DC’s Most Interesting Film Project Just Lost Its Star

Superhero fatigue is a term that gets thrown around a lot, for better and for worse. It wasn’t pulled out of thin air. Audiences stopped flocking to every superhero film because many began to feel the same. However, tights and capes are still capable of drawing in audiences. It helps if they are big “event” films, often bringing together heroes from more than one film series or franchise. But the real key is making something that doesn’t feel like it was assembled in a factory and then noted to death. That’s part of the promise of James Gunn’s DCU.

Gunn kicked off his tenure as co-head of DC’s films by announcing a slate of movies for its first phase. That slate came with a caveat. The Guardians of the Galaxy director doesn’t want to force films that aren’t ready. He has said time and again that even if a movie is announced it won’t go in front of cameras until the script is complete. That has led to massive delays for projects like a sequel to Matt Reeve’s The Batman but has allowed interesting productions like a Clay Face movie written by Mike Flanagan to move forward.

Another surprising film to be announced suddenly for DC’s slate was a Sgt. Rock movie starring Daniel Craig and Directed by Luca Guadagnino. Rock is a World War 2 Sergeant who’s good at throwing grenades and shooting Nazis. Despite the increased relevancy of the latter, the announcement, made on Deadline, felt incredibly surprising. Rock is far from a mainstream character, but reporting on the film said that the script, written by Challengers scribe Justin Kuritzkes was in “good shape.” Given Gunn’s metric for making things, that explained why the film was moving forward. However, now it may have hit a snag.

Deadline is now reporting that Craig has dropped out of the potential movie. No reason has been given for his departure, but if I had to wager a guess, the film may not have been as far along as believed. James Gunn hadn’t even talked about the proposed film, and he has not been shy about discussing production on upcoming movies. He did, however, include Sgt. Rock in an episode of his DC Animated television show Creature Commandos and has explained that characters in that show have the potential to appear in live-action. So, Rock may not be off the slate entirely. Yet.

As far as anyone knows, Luca Guadagnino is still attached to direct. He is certainly busy, with a remake of American Psycho starring Austin Butler also being announced, so now it may come down to which one gains more steam (though Deadline did claim that Rock is set to happen first). Ideally, the film does get off the ground, as it sounds like the kind of interesting move that would give us a reprieve from superhero fatigue. Guadagnino is a fascinating director. Having him helm a studio superhero picture is exciting enough, but I’d be lying if I said Craig stepping away didn’t tamper my excitement just a bit.