JOHNS OUT, LEE IN
Posted: 070218

DC President and chief creative officer Geoff Johns is gone from those positions for a writer-producer deal with Warner Bros. and DC. Johns is launching Mad Ghost Productions to work on films, television, and comics. He has been replaced in his former positions by Jim Lee. The move wasn’t a major shock and follows Diane Nelson‘s official resignation as DC President after taking a leave of absence. She and Johns didn’t get along at all since she didn’t want him to write any comics. There were reports of screaming arguments between the two at the Warner's offices. Johns worked on the Earth One Batman series of graphic novels and the now bi-monthly Doomsday Clock. Most of the creative teams on DC Rebirth were put together by Johns but he had scaled down his input a lot. Johns will get his own imprint called The Killing Zone, which will focus on lesser-known DC characters. He is also writing a new Shazam comic, and The Three Jokers project with Jason Fabok. Johns will also be the sole writer on the planned Green Lantern Corps movie, co-write and produce Wonder Woman 2 and co-wrote and is the executive producer of Aquaman. He co-developed and is executive producing/writing Titans for the upcoming DC Universe streaming service. All in all it sounds good but inside reports say Johns was pushed out and getting his own imprint was a golden parachute. The imprint could increase the already tense relationship between Johns and Dan DiDio. Johns had a lot of artists who he relied on such as Fabok and Ivan Reis and it’s a given they will only work for his imprint.