J.J. Abrams Doesn't Have Any Interest In Directing Any Of The DC Projects Bad Robot Is Producing

In the fall of 2019, J.J. Abrams (Star Trek, Star Wars: The Force Awakens) closed a $250 million deal to write, produce, and direct projects for WarnerMedia, turning down a staggering $500 million that was offered by Apple at the time. One of the reasons Abrams chose WarnerMedia was because of the deep reservoirs of intellectual property that his Bad Robot production company could mine – IP that includes things like Justice League Dark, Constantine, Superman, and more from DC Comics.

But temper your expectations, because Abrams does not plan to direct any DC-related projects. In a new interview, the filmmaker explains that he's committed to generating original ideas instead.

If you harbor big dreams of seeing Abrams direct a Justice League Dark film or delving deep into the DC archives to direct a cinematic adaptation of some obscure character like Plastic Man, here's some unfortunate news: it sounds like he's simply not interested in doing any of that.

In a new interview with Collider, Abrams reiterates that he's still out of the old reboot/remake game...for now, anyway.

"I know that Hollywood is a place where it used to be that people would be inspired by something that they would see or an old film or a show or something and think, 'Oh, here's my response to that. Here's a version of that.' It's become a place where, more often than not, you see something and people get inspired by it and go, 'Let's redo that exact thing.' I feel like, as someone who started writing in television and telling original stories on film and in TV, it is something that I really do miss. The few things that I'm working on now, as a writer, are original ideas. I just feel, as a director, I really would love to have my next projects be things that didn't pre-exist me necessarily."

That echoes comments he made back in 2017, when he said, "I feel like I've done enough [rebooting] that I'm more excited about working on things that are original ideas that perhaps one day someone else will have to reboot." While that stance feels out of step with current industry trends, it puts Abrams in a much more interesting position as a creative storyteller. After his (in my view) disastrous Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, I'm really looking forward to seeing what the next J.J. Abrams movie looks like that is totally unencumbered by decades' worth of fandom, history, and lore.