Henry Cavill will return to DC as Man of Steel 2 begins development at Warner Bros. Discovery. He’s a fan-favorite pick for the role of Superman, and people have wanted to see him back in the cape for a long time. But Cavill’s reappearance didn’t come without some drama. Warner Bros. Discovery is starting to reorganize the DCEU, and Dwayne Johnson’s influence both on and off camera is not to be understated. As executives leave and directors vie for movie rights, a Superman revival comes as a huge announcement for the DCEU. But with an already shaky reputation with their cinematic universe, DC risks a lot with Man of Steel 2.

DC hasn’t had the best luck with its previous films. The Wonder Woman movies were likely the franchise’s saving grace, but neither performed as well as a Marvel movie. The Snyder cut of Justice League might have gotten the most positive reviews from fans, but technically it’s not even canon. Zack Snyder’s movies (Man of Steel, Batman v Superman, Justice League) is among the DCEU’s most popular, but he had a lot of pushback from executives.

With new leadership in Warner Bros. Discovery, many things are changing in DC, both good and bad. Man of Steel 2 is a big chance to take for the studio.

DC’s In-House Changes

     Warner Bros. Pictures

DC has had a lot going on recently. Not only has its overseeing company, Warner Bros. Discovery, gone through a large merger and come under new management, but the company itself has experienced some changes. Recently, Walter Hamada, DC’s president, announced he would be stepping down. It’s a strange thing because not only does this create a bit extra chaos, but it also solves some of DC’s movie problems.

Man of Steel launched the DCEU back in 2013. Directed by Zack Snyder, the movie took a more modern look at Superman as opposed to the silver-age comic version we had been exposed to up until that point. People were still familiar with Christopher Reeves’ Superman, who was morally beyond reproach and the exemplar of an upstanding citizen. What people found with this new Superman was a superhero with a more realistic approach to society. He still had all the loyalties to humanity and good-natured morals that Reeves’ Superman had, but he was a bit darker, more aggressive, and looked at the world’s troubles in a more practical light. People responded well to Henry Cavill starring in Snyder’s movie.

The problem inside DC came when they began to launch the rest of the DCEU off this new Man of Steel. Zack Snyder stood at the helm, ready to take control of a lot of what was to come, but Walter Hamada had his own ideas for the direction DC should go in. Hamada believed that the DCEU and the properties shouldn’t be so centralized around a single director. Hamada also wanted to introduce a Black Superman written by the renowned author Ta-Nehisi Coates.

While not a bad idea, it would create a conflict of interest in the burgeoning days of the DCEU and create rocky ground for the movies ahead. A lot of power was taken away from Snyder, and the DCEU became a rocky, disjointed group of films that somehow felt like it was constantly trying to reinvent itself.

Snyder’s idea with Man of Steel was to create a trilogy that would reflect, and eventually link to, Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy. It would follow Superman down a similarly dark line of storytelling and introduce Batman towards the end. But the narrative became distorted in conversations between him and Hamada, and what was meant to be a three-movie wink at Batman turned into Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. But now that Hamada is gone, Snyder’s path is clear.

Henry Cavill Returns to DC

     Warner Bros. Pictures

Along these rocky lines DC had been operating on, Henry Cavill left to work on other more rewarding projects. Fans of Superman quickly became fans of Cavill as his charm and devotion to the characters he played followed him wherever he went. But his absence from the DCEU has become increasingly noted these past few years.

As Dwayne Johnson’s Black Adam premiered, Johnson continually pushes for a fight between his character and Superman. He seems determined to try and bring Cavill back into the fold. It’s also a smart play since Johnson and Cavill share the same manager.

But Black Adam represents a time in the DCEU when many things are up in the air. Johnson brings an incredible amount of star power to the franchise, and vacancies inside the corporation leave a huge power vacuum that, if the right people fall into it, could mean many good things for DC. Making a Man of Steel 2 could mean a lot of good. Snyder could get a chance to finally do it how he wants. And Dwayne Johnson could boost the film with its popularity.

But DC should be careful with its record of failure. Generating this amount of hype and then making a bad film could send fans away from the franchise permanently.