With all the buzz growing about The Avengers movie, there’s been a lot of chatter among fans about whether Warner Bros. can pull off the same with a Justice League movie using all the big tentpole characters based on the movies in the works and to date. At this stage of the game, we’ve got multiple movies and projects in the works and done where the characters all have their own world and simply don’t cross. Christopher Nolan’s Batman series, the varied Superman works over the years and now in development via a reboot of sorts, this summers Green Lantern feature, the David E. Kelley Wonder Woman TV series and projects involving both The Flash and Aquaman progress along at varying stages. That said, everything that has come out of the Hollywood creative side has said that these characters exist in their own world, and that’s that.
So along comes a story out of the LA Times profiling upcoming Warner head Jeff Robinov with how they company will handle things after the massive Harry Potter franchise finishes this summer. They’ve said in the past that it will be heavy with DC Comics characters since there is so much material to mine there, but the profile goes further with the LA Times saying, “Robinov is] aiming to release new Batman and Superman films in 2012 and Justice League, a teaming of DC’s top heroes, in 2013.”
That’s certainly news, though not a direct quote, so it’s hard to say how things were actually worded. It is hard to imagine Warner being able to pull of what Marvel is doing, especially with how they work their financials and deals with actors, but a Justice League movie is entirely doable – just with a whole different slate of actors. If Warner continues to view the DC Universe as separate properties to work through, creating a Justice League movie that’s completely unrelated to everything else certainly would be the way to go. Smallville exists in its own world and seeing Warner go that route makes the most sense. Work with younger, cheaper actors to portray the early careers of the characters as they come together and you can keep it under budget. It does make for some confusion among mainstream audiences, especially when you have someone different playing the characters that are in current movies ala Batman, Superman and Green Lantern, but these characters have all had multiple actors over the years and it could conceivably work well enough, especially if they do skew towards mid twenty-somethings.
…yeah, good luck with that.
Maybe a bit more planning than just throwing it out in 2 years *might* be in order WB. Sure you can change the animated casts in your movies at the drop of a hat (and do) but live action is a whole other beastie.