James Gunn Responds to Rumor of Chris Pratt Joining DCU

We’re still some time away from the debut of James Gunn and Peter Safran’s DC Universe with this December’s Creature Commandos. However, fans are eager to see how the franchise will unfold. A popular question among fans is whether the cast of Gunn’s Guardians of the Galaxy films for Marvel Studios will transition into the DCU. Currently, Sean Gunn is the only main Guardians cast member confirmed for DCU roles, portraying Maxwell Lord, Weasel, and G.I. Robot.

In a recent conversation on Threads, James Gunn confirmed ongoing discussions with Chris Pratt, who played Peter Quill / Star-Lord in the Guardians franchise, about the possibility of joining the DCU. “He’s a close friend,” Gunn remarked. “We talk about that all the time.”

Ever since Gunn’s appointment to his DC Studios role, fans have speculated about potential DC roles for the Guardians cast. Suggestions include Pratt as Booster Gold and Dave Bautista, who played Drax, as either Bane or Hugo Strange. In an interview with ComicBook earlier this year about his work on The Garfield Movie, Pratt mentioned that either joining DC or continuing as Star-Lord is possible, and he might appear in both superhero franchises. “Well, it probably makes more sense that I would be Star-Lord again,” Pratt said. “But anything is possible, especially with James over at DC. Maybe there’s something that would be right over there. Maybe both. How about both? I think it’s 100% both.”

In January 2023, Gunn and Safran revealed the initial DC Universe slate, which will include notable projects such as 2025’s Superman and 2026’s Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow. Other currently undated movies on the slate are The Brave and the Bold, Swamp Thing, and The Authority. TV shows on HBO Max will feature Waller, Booster Gold, Lanterns, Paradise Lost, and an animated series Creature Commandos.

There are also reports indicating that a live-action Teen Titans movie and an animated Jurassic League movie are being developed at DC Studios, but these have yet to be officially confirmed.

“A lot of people think it’s going to be Marvel 2.0, and definitely I learned a lot of stuff at Marvel,” Gunn explained in 2023. “I think that we have a lot of differences. We are telling a big, huge, central story that is like Marvel, except for, I think that we’re a lot more planned out than Marvel from the beginning because we’ve gotten a group of writers together to work that story out completely. But we’re also creating a universe that is like Star Wars, where there’s different times, different places, different things, or Game of Thrones, where characters are a little bit more morally complex.”