Nolte: Skydance Fears James Gunn’s Superman Sequel will Lose $100M, Report

Warner Bros./DC Studios A report now says Skydance is so worried that James Gunn’s Superman (2025) sequel, Man of Tomorrow, is a loser that it might not even warrant a theatrical release. The report adds that the best the studio is able to hope for is cutting its losses at $100 million. Unceremoniously firing DC Studios’ co-CEOs James Gunn and Peter Safran five months before their contract was up and eight months before Man of Tomorrow — which probably cost $300 million — was scheduled to hit theaters next July, is an insight into how little faith Skydance CEO David Ellison has in Man of Tomorrow. James Gunn arrives at the premiere of “Superman” on Monday, July 7, 2025, at TCL Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles. (Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP) What I mean is this… Firing Gunn and Safran is an unambiguous message that the cinematic universe the duo spent four years building is no more. It’s over, and that pulls the rug out from under everything in the pipeline, especially Man of Tomorrow. Basically, the message is that since the Gunn Universe is dead, Man of Tomorrow doesn’t really matter. The movie is no longer a building block, a step toward something bigger. Worse still, it’s part of a failed experiment. When Ellison pulled the trigger on Gunn and Safran, he had to have known how it would turn Man of Tomorrow into damaged goods. Still, he decided things were so bad over there, it was worth the sacrifice. Director James Gunn, left and Producer Peter Safran pose for photographers upon arrival at a fan screening of Superman, on Wednesday, July 2, 2025, in London. (Scott A Garfitt/Invision/AP) The likely death of Man of Tomorrow has its collateral damage, and that’s Superman himself, David Corenswet. Under the guidance of a better director who understood the Superman character, Corenswet would have made a good Superman. Gunn really let him down, as I explained in my review last year: In the original Superman: The Movie (1978), there’s a brilliant scene, one filled with the subtext of their mutual romantic and sexual attraction, where Lois Lane (Margot Kidder) interviews Superman (Christopher Reeve). Still, despite this attraction, she remains a Big City reporter eager to get the best of him, especially when he talks about his belief in the American way. She fails to best him, though. Why? Because this Superman is a thoughtful and intelligent man who’s thought things through—in other words, a man who can easily handle a condescending and cynical reporter. The interview scene in Gunn’s Superman is entirely different and even shrill. There’s no romantic subtext, and — before he storms out like a baby — Superman is quickly reduced to a child yelling at Lois about how “people will get hurt!” Replacing Superman’s thoughtfulness with feelings reduces the character to someone far less interesting. What’s more, this Superman never outwits any of his opponents. There’s only crashing and banging, which becomes tedious after a while. Superman: The Movie is still the greatest superhero movie ever made, Margot Kidder is still the screen’s greatest Lois Lane, and no one will ever top the dignity, intelligence, quiet strength, and decency Christopher Reeve delivered. One of the things that really works in that classic is that Reeve’s Clark Kent isn’t man enough for a woman like Lois Lane, while Reeve’s Superman is more than enough man for her. In Gunn’s Superman, Lois is too much woman for Clark and Superman. By no metric was the Gunn/Safran regime anything other than a catastrophe. Superman probably lost money. Supergirl was a historic box office flop. On TV, the Peacemaker and Lanterns divided rather than united fans. Clayface will probably lose money, something the trades are finally admitting to. Overall, Gunn did nothing to excite the fans about what’s coming next.