The Justice League unites the world’s greatest superheroes: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, Martian Manhunter, The Flash, and Green Lantern among them. But in the new DC Universe under DC Studios co-heads James Gunn and Peter Safran, which is set to launch Chapter 1: Gods and Monsters with the animated Creature Commandos on Max before next summer’s Superman movie, those names might prompt someone to ask: “Who?”
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While Creature Commandos is technically the beginning of a new canon, it carries over some events from the previous cinematic universe known as the DC Extended Universe, including the death of Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) in the Gunn-directed The Suicide Squad and the fallout of Amanda Waller’s (Viola Davis) daughter exposing her abuse of power as head of the government black-ops program Task Force X in Peacemaker.
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As explained by Gunn at New York Comic Con, “There are references [in the DC Universe] to things that happened in the past, and those references then become canon in the DCU because we mention them.”
What won’t be referenced, however, is the Justice League cameo that preceded Waller’s ousting in the Peacemaker finale written and directed by Gunn. After Peacemaker (John Cena) and team saved the world from the body-snatching Butterflies (parasitic aliens that took over the bodies of their human hosts), the Justice League showed up too late to help fend off the impending invasion.
Peacemaker cursed out Aquaman (Jason Momoa) and Flash (Ezra Miller), who arrived with a faceless Superman and Wonder Woman (body doubles Brad Abramenko and Kimberley von Ilberg, standing in for Henry Cavill’s Man of Steel and Gal Gadot’s Amazon warrior). The League’s other members, Batman (Ben Affleck) and Cyborg (Ray Fisher), were no-shows.
In a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Gunn described The Suicide Squad movie and the first season of Peacemaker as “light canon” with Creature Commandos and the incoming DCU.
“Peacemaker is pretty straightforward, with the exception of the appearance by a certain group [the Justice League] at the end. They don’t exist yet,” Gunn said. “But the rule is: if we mention [something from the past] in one of the new DCU shows [and movies], then it happened. So that’s the way we’re dealing with it.”
Creature Commandos introduces Flag’s father, Rick Flag Sr. (voiced by Frank Grillo), who will then appear in 2025 — in live-action — in Superman and Peacemaker season 2, the next two installments in the DCU slate that includes Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow and Lanterns.
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The DCU Justice League
While it’s unclear which members of the future Justice League are active at the time of Creature Commandos, Gunn’s Superman will introduce the younger Man of Steel (David Corenswet) and the superheroes Mister Terrific (Edi Gathegi), Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced), the Guy Gardner Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion), and Metamorpho (Anthony Carrigan), all of whom have served as members of the Justice League and Justice League International in the comics.
Superheroes confirmed to appear in Gods and Monsters include Kal-El’s Kryptonian cousin, Kara Zor-El (Milly Alock), who will headline the Supergirl movie; Earth’s Green Lanterns Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) and John Stewart (Aaron Pierre) in HBO’s Lanterns series; and the as-yet-uncast dynamic duo of Batman and Robin in Brave and the Bold.
DC Studios is also developing a Sgt. Rock movie with former James Bond Daniel Craig eyed for the title role, Dynamic Duo, an animated movie about the Robins Dick Grayson and Jason Todd, and the films The Authority and Swamp Thing, plus the live-action series Waller, Booster Gold, and Paradise Lost, set on the Amazonian island of Themyscira. As noted by Gunn, the actors who voice animated characters are planned to reprise those roles should they make the jump to live-action.
“Everything is very consistent in terms of the politics of the world and where the world is at and what’s going on; who are the metahumans in power, who are the metahumans not in power; who are the power brokers, who are not the power brokers,” Gunn told The Hollywood Reporter. “So we see a glimpse of it here [in Creature Commandos], but we see more of it in Superman and Peacemaker.”
Set after the events of The Suicide Squad and Peacemaker, the new series sees Amanda Waller (voiced by Davis) form Project M — “M” for monster — after Task Force X (a.k.a. the Suicide Squad) is forced to disband by Congress. Waller recruits the human Rick Flag Sr. (Grillo) to lead the new task force of incarcerated monsters recruited for missions too dangerous for humans: The Bride (Indira Varma), Frankenstein (David Harbour), Nina Mazursky (Zoe Chao), Dr. Phosphorus (Alan Tudyk), and GI Robot and Weasel (Sean Gunn).
DC Studios’ Creature Commandos is streaming Dec. 5 on Max.