SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING writers in negotiations to direct FLASHPOINT

A week ago, the Beat reported on the issues surrounding the planned Gambit solo feature, particularly how it had lost its third director in a row. WB’s efforts at pulling together a Flash project has run (ha, ha) into similar troubles. In 2016, after receiving a story treatment by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the original planned director, Seth Grahame-Smith – who had actually never directed a feature before, bowed out of the project to be replaced by Dope filmmaker, Rick Famuyiwa.

Despite a fairly extensive start to production between the studio and Famuyiwa, which included the director pulling together at least one key member of the supporting cast in Kiersey Clemons’ Iris West; irreconcilable differences between the two parties found the project again without someone in the director’s chair.

There had been a number of reports over the past 7 months or so that found WB looking at Robert Zemeckis for the film that at last year’s SDCC was officially titled Flashpoint, but after the struggles at the box office faced by Justice League, it was indeed a fair and open question as to the future of this project at all.

Well, have no fear on that front, because according to Variety, WB has tapped John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein to direct the Ezra Miller starring picture. Daley and Goldstein are best known in fan-circles as the co-writers of last year’s Spider-Man: Homecoming, but they also helmed the recent Vacation remake and have the upcoming comedy Game Night on their resume as well. Of course, Daley may be just as familiar to some of you Freaks & Geeks fans, as he played one of the central characters of that beloved cult series.

Given how there’s a good deal of Peter Parker in the studio’s presentation of Barry Allen on the big screen, it’s no surprise they’d go this direction in order to emphasize the more witty timbre of Miller’s take on the character. Variety reports that Ben Affleck was originally offered the job, but turned it down, but that initial courting makes sense as there’s an awfully good chance this will be the film where his Batman will make an exit (and probably replaced with Jake Gyllenhaal or whoever they decide should be the Batman in their universe for the foreseeable future).

While there’s been some hand-wringing over what DC Films’ plans may be in regard to the future of this current on-screen universe, at the very least we now have some sense of what’s coming beyond the guaranteed trio of Aquaman, Shazam!, and Wonder Woman 2.