James Gunn Needs To Stop Rewriting The DCU’s Rules

The new DC Universe is a tricky beast. Just when the rules of the reboot are starting to make sense, James Gunn and Peter Safran introduce a new loophole that throws everything off-balance. Keeping track of the duo’s many plans hasn't been easy: while they recently offered a progress update, the future feels messier than ever. Previously announced films have been shelved, others have been greenlit out of nowhere, and a handful of animated shows are now in active development.

It’s the latter that presents the biggest challenge where continuity is concerned. Gunn and Safran have been adamant about telling linked stories through multiple mediums; for all their efforts to unify the DC brand, however, an overwhelming number of projects won’t contribute to the DCU at all.

One of last week’s most exciting updates involved Starfire, a “younger-skewing” animated show that will serve as an origin story for the Princess of Tamaran. It’s one of a handful of projects set to focus on the younger generation of DC superheroes; while Gunn and Safran have tempered expectations for a Teen Titans film, a series about one of its most prominent and popular members feels like a step in that direction.

Given Gunn’s previous statements about the new DCU continuity, fans assumed Starfire would fit into canon alongside live-action projects. But Gunn recently clarified on Threads that Starfire, like “most [of] our family animated shows,” is an Elseworlds project. Elseworlds denotes any story that doesn’t take place within the main DC universe. Plenty of stories already fall under that label after DC’s hard reset. Matt Reeves’ “Epic Crime Saga” — which includes The Batman and The Penguin — is part of Elseworlds, as are the two Joker films and animated shows like Harley Quinn.

Keeping track of each non-canon project hasn’t presented much of a challenge so far, but the new DCU was meant to tell a unified, interconnected story across live-action, animation, and even video games. But Gunn and Safran seem to be rewriting the rules as they go, resulting in a confusing, even incoherent, plan. DC Studios seems to have more Elseworlds projects in development than canon stories: from The Batman II and Dynamic Duo to a growing animated universe, the new franchise feels just as disjointed as it was before the reboot.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with changing plans on the fly, but it’s getting harder and harder to keep track of the DCU’s many new developments. Gunn is constantly clarifying the rules of the new franchise on social media, and while that’s all well and good for the fans who hang on his every word, this will inevitably confuse casual viewers.

From the outside looking in, there’s not much distinguishing the new DCU from the old. Granted, the old DCEU really wasn’t working, but why overhaul everything just to slide right back into old habits? Fans want to give the new DCU an honest chance, but each update is taking the franchise further from its streamlined vision, and that makes it harder to trust in anything Gunn or Safran reveal.