We knew DC/Warner execs had to be pretty high on The Flash for them to stick with Ezra Miller through Miller’s prolific, well-documented legal troubles. Now they’re showing their commitment once again, hiring The Flash director Andy Muschietti to direct a new Batman movie before The Flash’s first weekend box office receipts have even come in.
Under the guidance of James Gunn and Peter Safran, the DC heads hired late last year, Muschietti will direct Batman: The Brave And the Bold. The film, which will be based on a comic series by Grant Morrison and “exist separately” from the Robert Pattinson Batman arc begun in The Batman, The Brave And The Bold “imagines a ‘Bat family,’ where Bruce Wayne’s biological son Damian serves as Robin to his dad’s Batman.”
Damian Wayne is the son of Batman and Talia Al Ghul and grandson of Ra’s al Ghul, meaning he will presumably have some daddy issues. (Talia and Ra’s were the characters Marion Cotillard and Liam Neeson portrayed in Christopher Nolan’s Bat-movies.) The Brave and the Bold would be the first Batman movie with a Robin character since Chris O’Donnell played him in 1997’s Batman & Robin, Joel Schumacher’s notoriously maligned film which was more notable for the nipples on George Clooney’s Batsuit than anything else.
Before The Flash, Muschietti was best known as a horror director who jumped from the modest-budgeted Mama to the big time with his two wildly successful adaptations of It, which grossed $700 and $470 million worldwide, respectively. (It is the highest-grossing horror movie of all time.) The 49-year-old Argentinian makes movies with his sister, Barbara, as his producing partner, and got his first feature job after Guillermo Del Toro saw the short film version of Mama and came on to executive produce the feature adaptation.
Gunn, who finished his last movie for Marvel, Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, before jumping to DC, has plans to become creative conductor of the DC universe the same way Kevin Feige is at Marvel. Gunn and Safran’s plans for DC thus far include Blue Beetle (“the first DCU character,” per Gunn), hitting theaters later this summer; Superman Legacy, set to be written and directed by Gunn; along with a Wonder Woman prequel series and a Green Lantern mystery series.
Variety also notes that “While the DCU exists as a multiverse, these titles will exist in one singular universe.”