With the purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery by Paramount Skydance, there’s a whole lot of questions as to the future of not just the movie and television studios. For us, there’s just as many questions about the future of DC Comics. In the acquisition, Paramount Skydance (now just Skydance) gained DC Comics (and DC Studios) and potentially Milestone Media and Wonder Comics. While it has been revealed that DC Studios’ leadership would remain in place, there’s still a lot of questions we have for the comic book division of this mega entertainment company.

We’d likely never be put in a position with executives to ask the difficult questions, but that doesn’t mean we still don’t have them.

Here’s the five questions we’d ask if given a chance.

1. Skydance now owns DC Comics, but what is its ownership of Milestone Media and Wonder Comics (DC’s imprint with Brian Michael Bendis)? While Wonder Comics is likely completely owned by DC based on its characters, we’ve asked and no one seems to have an answer about the deal between Milestone and DC.
2. Oracle’s Larry Ellison, Skydances CEO David Ellison’s dad, is a major funder in this deal. Larry was part of a strategy call in November 2020 (also articles here and here) about contesting the election with Trump’s attorney Jay Sekulow, Sen. Lindsey Graham, and more. He also described as the “chief known funder” of Opportunity Matters Fund, a PAC that supports conservative causes. How can Superman be taken seriously in promoting “Truth, Justice, (and the American way)” when it is owned/funded in part by insurrectionists who funded causes diametrically opposed to the character’s supposed beliefs?
3. Saud Arabia is another major donor. A similar question to the second but focused on Saudi Arabia’s abuses such as slavery, and murder of a journalist. It’s clear that the country is heavily investing in entertainment and attempting to white-wash its issues. Will DC participate in that?
4. Larry Ellison, along with major funder RedBird, and Saudi Arabia (and rumors of Elon Musk) are heavily invested in AI to the point their wealth is banking on its success. They need to show a “successful proof of concept” in entertainment to sell their snake oil to others. DC at the last New York Comic Con said it would not use AI in the creation of comics. When it is mandated by money daddies, will DC opposed the mandate? Are executives and creators willing to step down and quit over it? Jim Lee at the previous New York Comic Con took a stand against it. How deep does this belief go? Also, how does DC continue it’s lawsuit against AI companies when it is owned by individuals who are heavily invested in it?
5. With so much concern about the debt taken on by Skydance to fund this acquisition and questions in how it’ll be paid down, along with the volatile wealth of Larry Ellison and Saudi Arabia. How does an uncertain economic future impact long term planning for DC with the needed massive cuts, consolidation, and layoffs that will need to happen to pay down the debt?

These aren’t the only questions we have. There’s still a lot more as far as who will really be overseeing the publisher and what mandates will be made as far as content, licensing, and “synergy” with other divisions. There’s also the question of licenses that Paramount Skydance had with their properties being published by others (notably IDW Publishing). Finally, David Ellison seems to be pivoting that these “entertainment” companies are really “tech” companies now with a major emphasis on leveraging technology in future plans to increase revenue and decrease cost (queue flashbacks to AOL owning Time Warner and DC in that marriage from hell).

Stay tuned, 2027 may be a very dramatic year for the currently hot publisher and we may see a big opening to counter their growth happening soon.