Michael Shannon will reprise his role as Man of Steel’s General Zod in The Flash, and that potentially sets up a huge DCU retcon. While The Flash will be the first live-action Flash movie, the film is confirmed to be more than just a Barry Allen story. The Flash is expected to use Flash’s time travel powers to reinvent the DCU as audiences know it, or at least to revisit previous DCU films and other DC movies. Not only are Shannon’s Zod and Antje Traue’s Faora confirmed to appear in The Flash, but Michael Keaton will also return as Batman over three decades after Tim Burton’s Batman Returns.
What The Flash means for the DCU is something that has likely changed since the movie was first envisioned. Both Warner Bros. and DC Films have undergone significant changes in the last few years, which can help explain why The Flash is taking so long. With James Gunn and Peter Safran now leading DC Studios for Warner Bros. Discovery and planning the next decade of the DCU, not even a full reboot appears to be off the table. Still, should this new DCU keep certain elements like Henry Cavill’s Superman, then The Flash can have a perfect in-universe reboot, presuming Superman doesn’t kill Zod in a potential new timeline.
Why Zod & Faora Are Returning In The Flash
Faora presumably died in Man of Steel after being pulled in by the singularity, although some believe that Faora might have been taken to the Phantom Zone instead of dying. General Zod’s death in Man of Steel, however, left no doubts. Superman broke Zod’s neck to stop the Kryptonian villain from killing a family. Superman killing Zod in Man of Steel was arguably one of the most controversial moments in any superhero movie, and it set the tone for what Superman’s story in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Justice League would be. Now, close to ten years after Man of Steel, The Flash plans to revisit the Man of Steel villains.
Although it could be theorized that Faora is still alive in the DCEU, Zod’s death was quite definitive for it to be retconned, especially given that his body was later used to create Batman v Superman’s Doomsday. Therefore, for Faora and Zod to be in the DCU’s The Flash, either time travel or the multiverse must be involved. Both concepts are already confirmed to be in The Flash, as The Flash’s DC FanDome teaser trailer revealed that Flash will return to the night Nora Allen died, not to mention the appearance of Michael Keaton’s Batman. As a comparison, Zod and Faora’s returns might be similar to the Spider-Man villains in Spider-Man: No Way Home who emerge from different universes.
One possibility for how Faora and Zod return in The Flash is that Barry Allen goes back in time far enough to arrive during the events of Man of Steel. Flash would be able to see Superman fighting Zod, Faora, and the Kryptonian ships, which by itself would create a fun time travel DCU retcon for The Flash, as it suggests that Flash was always there. Another possibility is that Flash goes to an alternate universe in which Zod and Faora never died. Considering how Flash’s powers are also a key to the multiverse, that possibility cannot be ignored. It’s also important to remember that The Flash will feature Supergirl, who had never appeared in the main DCEU timeline.
Superman Killing Zod Is Still The DCU’s Most Controversial Scene
By featuring the return of Michael Shannon’s General Zod, The Flash will revisit the DCU’s most divisive moment. Having Superman kill Zod made Man of Steel one of the most controversial takes on Superman, especially in live-action. A lot of the conversation surrounding Man of Steel, the first Superman movie in seven years at that point, became limited to whether Superman should have killed Zod, which is a debate that has continued since. Zack Snyder’s Watchmen had already sparked a lot of discussions about comic book accuracy and creative liberties, and Man of Steel reignited those debates. A decade later, Superman killing Zod still impacts the DCU.
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was the closest thing to a Man of Steel sequel, and it doubled down on the divisive creative choices of the first movie. Superman’s actions in Man of Steel reflected Batman v Superman’s story, with Superman being haunted by the responsibilities he now had. Considering that Superman had already killed someone in Man of Steel, there were no limitations as to where Batman v Superman and Justice League could take the character next. Snyder’s Superman story would get even more divisive as Superman was controlled by Justice League‘s Darkseid.
Will The Flash Rewrite The End Of Man Of Steel?
Zod and Faora returning in The Flash does not necessarily mean that the movie will rewrite the end of Man of Steel. For example, whatever changes Barry Allen makes to the timeline could be reverted by the end of the story with Flash returning to the DCU’s original timeline. However, given that The Flash is adapting elements from Flashpoint and is expected to change the DCU on some level, Zod’s role in the movie could indeed lead to a Man of Steel retcon. Even if Flash fixes the problems caused by time travel and the multiverse, the DCU canon by the end of the film might still have been changed.
Once again using Spider-Man: No Way Home as an example, Tom Holland’s Spider-Man was able to save and redeem each of the previous Spider-Man villains that had joined forces with the help of the multiverse. At the end of No Way Home, the events of both the Tobey Maguire Spider-Man films and the Andrew Garfield Spider-Man films had been changed, at least somewhere in the multiverse. Similarly, Wolverine changing the past in X-Men: Days of Future Past rewrote the Fox X-Men movies timeline. A similar thing could happen in The Flash, with Barry returning to a rewritten DCU timeline where Superman never killed Zod.
Zod Being Alive After The Flash Would Completely Change The DCU’s Superman
If The Flash rewrites the events of Man of Steel and creates a new timeline in which Superman never killed Zod, then the DCU will have been rebooted. Although Superman’s story in Batman v Superman didn’t only rely on the fact that Superman killed Zod, it was clear that having to kill the only other alive Kryptonian in the entire universe affected Clark Kent. Superman cried from sadness and regret at the end of Man of Steel and then returned in Batman v Superman as a more reluctant, self-questioning hero who was not sure about being Superman.
Henry Cavill’s future as Superman is now up in the air following reports that Man of Steel 2 is not guaranteed to happen (via Variety). Still, unless a full reboot that recasts every DCU character happens, Cavill’s Superman is still the DCU’s Man of Steel. If the new DCU plans are going for a soft reboot that aims to still keep what has worked so far, then having Superman not kill Zod in a post-The Flash timeline would make sense. By retconning the end of Man of Steel, The Flash would essentially reboot Superman’s DCU story, thus opening the door for a new Superman movie starring Henry Cavill.