Chapter 283

Los Angeles, Hollywood, Warner Bros. headquarters.

Originally, Warner Bros. chairman and CEO Dick Parsons, due to a series of prior decision-making errors,

has already gradually stepped back to a secondary role and no longer participates in company decisions.

Although during his tenure, Warner produced The Dark Knight trilogy, re-igniting the Batman franchise to new heights,

this was largely due to Xu Can and Nolan's efforts,

Warner's Superman Returns bombed at the box office and received poor reviews, and all other Warner Pictures films failed to directly compete with Xu Can.

As company losses reached a critical level, the board has already initiated impeachment proceedings, and Dick Parsons will officially step down after handing over duties.

In his place comes Jeff Robinov, a senior executive at Warner Pictures.

As the saying goes, a new official burns three fires; at his first board meeting, new Warner CEO Jeff Robinov clearly outlined Warner's next strategy.

Marvel is pursuing three parallel tracks, aiming to launch the Marvel Cinematic Universe this year.

This plan is no secret within Hollywood, and industry insiders had already roughly understood Xu Can's layout a year ago.

But what can they do?

Xu Can has already taken the lead by acquiring Marvel and continuously reclaiming IP rights during this period.

While others were still unresponsive,

X-Men, Hulk, Deadpool, Punisher, Blade, Ghost Rider, Fantastic Four, Venom—all have returned to Marvel and become Xu Can's assets.

Other film studios may want to follow Xu Can and share the pie, but they lack suitable IPs!

Paramount has even been forced to produce a children's IP adaptation film: The Last Airbender.

The only studio in Hollywood with the qualifications and resources to challenge Marvel is Warner.

They possess a natural treasure trove: DC!

Unfortunately, they've played their hand terribly.

This CEO change, Jeff Robinov's plan is to deeply mine DC's potential,

and beat Xu Can to the punch by launching a cinematic universe: "Project 453."

In his own words:

"We're racing against The Avengers! We must beat Xu Can and shoot Justice League first!"

"This is our most important plan this year!"

Jeff Robinov's plan received unanimous approval from the Warner Bros. board,

and they granted him full green light to proceed.

This was already happening in 2008,

while Xu Can was filming Iron Man 2, Jeff Robinov had already begun planning Justice League.

Of course, filming Justice League—featuring many characters and a complex story—would surely confuse audiences.

Even if audiences weren't confused, the director would be.

But filming individual movies one by one would be too slow.

So Jeff Robinov chose a middle path:

he only needed to make one film that could continue from Superman Returns and The Dark Knight,

and then seamlessly lead into Justice League!

That's right, Jeff Robinov's solution was Superman vs. Batman!

Released in 2009, if Justice League is shot quickly, it could premiere in early 2010, easily beating The Avengers!

To avoid alerting Xu Can, he deliberately downplayed promotion and kept early marketing low-key.

While Xu Can was dominating with La La Land, Spider-Man 2, and Dying to Survive,

no one noticed Warner was secretly filming Batman v Superman!

The plot continues from Superman Returns and The Dark Knight:

In Superman Returns, Superman defeats the evil scientist Lex Lu Se, wins back Lois Lane's love, and stays in Metropolis to save Earth.

But during his battle with Lex Lu Se, he destroys Bruce Wayne's building.

And under Lu Se's manipulation, Superman blames a series of brutal crimes on the "fugitive" Batman.

Thus, manipulated by Lu Se, the two engage in a brutal fight, eventually reconciling.

The plot is largely identical to Zack Snyder's version of Batman v Superman,

except this time the director is not Zack Snyder, but Joss Whedon,

the director of the original Avengers and theatrical Justice League.

The actor playing Superman is not Henry Cavill, but the Superman from Superman Returns, the handsome Brandon Routh.

Christian Bale says he needs a break and is temporarily unwilling to play Batman.

So the role of Batman goes to the globally hot British heartthrob, Robert Pattinson!

Yes, the vampire from Twilight is playing Batman thirteen years early,

an move even Xu Can didn't anticipate.

When Warner released the first teaser for Batman v Superman, Xu Can, filming Interstellar in China, was stunned.

"What do we do? Warner is coming at us hard—they've clearly invested at least $200 million."

On the other end of the line, Marvel president Kevin Feige was deeply worried.

"According to reliable sources, they've already started casting and plan to shoot Justice League seamlessly—we'll fall behind on The Avengers."

"Pfft…"

"Wait, what are you laughing at?" Kevin Feige was like a eunuch panicking while the emperor stayed calm.

At this critical juncture for Marvel's survival, the boss Xu Can was still laughing.

If *Batman v Superman* and *Justice League* turn out to be quite successful, then the DC film universe will be far stronger than the Marvel film universe.

When that time comes, even *The Avengers* won't achieve its intended effect,

and their entire MCU plan will probably be affected to some degree because of it.

But calming down and thinking it over, from the very beginning when Xu Can proposed the MCU plan, every step looked risky, yet he walked it steady and sure.

He forced his way up from a mere extra, and has now become a force in Hollywood that cannot be ignored.

Xu Can is absolutely the most unfathomable, most far-sighted person in Kevin Feige's memory.

Even the bigwigs who have long dominated Hollywood probably can't lay out a plan as well as the Xu Can Society.

He himself isn't worried — perhaps this matter really isn't that serious?

"Don't worry, Kevin. You have to trust Warner."

"Huh? Trust Warner?"

"Yes, trust Warner."

In every life, past or present, the Warner executives' moves are exactly the same — any good hand gets played into a mess by them.

Xu Can, on the other hand, wants to see what kind of storm this new version of *Batman v Superman* can stir up.

……

After the Huaxia scenes wrapped, the filming progress of *Interstellar* was basically more than halfway done.

Apart from shooting some frozen-planet footage in Bingdao, all the other space scenes and space-station scenes were filmed inside the Los Santos studio.

To simulate reality as closely as possible, the Los Santos studio was jointly built by Xu Can and Nolan.

They really built out a full set of standard spaceship and space-station interior compartments.

Every part and every piece of equipment inside was restored according to a real space capsule.

In pursuit of 100% restoration, all this equipment used parameters supplied by CNSA, or directly used equipment retired by CNSA.

Put it this way — as long as a suitable shell is built,

the studio Xu Can made could be completely launched into space and used normally.

"Xu, Los Santos is all ready over here. When are you coming back?"

Nolan stayed in Los Santos to oversee the studio construction and didn't go to Bingdao.