Following chats with James Gunn, Ben Affleck has ruled himself out of directing a superhero film in the new-look DC Universe.
James Gunn’s affinity for Twitter means that we tend to get a lot of unfiltered information spewing forth from one of the more powerful people in Hollywood. Whilst we can imagine that can be tricky if you’re one of Warner Bros’ PR people, it’s fun for everybody else as we get far more regular glimpses ‘behind the curtain’ than with other studios who are carefully shepherding projects into production.
One of Gunn’s more notable reveals from a while back was that he’d been chatting with Ben Affleck about the possibility of directing a film for the new DC Universe. Affleck of course was Batman for the last iteration of interconnected DC films and whilst Gunn seemingly had no plans to continue with him in the suit, he did seem keen to get Affleck, a successful director, behind the camera.
As for Affleck though? It seems he’s less enthused.
The actor and director has revealed in an interview with The Hollywood Reporter that he won’t be pursuing that possibility, stating “I would not direct something for the [James] Gunn DC. Absolutely not. I have nothing against James Gunn. Nice guy, sure he’s going to do a great job. I just wouldn’t want to go in and direct in the way they’re doing that. I’m not interested in that.”
Pretty hard pass then and not a surprising one, really.
Affleck has his Actors Equity label that he and Matt Damon are running, and seems very focused on making that a success. Air, the first film from that endeavour is releasing next month with Affleck having helmed it. Besides, the process of playing Batman and trying to get a solo Batman outing off the ground wasn’t always a fun process for Affleck. He’s chatted in the past about some of the personal difficulties he had to contend with throughout that period and it sounds like he had a pretty tough time.
Also, the mercurial reception to his Batman must have been difficult to reckon with too. It’s something he references in the interview, especially the strange process of a challenging Justice League film which was initially received very poorly by fans, only for the eventual Snyder Cut release to land him with plaudits for his portrayal of the Dark Knight.
“I’ve never had one that went from nadir to pinnacle,” he says. “Retroactively, it’s a hit. All of a sudden I was getting congratulated for the bomb I’m in. I was going to direct a Batman, and [Justice League] made me go I’m out. I never want to do any of this again. I’m not suited.”
Of course, we’re pretty sure we remember Affleck promising he was done with superhero films after he starred in 2003’s critically-maligned Daredevil so never say never. For the time being though, Affleck seems content to focus on other types of projects and we’re looking forward to seeing what they might be. You can catch the full interview which has loads of good tidbits in right here.
—
Thank you for visiting! If you’d like to support our attempts to make a non-clickbaity movie website:
Follow Film Stories on Twitter here, and on Facebook here.
Buy our Film Stories and Film Junior print magazines here.
Become a Patron here.
