10 Ways Warner Bros. Should've Made The DCEU
6. Read More Than One Comic For Inspiration
Someone should've probably told the folks at WB that The Dark Knight Returns isn't the only book in DC's library, seeing as how pretty much every release has paid homage to it in one way or another.
That particular comic, first published in 1986, might be one of the most influential in the medium, but there's only so much Miller one can take before things start to feel stale. That, and the DCEU's continued use of New 52 iconography - a comics reboot left behind in 2015 - is pretty jarring, owing to the fact that there are literally dozens of better books out there that WB could be taking inspiration from (a whole ruck of them can be found here).
Even though the MCU gets stereotyped for its ostensibly formulaic nature, there's no denying that dozens of different comics, storylines, writers and artists have factored into the finished product. Captain America: The Winter Soldier takes major inspiration from Ed Brubaker's run on the character from the late 2000s, while Thor: Ragnarok unashamedly embraces Jack Kirby's comics from the bullpen era of the sixties.
This has given the MCU a heterogenous feel, in that it can play to multiple genres and comics whenever it wants. With the DCEU, everything is very much of the Miller mould: dourer, cynical and totally unconventional.