DC Studios boss James Gunn recently shared a funny exchange he had with Ryan Reynolds about the possibility of Reynolds returning as Green Lantern.
During an appearance on the Happy Sad Confused Podcast, Gunn revealed that he reached out to Reynolds after starting his new role at DC, jokingly asking, “You coming back?!”
Reynolds, who played Hal Jordan in the 2011 Green Lantern film, humorously shut down the idea, saying, “Get the f— out of here!”
Gunn said on the podcast, “Ryan doesn’t give a sh*t [Laughs]. One of the first people I talked to after getting the job was Ryan Reynolds.”
“I’m like, ‘You coming back?’ He’s like, ‘Get the f*** out of here.’ I’m joking! I wasn’t really telling him to come back.”
The moment reflects Reynolds’ well-known disdain for his role as Green Lantern in the 2011 film, which was a critical flop and a box office disappointment, earning just $220 million worldwide against a $200 million budget.
Reynolds has blamed much of Green Lantern’s failure on poor production management.
He previously explained to Variety that there were “too many people spending too much money,” and when issues came up, the typical response was to pour more money into special effects instead of focusing on character development and storytelling.
Pointing to a lack of clear creative direction, he further added, “That just never… the thinking was never there to do that. And to their credit, it’s a very old school way of looking at things.”
“It’s just ‘Let’s just keep spending our way through this.’ And that was… it didn’t work.”
Over the years, Reynolds has openly mocked the film, even recalling his reaction when he first watched it, saying it was filled with exclamations like “holy s***” and “no, no!”
Gunn’s playful comment comes as DC prepares to launch a new Green Lantern series featuring a fresh cast and a storyline focused on Earth-based adventures.
The show is described as a True Detective-style drama, following John Stewart (Aaron Pierre), a rookie Green Lantern, as he partners with veteran Lantern Hal Jordan (Kyle Chandler) to solve a murder mystery set in the American Heartland.
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