12 years ago, Blade and Batman Begins writer David S. Goyer penned Man of Steel, the Superman movie that got the DC Extended Universe going. Earlier this month, the DC Universe franchise kicked off its film side with a Superman movie too, which was written and directed by Guardians of the Galaxy and The Suicide Squad’s James Gunn. Goyer is among the many people who’ve gone to see this new offering on the 2025 movies schedule, and while sharing his thoughts about it, he brought up an analogy involving The Dark Knight that made a lot of sense.
I recently had the pleasure of speaking with David S. Goyer about The Sandman, the Netflix subscription-exclusive TV adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s comic book series that he co-created with Gaiman and Allan Heinberg. After we were done discussing the second half of the show’s final season, which releases on Thursday (followed by a bonus episode on July 31), I immediately asked what he thought of James Gunn’s Superman, and he started off saying:
I really liked it. People always assume that because I did The Dark Knight, I wouldn’t like The Batman, but I really enjoyed it. Each generation gets the Superman they need. It felt like the pendulum with Man of Steel, obviously that was a much darker grounded version, and, and we’re in a very different place, and I love that just the tagline that ‘Kindness is punk rock.’
co-writing the 20-year-old Batman Begins, Goyer helped crack the stories for The Dark Knight and The Dark Knight Rises, making him a key contributor to Christopher Nolan’s Batman saga. But that doesn’t mean he’s automatically going to dislike new versions of characters he’s worked on before. He liked what Matt Reeves did with The Batman and he was a fan of James Gunn’s work on Superman. Goyer even offered to help out on Marvel Studios’ Blade reboot given all the setbacks it’s endured.
Edi Gathegi’s depiction of the character, as well as Supes himself, Krypto, Metamorpho and everything else James Gunn brought to his take on the Man of Steel’s mythology.
Whenever The Brave and the Bold, i.e. the movie featuring the DCU’s Batman is released, I’ll be interested to learn what David S. Goyer thought of it. There was also a time when he was attached to co-write a Green Lantern Corps movie, and while that never moved forward, Lanterns will premiere on HBO next year. Meanwhile, in addition to The Sandman, Goyer’s other current TV shows include Murderbot and Foundation, both of which can be streamed with an Apple TV+ subscription.