DC Comics
Guillermo del Toro has many unrealized projects. Thankfully “Frankenstein,” which he’d been trying to direct for years, is no longer one of them, but “Justice League Dark” is. The film was announced in 2012 with the working title “Heaven Sent,” but del Toro left it in 2015. Currently, it sounds like del Toro is content with leaving “Justice League Dark” in the past.
But let’s back up: What is the Justice League Dark? Basically, it’s a team combining all the prominent magical or supernatural characters in the DC Universe, including Zatanna, John Constantine, Swamp Thing, Deadman, and Etrigan the Demon, among others. As del Toro had already combined the supernatural and superheroes with his “Hellboy” films, he would’ve been a perfect fit for “Justice League Dark.”
While it wasn’t meant to be, del Toro has been upfront about sharing what he had planned — which only adds to the bittersweetness. Recently, on the “Happy Sad Confused” podcast hosted by Josh Horowitz, the filmmaker confirmed the ensemble’s lead would’ve been Constantine, the cynical chain-smoking exorcist. Swamp Thing — not just a living plant but an avatar of all Earth’s plant-life, “The Green” — would’ve had a major role, too, while one of Swamp Thing’s nemeses, the Floronic Man, was set to appear as a villain.
While del Toro said he didn’t get far enough into the production to start casting the Justice League Dark, he had his frequent collaborator Doug Jones in mind for Deadman (the withered ghost of murdered acrobat Boston Brand). Jones typically plays the prosthetic-animated characters in del Toro films, like the Faun and Pale Man in “Pan’s Labyrinth.”
“Physically I could do the suit [for Deadman] and I know [Jones’] mannerisms and all that,” del Toro explained. Most excitingly, he revealed a huge cameo his script included: Batman.
Batman would’ve appeared in Guillermo del Toro’s Justice League Dark
Warner Bros. Animation
Now, Guillermo del Toro’s “Justice League Dark” was announced shortly before the DC Extended Universe came together. There’s a decent chance the movie didn’t happen because it couldn’t fit into Warner Bros.’ bigger plans for DC. But if it had come to fruition, it probably would’ve been folded into that Zack Snyder-led universe — which means the Batman who appeared in del Toro’s movie probably would’ve been Ben Affleck.
On “Happy Sad Confused,” del Toro explained how the Dark Knight would’ve appeared: “They said, ‘We need a plane,’ and he said, ‘I know a friend of mine has a plane’, and then you were in Bruce Wayne’s office.”
This isn’t unprecedented. Batman appeared in the 2017 animated “Justice League Dark” movie — some cynical marketing even put him at the front of the poster. (See above.) But Batman does have connections with many of the JLD’s members. He made a handful of appearances in Alan Moore’s “Saga of the Swamp Thing,” he’s an acquaintance of Zatanna (who even guest-starred on an underrated “Batman: The Animated Series” episode), Etrigan’s human self, Jason Blood, lives in Gotham City and sometimes teams up with Batman, etc.
While del Toro would’ve likely been limited with how much he could use Batman, it would’ve been incredible to see him take a stab at the Dark Knight. Batman is a gothic superhero and an outsider who stays in the shadows, so he’s not far off from del Toro’s milieu either. I can only dream of del Toro adapting Peter Milligan and Kieron Dwyer’s “Batman: Dark Knight, Dark City,” where Batman discovers a demonic secret hidden beneath Gotham.
So, Batman, Constantine, Swamp Thing, and Deadman were locked in for del Toro’s “Justice League Dark.” Who else?
Guillermo del Toro’s Justice League Dark pulled from Jack Kirby and Alan Moore
DC Comics
In a 2013 interview with IGN, Guillermo del Toro mentioned wanting to use Etrigan, Zatanna and her father Zatara, and the Spectre (a literal angel of vengeance) in “Justice League Dark” (then called “Dark Universe”). During a 2021 appearance on “Happy Sad Confused,” del Toro called Zatanna an “effortlessly powerful” character and said Etrigan the Demon is “one of [his] all-time favorites.”
Created by Jack Kirby, Etrigan is a demon bound to the mortal Jason Blood by the wizard Merlin. He speaks mostly in rhymes, including the incantation Blood says to transform: “Gone, gone, the form of man. Rise the demon, Etrigan!” Funnily enough, Etrigan isn’t far removed in concept from a studio note that del Toro fought off on “Hellboy,” i.e. that Ron Perlman’s hero should be a human who transforms into a demon and back again. Speaking on “Happy Sad Confused,” del Toro indicated that he also wanted to include one of Etrigan’s nemeses, Klarion the Witch Boy.
There was another key ingredient to his script: romance, because del Toro was looking to Alan Moore’s “Swamp Thing,” particularly that book’s “Beauty and the Beast”-esque love story between Swamp Thing and his beloved Abby Arcane. I’d argue that “Hellboy II: The Golden Army” is del Toro merging his love for Hellboy and Swamp Thing — del Toro takes Mike Mignola’s Hellboy, a hardboiled paranormal investigator, keeps the gothic, and adds in a romance between Hellboy (Perlman) and Liz Sherman (Selma Blair) that evokes Swamp Thing and Abby. Misanthropic Elf Prince Nuada (Luke Goss) resembles the plant supremacist Floronic Man, too.
DC Studios have a “Swamp Thing” movie in development but it’ll never live up to our imaginations of what del Toro’s “Justice League Dark” could’ve been.