Joe Manganiello reveals why his Deathstroke movie never happened. Deathstroke has been a popular character in the pages of DC Comics since being introduced in The New Teen Titans #2 in 1980. Deathstroke has appeared on animated television series such as Teen Titans and Young Justice, the hit show Arrow on the CW and Titans on DC Universe, and was even the main villain in the animated film Teen Titans Go To the Movies. Deathstroke almost got a solo movie as well.
DC and Warner Bros. had big plans for the character of Deathstroke when they cast Joe Manganiello in the role and revealed him to fans in August 2016. The plan was for Deathstroke to feature in Ben Affleck's upcoming Batman solo film. The Batman plans changed to a new director, star, and direction for the franchise. However, Warner Bros. still had an interest in Deathstroke and in 2017 announced Gareth Evans would helm the project, although the talks never went on beyond just the discussion phase of development. Yet the film never materialized, and the Deathstroke actor reveals precisely why.
According to THR, Manganiello says the Deathstroke movie was axed in late 2017 to early 2018 due to executive changes over at Warner Bros. Manganiello had written a treatment, and it was he who convinced Evans to board the project, despite the director's hesitancy to join a studio film. Warner Bros. seemed hesitant to greenlight a movie based on a supervillain. Manganiello said:
"When the dust settled, it was not seen as a priority to make a 40 million movie about a villain origin story in which you show the backstory,"
Late 2017 to early 2018 saw many significant changes at Warner Bros. While 2016 is when AT&T first made a move to purchase TimeWarner, it was in 2017 when the major pieces were put into place, and the deal was finalized in June 2018. Justice League hit theaters in November of 2017 with numerous behind-the-scenes issues. The studio executives refused to delay the film's release to give the film proper prep time for CGI effects because they didn't want to affect their bonuses from the recent AT&T buyout. January 2018 was when Walter Hamada became president of DC Films after the poor box-office and audience reaction to Justice League and shifted the focus of what types of films DC would be making. Hamada greenlit Shazam!, Birds of Prey, and Joker but not Deathstroke, although, by this point, the film could have been passed over before he came aboard the company.
However, the release of Joker did prove that Manganiello might have been onto something with a solo supervillain origin film. Joker was also a smaller budgeted film based on a DC Comics supervillain that grossed $1 billion at the worldwide box office. While Deathstroke may not have made the same amount of money Joker did due to the character's widespread popularity, a $40 million action film featuring a popular DC character had the potential to turn a tidy profit for the studio and launch another smaller franchise into the broader DCEU. With Deathstroke's appearance in the upcoming Zack Snyder's Justice League and Manganiello's commitment to the role, there is always still a chance that Warner Bros. and DC could move forward with a Deathstroke film.
Source: THR
from ScreenRant - Feed https://ift.tt/3t80qGt
0 Comments