Superman will be ‘relatively serious’ yet ‘pretty family-friendly’, says director James Gunn

James Gunn has teased Superman will be “relatively serious” yet “pretty family-friendly”.
The 58-year-old director – who is also DC Studios’ joint CEO with Peter Safran – compared his upcoming film to his HBO show Peacemaker, and said the character of Superman would be more accessible than the “very adult” series, but would also be a more grounded and traditional superhero story.
Speaking about the DC Universe as a whole with MovieZine, Gunn said: “Everything’s going to be totally different. We have something that’s relatively serious like Superman and then something that’s relatively comedic like Peacemaker all in the same universe. [Or] something very adult, like Peacemaker [and] something pretty family-friendly like Superman.”
The Guardians Of The Galaxy filmmaker added he was glad DC Comics had such a wide array of characters and themes because it allowed the movie studio to “tell a bunch of different stories” for different audiences.
He explained: “They’ve told stories that were more family-orientated, stories that were more adult-orientated, dark stories, light stories. I think for us, we just want to tell a bunch of different stories.”
Even so, Gunn insisted DC were trying to avoid repetition in their filmography because he had gotten “a little sick” of superhero movies being so similar.
He said: “A lot of those different stories are going to be in the DCU. I think that to be able to tell different kinds of stories is kind of what makes things fun. One of the things I’ve gotten a little sick of is all these stories being relatively the same.
“I’m trying to step outside of that. We at DC are trying to step outside of that.”
Gunn is currently working on Superman after principal production on the film wrapped in July.
Superman – which stars David Corenswet as the Man of Steel, Rachel Brosnahan as his love interest Lois Lane and Nicholas Hoult as villain Lex Luthor – will follow the superhero as he attempts to juggle his Kryptonian ancestry and life on Earth, all while his enemies plot to destroy him.
Looking beyond Superman – which will land in cinemas in July 2025 – Gunn recently teased DC were keen to explore more R-rated projects after Marvel’s own mature blockbuster Deadpool And Wolverine proved to be a smash-hit.
Even if some of the earlier R-rated flick don’t impress at the box office, the studio head was adamant that DC would continue to back mature movies because “good, authentic stories” would benefit the greater DCU.
The Creature Commandos director told Collider: “We’re not about ‘See how it does.’ We’ve got one opportunity to take these characters and really press forward and do what we believe.
“I am a great believer that if we tell good, authentic stories, if a movie does well or doesn’t do as well, if you keep with that same philosophy, that you’re going to build a universe that people are going to love and want to be a part of for a long time.
“It’s not about testing out to see if this thing works. It’s just about telling a story. If a story is going to be R-rated, we’re totally okay with that. If it’s going to be PG, PG-13, or G, I don’t care – whatever is worthy of the story, that’s what we’re going to do.”