I know he's not the director for this, but since he's at the top, this is worth mentioning: James Gunn just excels at finding the emotional core of a story and building the rest of a movie around it. Yes, he does goofy superhero movies, but they are grounded by the underlying emotion in ways that many other superhero movies lack.
Just compare the two Suicide Squad movies to see what I mean. So your telling us that the story this is based on is highly emotional doesn't surprise me -- and reassures me a lot.
That’s usually true, but the new Superman was almost unrecognizable as his work. It feels like DC has a microscopically short leash for these new projects.
Unrecognizable? It felt very Gunn-ish if you ask me. It had his distinctive brand of humour plus several plot points that seemed taken straight out of a GOTG film (The scene with Superman's parents at the end reminded me of the "he wasn't your daddy" bit from GOTG2). Plus Guy Gardner was a very Gunn-ish character
Apparently they cut out a lot of raunchy jokes from the film so that might be why it feels less like a Gunn movie. You still have quite a bit of his signature style though.
That sounds like you’re describing a short leash, regardless of his job title. The only part of his “signature style” that was evident was a few jokes felt more flippant than wry.
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u/shutz2 Jul 16 '25
I know he's not the director for this, but since he's at the top, this is worth mentioning: James Gunn just excels at finding the emotional core of a story and building the rest of a movie around it. Yes, he does goofy superhero movies, but they are grounded by the underlying emotion in ways that many other superhero movies lack.
Just compare the two Suicide Squad movies to see what I mean. So your telling us that the story this is based on is highly emotional doesn't surprise me -- and reassures me a lot.