Warner Bros Offered Kevin Feige to Jump Ship Before Hiring James Gunn
Regardless of what superhero you personally like the most, it is obvious that the attempt to replicate MCU's success with DCEU (now rebranded DCU) fell far short of the mark.
Ever since Warner Bros. became Warner Bros. Discovery, its new CEO, David Zaslav, has been making sweeping changes to address this failure and overhaul the DC brand. As DCEU became DCU, DC Film became DC Studios, and its leadership was replaced.
James Gunn, director of Guardians of the Galaxy and The Suicide Squad, and prolific producer Peter Safran are now taking charge of the franchise. Changes in the approach, introduced by new bosses, are already noticeable, with cancellation of Batgirl (as rumors say, the movie was deemed a trainwreck that could not possibly meet their quality standards) and shelving of several more projects, return of Henry Cavill as Superman, even if only in a cameo role so far, and some indications that return of Zack Snyder to DCU is possible.
These people most likely have skills, necessary for the difficult task ahead of them. But they weren't Zastav's first picks. We know that Zastav spent months searching for someone to oversee the struggling film branch of his corporation. He wanted a person capable of duplicating the achievements of Kevin Feige at the helm of MCU. And allegedly he even asked Kevin Feige himself to jump ship at one point (via Above The Line).
Kevin, naturally, politely declined this invitation. Gunn and Safran initially weren't candidates for a new head of DC Studios – they advised Zastav in his search of a suitable candidate for that position, and their advice eventually impressed him enough that he decided to appoint them as the co-chairpersons and CEOs of DC Films. As for James Gunn himself, though he is now tasked with building a competitor for the sprawling creation of his former boss, he explained on Twitter that there is no bad blood between him and Feige.
"Not only do I love Kevin, he was the 1st person I told after I did the deal with DC (@JohnCena was the 2nd). Contrary to popular belief, a dollar less for Marvel is not a dollar more for DC. DC & Marvel have the common goal of keeping the theater-going experience vibrant & alive!"
Gunn may be a bit disingenuous in this statement, given that movies in the same genre do in fact fight each other for audience, but in any case, having strong competition in the market is a good thing for consumers – if he manages to improve DCU to the point of threatening MCU's dominance in the field of superhero movies, then whomever wins at the box office, we win too!