Gunn Down: How Warner Bros.’ Quirky Savior Became DC’s Biggest Flop

Gunn is gone.

James Gunn, tapped in 2022 to revive the flagging DC movie empire, got the pink slip weeks after Skydance acquired Warner Bros.

The move was shocking but not unexpected after the meager successes and epic failures that defined his brief run with the mega studio. Gunn’s mercurial approach seemed like a cozy fit for a revived comic book empire.

The results said — or rather screamed — otherwise.

Gunn will go on, and we’ll see how he hopes to extend the “Superman” universe in 2027 with the “Man of Tomorrow” sequel coming in July.

Let’s honor this transition by looking back at the best and worst of Gunn’s cinematic empire. After all, he was given the keys to the DC universe for a reason.

A young Gunn wrote two “Scooby-Doo” live-action movies at the dawn of his Hollywood career. Neither shed their kid-friendly trappings, but they snagged enough box office love to open some doors.

The 2006 horror-comedy “Slither” doubled as Gunn’s directorial debut. He nailed that genre hybrid thanks to a better-than-necessary cast and a cheeky sense of humor. Worm-like creatures invade a small town — a hamlet ill-prepared to fight back.

Nathan Fillion, Michael Rooker and Elizabeth Banks gave “Slither” some bite, and the film’s gross-out humor proved sophomoric and satisfying.

Gunn’s 2010 follow up featured a mid-“Office” Rainn Wilson as a sad sack who decides to take the law into his own hands. In “Super,” he crafts a clumsy superhero suit and crushes evil doers with an oversized wrench.

He learns super fame comes with its own complications, and when he attracts a wannabe sidekick (a pre-transitioned Ellen Page), our hero’s life takes a weird turn. Gunn’s attempt to sexualize that bond was more icky than awesome, a theme we’ll see later in his DC days.

Still, the film’s affection for the Everyman proved effective, even clever.

That all changed when Gunn saw the potential in a lesser-known title in the Marvel Comics galaxy. He wrote and directed 2014’s “Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 1,” a vibrant spin on the superhero genre complete with perfect needle drops and sublime casting, led by Chris Pratt & co.

The film made the quartet into a huge new cog in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, giving him the freedom to write and direct two lesser sequels. Both still made bank, at a time when superhero films were showing some financial rust. “Vol. 3” made $845 million globally in 2023.

That third movie got delayed when Disney briefly benched Gunn for old, problematic jokes. His sense of humor runs dark on a good day, and the woke mob nearly crushed his film career before cooler heads prevailed.

DC saw Marvel’s “Guardians” success and wanted him to bring it to their camp. So, Gunn attempted to revive a potential franchise and delivered 2021’s “The Suicide Squad” for Warner — a soft sequel to the 2016 “Suicide Squad” critic dud.

Gunn’s take on the antihero theme hit theaters while COVID-19 protocols were still in effect, so it simultaneously bowed on HBO. It improved on the first film (faint praise) and proved Gunn’s plucky sense of storytelling could still draw a crowd.

In an unprecedented move, Warner Bros. Discovery made Gunn and his longtime collaborator and producer Peter Safran co-chairmen and CEOs of DC Studios in 2022.

His first major salvo as head of all things DC? “Superman,” a candy-colored reboot that often made the Man of Steel a side character in his own film. Super cameos flooded the screen. Superman bickered with Lois Lane (Rachel Brosnahan) and got beat up time and again.

Gunn picked a solid Clark Kent with David Corenswet, but time won’t be kind to Gunn’s messy reboot. The 1978 “Superman” with Christopher Reeve still flies high nearly 50 years later.

On the small screen, Gunn took greater liberties on his HBO Max series “Peacemaker.” The second and likely last season, which debuted last year, featured a full-scale orgy in its first new episode. That’s a far cry from DC Comics norms.

That “Peacemaker” makeover sank the show’s ratings after a strong start. Then, Gunn’s second official film under his new regime proved one of the year’s biggest disasters: the not-so-super “Supergirl.”

Star Milly Alcock stumbled during her press tour rollout, and critics hammered the film. The box office numbers proved ghastly, with reports the superhero flick would cost Warner Bros. a cool $100 million (or more).

“Clayface,” the final film from Gunn’s brief Warner Bros. tenure, did modest box office returns a few weeks later. The film turned an obscure Batman foe into a horror-like figure, but even its Halloween-timed release date (Oct. 23) couldn’t make it a smash. The film’s relatively small budget means it might eke out a profit, but Gunn desperately needed a home run and snagged only a single.

What went wrong? Gunn may be creatively spent, for one. Some creators lose their artistic vitality over time. It happens to the best Hollywood storytellers. Gunn was never an elite writer/director, but he carved out a respectable career.

Other wounds were self-inflicted. He took over a family-friendly brand and sexualized it via ”Peacemaker’s” second season. Gunn opted for less familiar characters, like “Clayface” and “Supergirl,” over beloved figures in the DC universe (Wonder Woman and Aquaman, for example).

He also unleashed the woke hounds on HBO Max’s “Lanterns,” as if it were 2020, not 2026. The show drew solid ratings but quickly enraged Comic-Con nation by turning Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) into a bitter white man and playing up the saga’s sudden racial politics.

Gunn was always too quirky and meta for the mainstream. His colorful and calamitous DC tenure was doomed from the start.

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Christian Toto is an award-winning journalist, movie critic and editor of HollywoodInToto.com. He previously served as associate editor with Breitbart News’ Big Hollywood. He’s also the host of The Hollywood in Toto Podcast. Follow him at @HollywoodInToto.