Joe and Anthony Russo Open Up on How Snyder’s DCEU Flop Inspired MCU Masterpiece

‘Captain America: Civil War’ was an extremely important movie in the MCU, primarily due to its introduction of the Sokovia Accords, which divided the Avengers and led to a conflict between Captain America and Iron Man, for the first time in the MCU pitting superheroes against each other, with no real winner in the conflict.

It also introduced new characters like Black Panther and Spider-Man, impacting the future of the MCU. The film’s character conflict and action-packed storyline had lasting effects on team dynamics and relationships within the Avengers, making it one of the most memorable entries in the franchise.

But did you know that MCU masterpiece was actually inspired by a DCEU flop? Joe and Anthony Russo explained how one of Snyder’s badly received movies – ‘Batman Vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice’ inspired them to switch lanes and gave them the idea to pit the superheroes in an epic ideological fight.

For our part, when we finished Winter Soldier two years ago and we were thinking about doing the next one, the only thing that seemed interesting to us was to deconstruct the Marvel Universe — because where else can we go at this point? There have been 11 or 12 movies so far, all with a fairly traditional structure. Our pitch to them was: People will tell you they love chocolate ice cream — until you give it to them five days a week. It’s time to give them some rainbow sherbet. Kevin [Feige] is a maverick and he’s very sensitive to how people are responding to his content. He said he thought we might be right. And after they announced Batman v. Superman, he said, ‘you guys are absolutely right.’ We needed to do something challenging with the material or we were going to start to lose the audience.

It was Snyder’s risk that inspired them to pursue other directions.

‘Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice’ was criticized for its pacing issues, dark tone, and portrayal of iconic characters like Batman and Superman. The film’s convoluted narrative, plot holes, and overcrowded storylines also received negative feedback, leading to mixed to negative reviews from critics and audiences alike. The movie was successful during its first weekend in theaters but ultimately received a historical drop the following weekend when word got around how bad the movie actually was.

But, we can all agree with one thing regarding Snyder, he was a visionary who took risks, it didn’t always pay off, but at least he pawed the way for some hits.

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