Fanboy Fix: DC Comics' 'Justice League' Movie Might Be Closer Than You Think

Move over, Marvel. In response to the blockbuster success of The Avengers, your comic book rivals over at DC Comics are moving pieces into place to answer with their own superhero ensemble adventure, The Justice League of America. And it might be closer to reality than you think.

A handful of news items broke over the last few days surrounding a JLA movie, which has been a pipedream for Warner Bros. (which owns the cinematic rights to the DC universe) for some time now. WB obviously has stayed busy with individual movies centered on Batman, Superman and – most recently – Green Lantern. But plans for a full-fledged, multi-hero JLA movie always seemed to stall in pre-production for various reasons.

Then, after years of planning and meticulous execution, Marvel Studios pulled off the impossible by delivering a massively successful Avengers movie – and DC felt it was time to respond.

Variety broke the news that Gangster Squad writer Will Beall has been given the go-ahead to write a Justice League movie. In addition to writing Gangster – which stars Sean Penn, Josh Brolin and Ryan Gosling in a 1940s period crime thriller – Beall is hard at work writing Lethal Weapon and Logan’s Run remakes for the studio. Now he’s tasked with living up to the Avengers hype, only with DC’s top characters.

But that’s not all.

In the same story, the trade confirms that Green Lantern co-writer Michael Goldenberg has been hired to write a new treatment for a Wonder Woman movie, while the remaining two Green Lantern writers, Marc Guggenheim and Michael Green, were hired a while back to pen a feature film for The Flash.

So it appears Warner Bros. has started the ball rolling on expanding the DC universe for some time now, and they’re just now letting those plans leak out. In addition, we know that Superman will be back on screen in 2014 in Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel. And Christopher Nolan will bring his Batman trilogy to a close in July with The Dark Knight Rises.

Why doesn’t Nolan just agree to direct this new Justice League movie, bringing Christian Bale back into the fold as Batman for one last film? I know, I know … but a fanboy can dream, can’t he?

As for the Justice League movie, it doesn’t sound like a distant mirage anymore. While the pieces aren’t exactly coming together, they at least are being created, and we’ll see in time whether they snap together to form as complete a puzzle as Joss Whedon’s Avengers did … or if the production(s) stall as they have several times before.

Follow along on Twitter @Sean_OConnell and @Fandango for more news, trailer and clips.

Tags: The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises