Christopher Nolan was heavily involved with Man of Steel, but the DCEU ended up failing what the Dark Knight director had planned for Superman.

The DCEU began with Zack Snyder’s Man of Steel, but the Christopher Nolan-produced Superman movie was never supposed to be the start of a shared universe. Despite mixed reviews and controversial story decisions, Man of Steel was granted a sequel with Zack Snyder returning as the director, except that the project was more than just a Man of Steel sequel. During San Diego Comic-Con 2013, it was announced that Zack Snyder would direct Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, which would continue the story of Man of Steel but with Batman in it – essentially putting an end to Nolan and Snyder’s original plan.

Five years before Man of Steel, DC was at the top of the superhero movie conversation with Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight. Nolan’s Batman Begins had already succeeded in rebooting the Batman franchise eight years after the critically-panned Batman & Robin, but no one could have anticipated the impact The Dark Knight would have on the audiences and on the industry as a whole. Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight set the bar high not just for Batman movies but for superhero films in general, and it redefined how fantasy and realism blend in a blockbuster movie. By the time The Dark Knight Rises premiered, what Nolan had done with The Dark Knight was a reference for Warner Bros. and other studios, and The Dark Knight's "formula" was something that many tried to replicate.

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Curiously, Christopher Nolan himself was inspired by what he had done in The Dark Knight when developing a Superman movie. The project that would become Man of Steel was envisioned by Jonathan and Christopher Nolan when the duo was still working on The Dark Knight Rises. Christopher Nolan and Christian Bale had already made clear that The Dark Knight Rises would be their final Batman movie, but the studio would obviously try to replicate Nolan’s success with Batman in another franchise. Christopher Nolan was heavily involved with Man of Steel, only not as a director, and the idea was for Zack Snyder to helm what would be a Superman trilogy. However, once the Man of Steel sequel became Batman v Superman and Nolan’s role in the project got reduced, the original plan for a Superman trilogy was by all means scrapped. By using it as the launch pad for the burgeoning shared universe, the DCEU ultimately failed Nolan's original vision.

Man of Steel shares a lot of similarities with Batman Begins. That is no surprise considering that both Man of Steel and Batman Begins were Christopher Nolan productions written by David Goyer. Man of Steel’s non-linear narrative is very much similar to what Goyer had previously done in Batman Begins, a clever strategy to tell an origin story with faster pacing. Similar to Batman Begins, Man of Steel tried to ground its main character on reality as much as possible. Obviously, Superman can never be as realistic as Batman, but Man of Steel still tried to hold on to some sense of realism.

Zack Snyder made Krypton into a high sci-fi world and created in-universe explanations for the superpowers shown by Superman, Zod, and the other Kryptonians. Man of Steel even featured a scientist, Doctor Hamilton, as a prominent character whose role in the story was to provide explanations for the Kryptonians’ powers and plans. Superman being a sci-fi character had already been done in the comics, but it was only in Man of Steel that such an element was brought into the big screen. All of those decisions make clear that Man of Steel was supposed to be the Batman Begins of a Superman trilogy, and that the Man of Steel sequels would try to mirror the rest of the Dark Knight trilogy.

Considering that the plan was for Man of Steel to be the start of a Superman franchise, Man of Steel 2 would have been a much smaller story than Batman v Superman by default. That was confirmed by Man of Steel and Batman v Superman director Zack Snyder himself, who before Batman v Superman was released revealed that he wanted Metallo to be the Man of Steel sequel's villain. Concept art for Metallo had even been made, but those plans were scrapped once Warner Bros. asked for Batman to be in the film. Curiously, Zack Snyder did want to add Bruce Wayne in Man of Steel 2 – but only as a post-credits scene at the end of the film to nod at Batman existing in that universe. Previously, a Wayne Enterprises satellite could be spotted in Man of Steel.

Related: Dark Knight Rises Sequel: Why Nolan Never Made A 4th Batman Movie

Still, the leap from a Bruce Wayne reference to Batman being heavily featured in the movie made it so that Batman v Superman could never be the Man of Steel sequel Nolan and Snyder originally planned. It’s also important to remember that Christopher Nolan was not actively involved with either Batman v Superman or Justice League, meaning that the original Superman franchise planned before Man of Steel and the DCEU turned out to be two completely different things.

It is also important to remember that 2012, the year The Dark Knight Rises was released, also saw the premiere of Marvel’s The Avengers. After a four-year setup that started with the also universally praised Iron Man, the Marvel Cinematic Universe saw the conclusion of its first phase with The Avengers, a movie that also redefined the superhero genre in many ways. Superhero teams on the big screen were nothing new, especially for Marvel, but 2012's The Avengers was the first movie to actually translate the scope and the scale of a Marvel comic into live-action. The MCU strategy worked perfectly, and The Avengers went on to make $1.5 billion at the box office. Suddenly, Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy was no longer the only reference for superhero films, and now all the studios wanted to have their own Avengers-style IP. However, Warner Bros. was the only one to actually have an IP that could rival Marvel — DC Comics. That helps explain why the studio pushed for not only Batman but the entire Justice League to be featured in the Man of Steel sequel.

In hindsight, it is clear that Man of Steel would have worked much better as its own franchise rather than the start of a DC Universe. Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy made its mark on pop culture without any sort of connections to a bigger story, and the same could have happened with Man of Steel. Not only that, but Zack Snyder’s approach to Superman was far too divisive to be the center of a DC Universe that would involve several other characters and filmmakers. Had Man of Steel and its potential sequels remained in its own universe, then Snyder could have had much more freedom to tell his Superman story without risking affecting the future of a much larger franchise.

Man of Steel 2 would have been judged by its own merits as a Superman movie sequel only, but instead, Batman v Superman had to be multiple things at the same time. Nothing guarantees that Man of Steel 2 would have been better received than Batman v Superman, but a proper Man of Steel sequel would have been at least more truthful to what Christopher Nolan and Zack Snyder had originally planned for the Superman franchise.

Marcelo Leite is a senior writer for Screen Rant with years of experience in creative and academic writing. Although his chosen field was structure engineering, there is nothing he likes better than writing about the things he loves.