There has been a lot of excitement over James Gunn and Peter Safran being named the heads of the newly established DC Studios. Since this game-changing news hit the airwaves in October, Gunn hasn’t been too shy about teasing what the next 10 years of the DC Universe would look like under his new regime. This includes teasing characters like Lobo and Mister Terrific. Now the fan-favorite filmmaker has just dropped arguably his juiciest tease of all, and it involves Kingdom Come.
The image that Gunn dropped on his various social media pages is of the now iconic 20th anniversary cover of Kingdom Come. Done by the legendary comic book artist Alex Ross, the image has Superman standing around a table with his reformed Justice League. A League which includes Wonder Woman, Hawkman, Atom Smasher, Red Robin, Red Arrow, Red Tornado, Donna Troy, and Alan Scott’s Green Lantern. Gunn accompanied the image with the simple caption “Making plans.” Shazam himself Zachary Levi even responded to Gunn’s post on Instagram excitedly saying, “F***. Yes.” with a fire emoji for good measure.
If Kingdom Come is indeed a part of Gunn's “plans” this could be huge for the DCU. The original 1996 miniseries written by Mark Waid with the art done by Ross is one of the best comic book storylines ever written. It was an epic Elseworlds story that saw an older Superman come out of retirement to reform the JLA after the newer generation of heroes got a bit too violent for the Man of Steel’s liking. This caused him to butt heads with Batman who didn’t take kindly to DC’s flagship character being away for a decade. This post-apocalyptic and futuristic storyline still has influence over DC 25 years later. It inspired the Injustice video game franchise and Superman alum Brandon Routh played the Kingdom Come version of the character in The CW's "Arrowverse" crossover “Crisis on Infinite Earths” in 2019. Also, hit shows like Batman Beyond owe a lot to Kingdom Come's success.
So how would this play into DC’s new 10-year plan? Well, the groundwork for the story is already there from the preexisting canon. Characters like Superman, Shazam, Batman, and Wonder Woman are already well-established cinematic heroes. On top of that, DC’s latest film Black Adam introduced Hawkman and Atom Smasher along with the title anti-hero who all had roles to play in Kingdom Come. DC’s plan needs an Endgame-type film and, with Zack Snyder’s Darkseid storyline up in the air at the moment, Kingdom Come would be a great epic conclusion featuring a boatload of heroes to cap off the first 10 years of this new DC Universe. Especially since Henry Cavill’s Superman and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman are expected to have big futures under Gunn. Even Ben Affleck’s Batman having appearances in The Flash and Aquaman 2 next year might also hint that DC isn’t done with that version of the character just yet. Given his role in the comic, it would be fun to see an even older version of Affleck’s Batman go toe-to-toe with Cavill’s Superman again.
While this is all pure speculation at this point, Gunn knew exactly what he was doing when he posted this heroic image. While we wait to get an exact film roadmap for DC’s next 10 years, fans are just going to have to imagine Cavill with gray streaks in his hair while wearing that iconic black and red “S” shield. You can view Gunn’s Kingdom Come post down below.