Spider-Man: Homecoming screenwriters John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein, who are still in negotiations with Warner Bros. to direct Flashpoint, reveal details as to how the company approached them to help further expand and develop the DCEU.
Daley recalls, “They gave us a list of DC properties and said, ‘Is there anything you’d be interested in?’, in no way promising us anything at all. [Because of both Spider-Man and Game Night] they did kind of say, ‘We’d like you to consider one of our movies.’ So we read a number of the scripts, and that was one—we’re huge fans of [The Flash], I collected the comic books as a kid. It was an exciting possibility.”
Flashpoint is based on the infamous 2005 story written by Geoff Johns and drawn by Andy Kubert. In the original plot, Barry Allen, aka The Flash, wakes up powerless in an entirely new timeline in which everything is both backwards and tragic. The villains he knows are heroes, Thomas Wayne is a more lethal Batman, and Aquaman and Wonder Woman are mortal enemies in an Atlantean-Amazonian war that threatens to engulf the planet. The story was also the billed catalyst for DC’s New 52 line of books that rebooted their titles.
DC recently undid much of the foundations laid by that business decision by reintroducing legacy with their DC Rebirth line. Barry Allen made the leap to the big screen portrayed by actor Ezra Miller in both Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and last November’s Justice League. The latter started with Barry being a little aimless and, by the film’s end, got into the Central City crime lab after a recommendation from Bruce Wayne.
Goldstein adds, with regards to this rookie-level introduction, “It’s a relatable way in to a superhero movie in some of the same ways that Peter Parker was for the Marvel side of things.”
WB has plans to release Flashpoint in 2020, but no official release date has been set.
