DC Films chief Walter Hamada exits the studio

Walter Hamada, the head of DC Films, has officially gotten the boot from the company, according to Deadline. This move seemed to be inevitable once the David Zaslav took over as CEO of the newly formed company Warner Bros. Discovery, but it’s still a loss in light of Hamada’s long service.

For many years now, Hamada was known as the DC Films version of Marvel’s Kevin Feige, or at least the closest you could get at Warner Bros. He had a hand in shepherding Aquaman, Joker and The Batman through to completion, all of which were hits for the studio.

And now, this beacon of light has been put out, and the future of DC Films looks grimmer than ever, at least in my opinion.

With Walter Hamada out, who will lead DC Films?

Hamada was one of several executives upset at decisions made by Zaslav and his new team, including the shelving of the Batgirl movie, once intended for HBO Max. The hope now is to put “a Kevin Feige type” in charge of the DC film franchise. I get the intention, but let’s be honest: they’ve been trying to do this for a long time and consistently failed. And it didn’t help that they ticked off the guy responsible for some of the studio’s recent successes.

I’m unsure what Zaslav is doing and why he’s been making such erratic decisions. What is the game plan here? What is the long-term goal? Is there a goal or plan? There are so many questions and not enough answers.

Until Zaslav finds a replacement, Michael De Luca and Pam Abdy will oversee DC Films. Many think that these two, and De Luca in particular, have a good handle on what DC films should look like, so perhaps they won’t have to be replaced. We’ll have to wait and see what happens.

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h/t The A.V. Club