Multiple writers and directors were attached over the following years, with Seth Grahame-Smith, Rick Famuyiwa, Daley, and Goldstein all departing the project over creative differences with the studios.

Its box office performance was attributed to factors such as Miller's legal issues and controversies, the franchise's imminent reboot with the DC Universe (DCU), an overall decline of the superhero genre, and the film's mixed reception and marketing practices.

Despite Bruce's warnings of time travel's unintended consequences, Barry places the can in Nora's grocery cart to prevent Henry from leaving the house.

[c] To fight Zod, the Barrys attempt to assemble the Justice League but are unsuccessful; in this timeline, Diana cannot be located, Victor Stone has not gained his abilities yet, and Arthur Curry never existed.

During the battle, Kara learns that Zod had intercepted Kal-El's escape pod from Krypton and killed him while attempting to extract the Codex needed to repopulate the Kryptonian species.

The unknown speedster who initially knocked Barry out of the Speed Force returns and is revealed to be an older, future version of 2013-Barry who still believes he can defeat Zod and save his Earth.

[7] Other appearances include Karl Collins as Henry Allen's lawyer,[37] Kieran Hodgson as a sandwich shop employee, Sean Rogers as 2013-Barry's roommate Gary,[9] and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau and Muschietti, in a cameo, as a pedestrian and a reporter who both get their food stolen by different versions of Barry.

[42][43][44] Also appearing in the Speed Force sequence through CGI are Jai Courtney in his DCEU role of George "Digger" Harkness / Captain Boomerang;[45] the film's co-editor Jason Ballantine as the Jay Garrick incarnation of the Flash;[46][47] and Nicolas Cage as an alternate version of Superman fighting a giant spider.

[54][55] Goyer approached Ryan Reynolds to portray the Wally West version of the Flash after working with him on the Marvel Comics–based film Blade: Trinity (2004) and intended to have the character Barry Allen appear in a supporting role.

[65] Charles Roven joined the project as a producer by July 2009, with Geoff Johns consulting and writing a film treatment that Dan Mazeau adapted into a screenplay.

[95] Raimi, Marc Webb, Jordan Peele, and Ben Affleck—who portrayed Bruce Wayne / Batman in previous DCEU films—had already turned down offers to direct the film.

[96][97][98] At the July 2017 San Diego Comic-Con, the film was announced with the new title Flashpoint, based on the eponymous 2011 comic book storyline, in which Allen travels back in time to save his mother's life and accidentally creates an alternate timeline.

[103] Later that month, the filmmaking duo of John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein entered negotiations to write and direct Flashpoint after the studio chose not to wait for Zemeckis's schedule to be free.

[104] The duo's exit was confirmed the following month when Warner Bros. chose Christina Hodson to write a new screenplay for The Flash after she wrote its DCEU film Birds of Prey (2020).

[120][121][122] This allowed for Batman to be featured in the film and for that comic's focus on time travel to be incorporated with the exploration of the Flash's origin story, in which his mother is killed and his father is wrongfully convicted for her murder.

[129] At that time, the Muschiettis were preparing for production in the United Kingdom, with filming set to begin in April at Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden, after Miller finished on The Secrets of Dumbledore.

[20][18] Calle was chosen from a group of more than 425 actresses that also included Bruna Marquezine and Rachel Zegler, who were later cast in the DCEU as Jenny Kord for Blue Beetle (2023) and Anthea for Shazam!

[144] In mid-June, Miller, Clemons, Keaton, and Calle filmed scenes at St Paul's Cathedral in London, with the surrounding locations designed to portray Central City.

The latter was considered an "unprecedented move" due to its large budget, though it would have come after WBD already canceled the nearly complete $90 million film Batgirl that was being produced for the streaming service HBO Max.

An alternate ending was filmed in September 2022 that included Miller, Calle, and Keaton alongside Henry Cavill and Gal Gadot in their DCEU roles of Kal-El / Superman and Wonder Woman.

[172][173] Writer/director James Gunn and producer Peter Safran, who had worked on prior DCEU media, were hired as the co-chairmen and co-CEOs of the newly formed DC Studios at the end of October 2022.

[174] A week after starting their new roles, the pair had begun developing an eight-to-ten-year plan for a new franchise called the DC Universe (DCU) that would be a "soft reboot" of the DCEU.

[197] Alli Rosenbloom at CNN also praised Keaton's appearance, highlighting the usage of Danny Elfman's score from Batman, while Collider's Collier Jennings felt that trailer "certainly is working to sell the image that the wait was worth it".

Additionally, the studio provided advanced screenings to various figures, including Tom Cruise and Stephen King, to improve discourse surrounding the film, while Zaslav and Gunn touted it as "among the greatest superhero movies of all time".

[224] Rolling Stone's David Fear identified the film as being the best in the DCEU, but cited the complicated production and Ezra Miller's legal controversies as detracting elements.

He praised Keaton's and Calle's performances, feeling that Batman felt well into the narrative while commenting the script was "primed for both nimbly quickening the action and slowing down enough to wink, nudge, and crack jokes".

[236] Manohla Dargis of The New York Times gave a mostly positive albeit mixed review, appreciating its "relatively brisk" runtime and felt it was a comparatively better superhero film, enjoying the overall cast performances, saying the "overall vibe is upbeat", and praised Muschietti's direction and pacing.

Bastién disliked the visual aesthetic and use of computer-generated imagery (CGI), ultimately describing the film as "the cinematic equivalent of a snake eating its own tail" and "closing down of all the possibilities a multiverse is meant to represent".

His biggest highlights were the opening sequence, feeling it strongly established the comedic tone, Hodson's writing and characterization of Barry as a "virginal nerd who has gone through college without managing to acquire much self-assurance, even after mastering his superpowers", and Muschietti's overall direction.

[253] The poor box-office performance of The Flash led many commentators to question and doubt the prospects of a sequel being made,[215][216][217] and in October 2023, Variety reported that no actors from Zack Snyder's DCEU films, including Miller, would reprise their roles in the DCU.