Man of Steel Film - A First Step for DC Comics

Warner Bros. expects its forthcoming Superman movie Man of Steel to be the first of a string of new movies from the DC Comics universe. "It's setting the tone for what the movies are going to be like going forward," President Jeff Robinov told Entertainment Weekly. "In that, it's definitely a first step."

Rival comics publisher Marvel has made a habit of including hints about future movies in its films, including last year's Joss Whedon-directed The Avengers, which combined multiple characters from separate film franchises into one storyline. With Man of Steel, DC is looking at a similar approach with director Zack Snyder and producer Christopher Nolan.

"I think you'll see that, going forward, anything can live in this world . . . [Nolan's] Batman was deliberately and smartly positioned as a stand-alone," Robinov said. "The world they lived in was very isolated without any knowledge of any other superheroes. What Zack and Chris have done with this film is allow you to really introduce other characters into the same world."

That next step should be revealed soon. "We'll announce something in the next several weeks that will hopefully position the DC characters and the movies we're going to be making," Robinov said.

But those behind Man of Steel aren't keen to offer easy hints about sequels. "One of the things we dealt with on the Batman films is, Chris dislikes it when you plan something, when you say, 'I'm going to follow this up in the next film,'" said screenwriter David S. Goyer, who co-wrote The Dark Knight series and the screenplay for Man of Steel.

He continued, "[Nolan] always said put everything you have into this film and then worry about the next film later. That gives the film its own integrity as opposed to being part of an overall plan. So of course the comic book fans, it's hard not to think about [crossovers] but I, having done three Batman films and worked in that way, it's definitely the approach we took with Man of Steel."

When asked whether The Dark Knight trilogy was a stand-alone series, Rabinov gave a slight hint at a larger possible DC crossover. "They do. Or they did," he replied. "Where we go in the future is a whole other conversation." But he denied a full Justice League movie with Nolan was in the works. "No, no it's not," Rabinov simply said.

Man of Steel Movie is due out June 14th.