There seems to be more gossip surrounding DC/Warner Bros. forthcoming JUSTICE LEAGUE movie than your average issue of Heat magazine. Expect some official announcements to come out of Warners after MAN OF STEEL is released this summer, but until then here is a round-up of what we have so far:

1) It may be happening. According to reports “Fans enthusiasm for future movies will be rewarded once MAN OF STEEL comes out”. Read into that what you will, but it kind of sounds like JUSTICE LEAGUE has a gun to its head and if enough of us don’t go and watch MAN OF STEEL then it will have its collective brains spread over the wall. Nothing like a little blackmail to get bums on cinema seats, although as most comic book fans seem to be less than enthusiastic about a JUSTICE LEAGUE movie, that may not be the best tactic to get people in to see MAN OF STEEL. 

2) Christopher Nolan is on board as producer and rumours seem to point to it being likely that MAN OF STEEL director Zack Snyder and his wife will also come on board as producers as well. Warners have made no secret of the fact that they want Nolan to be involved in all future DC adaptations in some way or another, so there may be something to this. The involvement of the Snyder’s will most likely depend on the success of MAN OF STEEL.

3) Christian Bale won’t be Batman. While we’re addressing the hugely obvious statements, it also may be worth mentioning that Michael Keaton probably won’t be playing Batman in the film either! More interesting was the rumour that Ben Affleck was approached to both direct JUSTICE LEAGUE and play Batman, but that seems to have been swept away in favour of Bale’s non return!

4) Will Beall’s script was so bad it was burned and then taken out of the woods and buried under a tree. Okay, I may have exaggerated just how bad the script was, but it does seem that his script has been thrown out for not being up to scratch. As anyone who sat through GANGSTER SQUAD will tell you, it’s probably not that surprising really. Wouldn’t it make sense to get somebody in who has written the comics? Or even some of the writers from the animated series? When Paul Dini or Grant Morrison are out in the world, why not give them a shot at it?

5) Nobody seems that enthusiastic about a JUSTICE LEAGUE movie. Not that it means anything, but the online buzz for this project mostly seems to be in the negative. It seems to be a movie that everybody wanted, but nobody is excited about. The big problem seems to be Marvel. Marvel has had a huge amount of success with their cinematic output and that is down to two key facts; planning and passion.

Marvel carefully planned out their journey to AVENGERS ASSEMBLE, building up peoples’ excitement for it one film at a time. They also aren’t afraid of letting their passion for their characters come out on film and people have a lot of love and goodwill towards them for it. Warners JUSTICE LEAGUE smacks of a cynical attempt to rush a competing franchise out there before doing the work to get fans on board.

So do you think we’ll ever see a JUSTICE LEAGUE movie? What would you like to see in it? Personally I’d like to see them go the Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Guy Gardner, FORMERLY KNOWN AS THE JUSTICE LEAGUE route instead, but that’s just me…

Let us know your thoughts in the comments below or on Twitter @STARBURST_MAG

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