Along with discussing his firing by Marvel Studios, director James Gunn’s recently lengthy interview with The New York Times also touched upon the endless fanboy debate that will never die – DC vs. Marvel.
Between the two “Guardians of the Galaxy” movies and the upcoming “The Suicide Squad,” he’s now the first credited director who has made live-action films for both DC and Marvel Studios.
This gives him a unique perspective on what it’s like to work for both and where the strengths of each lie. He explains there aren’t as many differences as people think between Disney and Warners’ approaches to their respective franchises. On the Marvel front:
“There’s no doubt [Marvel chief] Kevin Feige is way more involved with editing than people are at Warner Bros. He gives more notes. You don’t have to take them and I don’t always take them. Then again, I had more problems. If you saw the first cut of “Guardians” 1, it had more problems, because that was my first time making something so gigantic and there’s some learning to what works and what doesn’t, carving away the excess stuff. The truth is, as Marvel goes on and Kevin Feige starts to amass ownership of half of all film in general, he’s more spread out.”
On the DC front, he sees the appeal and strength lie in how, unlike Marvel and Disney which has to stick to a certain formula and universe and keep it all coherent, DC has the ability to be completely different with each film and really change things up in ways to keep it fresh – even if it means the results are more uneven overall.
Asked if it seems strange DC films can encompass the very R-rated “The Suicide Squad” and the much more family-friendly “Shazam!,” he says:
“I think it’s great. That is the one of the ways in which DC can distinguish itself from Marvel. What I do is very different from what Peyton Reed does, it’s very different from what Jon Favreau did, it’s different from Taika Waititi. But not as different as ‘Shazam!’ and ‘Suicide Squad’ however. I think the current batch of folks over at Warner Bros. are really interested in building out a world and creating something that’s unique to the filmmakers. We’re in a strange time, so anything can happen.
I do find, because of the ability to do different stuff in the DC multiverse, it’s fun. They’re starting to really resemble their comic books. The Marvel Universe has always been a little more cohesive, and DC has always had more great single runs. They had The Dark Knight Returns. They had Watchmen. They had The Killing Joke. They had Alan Moore’s Swamp Thing.
The fact that they did ‘Joker,’ which is a totally different type of movie, that to me is cool. I’m very excited about Matt’s movie [‘The Batman,’ from Matt Reeves]. They’re getting some really good filmmakers involved. They’re always going to be hit or miss – I just don’t want them to get boring.”
Gunn also appears in a new featurette about the IMAX-certified RED cameras they used to shoot “The Suicide Squad” which allowed them to create a dynamic shooting style that wasn’t possible before the creation of the latest iteration of the camera.
The clip also boasts plenty of new footage from the movie that hasn’t been seen before. “The Suicide Squad” arrives in theaters and on HBO Max on August 6th.
