James Gunn is leaning into Supergirl as proof that a superhero movie does not need to chase universe-level destruction to work. Craig Gillespie’s first DC outing is being framed as a smaller, personal adventure that bucked the save-the-universe trend and did it well.
The critique is sharper than the praise. Some critics are calling the film “formulaic” and “boring,” which gives DC a familiar post-release problem: decide whether to treat a modest-scale success as a template or as a one-off.
Craig Gillespie and the small-scale bet
Supergirl matters because it pushes against the logic that has dominated Marvel and DC storytelling for years. The bloated MCU has pushed most smaller-scale stories to television, and even there they still have to point back toward a bigger story built around the possible destruction of everything.
That structure has changed how studios talk about stakes. Avengers: Infinity War arrived in 2018 promising a showdown between the majority of the MCU’s biggest names and Thanos, who was hellbent on destroying not just our universe, but half of all universes. Avengers: Endgame reversed those events one year later, and the universe has remained the primary stake since then.
Infinity War, Endgame, and fatigue
With the Multiverse twist layered on top, the MCU can feel both smaller and larger at once. Smaller, because the franchise keeps narrowing attention to internal rules and linked properties; larger, because the scale keeps widening into multiple universes instead of one story that can stand on its own.
Hideo Kojima’s “formulaic” and “boring” description lands in that context. Those words are not just criticism of one movie; they are shorthand for a bigger complaint that universe-ending stakes have become repetitive, especially when a two-hour-wide story can carry more pressure than a 31-hour marathon that keeps demanding another setup.
David Ehrlich’s read on the film points toward the same business question DC brass now faces: whether to double down on the movie’s small-scale, personal adventure or turn it into a lesson about what not to do. The apparent failure narrative will likely produce notes that try to flatten the very thing that made Supergirl different.
The cleanest takeaway is also the hardest one for studios to act on: if Supergirl can survive without save-the-universe stakes, DC should treat that as a release valve, not a mistake. That is the real test now — whether it follows the film’s logic, or retreats to the safer noise of another universe on the brink.
