‘The seeds were planted’: Deadpool creator claims the downfall of the DCU started at the very beginning

Thanks to a string of recent critical and commercial flops – which has somehow ended up with Black Adam being the franchise’s highest-grossing release in the last five years – the latest inquest into where it’s all gone wrong for the DCU is underway.

Of course, this is something Warner Bros.’ shared universe has become accustomed to over the last decade, with countless creative reshuffles, the demise of the SnyderVerse, multiple projects being announced and never made, or even the latest reboot under the watchful eyes of James Gunn and Peter Safran providing no shortage of wreckage to sift through.

However, Deadpool creator Rob Liefeld has offered his own insight into the matter, and it makes a great deal of sense. We might be 10 years into the saga, but the comic book writer has suggested that the root of the DCU’s issues go right back to Man of Steel.

It’s easy to say in hindsight, but a second solo outing for Henry Cavill’s Superman might well have been the best and safest course of action to let it breathe a bit before rushing into cross-pollination. After all, just one movie after establishing the DCU, Zack Snyder’s Dawn of Justice threw Batman, Alfred, Lex Luthor, Doomsday, the entire Justice League, and countless more elements into the mix that stuffed it to bursting point, and those reverberations are still being felt in The Flash.

Either that, or maybe the entire mythology is doomed no matter what happens, but that’s up to Gunn and Safran to figure out in an effort to stop the bleeding that’s seen the saga trending downwards for half a decade.