Ava DuVernay hints that Zack Snyder's Justice League is the reason New Gods was canceled

Director Ava DuVernay has alluded to the reason her movie New Gods was canceled by DC – and it looks like Zack Snyder's Justice League may be to blame. 

"My overall deal was at Warner Brothers and DC is at Warner Brothers," DuVernay told SiriusXM (via IGN). "Once I got to Warner Brothers, I was like, 'I'm going in that vault and I'm looking at what y'all got.' And I loved New Gods, which is the project that got axed. The studio decided that they did not want to pursue a certain part of that comic world, based on some things that were going on with another film in that world. Before I even was able to complete my script with Tom King, they axed it." 

Although she doesn't name any specific movie, Zack Snyder's Justice League was being worked on during the time that New Gods would have been in production, and they both share a common theme – Darkseid is the villain in both stories. It seems Warner Bros. didn't want the character appearing in multiple movies, so New Gods was shelved. 

The New Gods are a race that live outside of normal time and space in a realm called the Fourth World. Darkseid, the ruler of Apokolips, is one of them. His character was teased in 2016's Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and 2017's Justice League, but didn't make his big-screen appearance until Synder's director's cut was released. 

However, DuVernay still has two other projects on the go at Warner Bros. based on DC comic books – Naomi for the CW in 2022, and DMZ for HBO Max, which will both premiere in 2022. 

While we wait for DuVernay's other project to hit the small screen, fill out your watch list with our picks of the best superhero movies of all time.