Avengers: Endgame co-director Joe Russo comments on Warner Bros. Discovery's decision to cancel the Batgirl film. Joe and his brother Anthony Russo have become veteran directors in the superhero movie industry due to their work in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, starting with 2014's Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Since then, the Russo brothers' superhero filmography only grew in number and in scale with each of their subsequent projects, 2016's Captain America: Civil War, 2018's Avengers: Infinity War, and 2019's Avengers: Endgame, with the latter temporarily becoming the highest-grossing film of all time.
On the other side of the world of comic book movies, the DC Universe made headlines back in August 2022 when Warner Bros. decided to cancel their nearly completed Batgirl film starring Leslie Grace, which reportedly had a budget of $90 million dollars and was set for an exclusive HBO Max release. The news sent shock waves among DC fans as it felt unprecedented to cancel a film that was not only high profile, but also so far into production. Following the news, Warner Bros. CEO David Zaslav commented on the decision to cancel the film by alluding to the fact they didn't believe in the project and that they felt it was their duty to protect the DC brand. Since the cancelation, many people from both inside and outside the production has reacted to the decision, including Marvel president Kevin Feige who directly reached out to the directors Adil El Arbi and Bilall Fallah, having previously worked with them on Ms. Marvel.
In an interview with Variety, Russo has become the most recent person to comment on the Batgirl cancelation, calling it a "murder". The Avengers: Endgame co-director goes on to allude to the corporate thought process that likely went into this decision-making. Check out the full quote below:
“It’s rare that I can think of something that high profile, that expensive, that was murdered in such a way. It’s sad, but we’re at a time in the business where corporate sociopathy is going to rear its head because people are scared.”
Why Batgirl Was Cancelled
Russo does not hold back when expressing his thoughts on the situation, directly taking shots at the executives of Warner Bros. Discovery for axing Batgirl. It is not without cause however, as the cancelation decision stemmed from the fact that taking a tax write-off for the film was more beneficial financially for the studio than releasing it. When he first came on to the studio, Zaslav needed to clear up $3 billion in debt he inherited from former CEO Toby Emmerich, and despite early Batgirl test screenings being the same as Black Adam, which is currently the highest-rated DCU theatrical movie with audiences, his lack of faith ultimately saw the Leslie Grace-led movie canceled.
Like many others, Russo is clearly upset with the decision to shelf Batgirl and acknowledges how rare it is to see a studio make the decision that Warner Bros. did. With that being said, with all the changes and re-adjusting that has been made with Warner Bros. and their DC properties through recent years, it can be argued that an abnormal event like this was a long time coming for the studio. It remains to be seen how DC changes going forward with their more recent changes in personnel, but audiences can hope that situations like this are in the rearview mirror.
Source: Variety
