like the Infinity Saga. At town hall on Thursday, Safran emphasized that DC will focus on telling a single story.
Safran, who is famous for producing Shazam! and Aquaman. “A great big story about movies, TV games, live action, and animation.”
Gunn noted that he and Safran had already begun long-term planning for that story.
“The opportunity to make DC the best it can be – that’s why I did this job because I knew that Peter and I could do it,” Gunn said. “We spent the last few days with a team of some of the best thinkers in the industry, the best writers in the industry starting to map out that 8 to 10 year plan for what it would look like in the future. theater, in TV, in animation, on a large scale for these characters. ”
At the end of October, Zaslav nominated Gunn and Safran to lead DC Studios as co-president and co-CEOS, with the duo beginning their assignment on November 1.
Gunn became prominent, making Marvel less known Guardians of the Galaxy characters to a globally recognizable name. When he came to DC in 2018 to develop a feature, he chose to upgrade characters like Ratcatcher-2 and Polka-Dot Man in his 2020 feature. Suicide Squad instead of taking on recognizable heroes like Superman. In town hall, he highlighted his love of little-known people, sharing his affinity for The Metal Men and Bat-mite. But he also paid tribute to DC’s best known heroes.
“I love Superman, and I love Batman. I love their interaction,” says Gunn. “I like the ways they are similar and the ways they are completely different.”
Gunn and Safran will report directly to Zaslav, who this week told investors he has spent a lot of time with the duo over the past few months. They replace Walter Hamada, who stepped down as president of DC Films last month after holding the position for four years. The search for new leaders to run DC has been lengthy and closely watched, with the rise of Gunn, a top filmmaker, coming as a surprise.
Gunn spent some time in town hall on Thursday speaking directly with Zaslav.
“I know you’re doing all of this because you love these characters too, and you love the possibility, the hope they represent and that was clear to us from the start,” he said. Gunn said. “We would never have looked into this if that weren’t the case, so thank you.”
