Long before James Gunn began introducing and tying together all the DC comic book characters and locations in the DCU, Superman actor Christopher Reeve tried to do it himself with a single joke pitched at a dinner table.
During a time when shared comic book universes didn’t exist, Reeve stood in front of a crowd at the 1994 Dixie Trek convention and revealed that he actually pitched the idea of a Superman cameo while Tim Burton’s Batman was in production.
Reeve’s pitch was surprisingly really small — nothing more than a very short cameo where Superman shows up, waves at Batman, and flies off. The logic was that even Batman, who Reeve believes only really has “a cool car”, would run into some kind of trouble that he couldn’t handle alone and would need Superman’s help. This wasn’t a Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice exchange. It was just meant to establish that they belong to the same universe.
Warner Bros. Completely Shut Him Down
Reeve, of course, was careful to frame it as half a joke even as he told the story again, but, hearing him talk about it, he sounds pretty sincere about the idea. “Because in this universe there’s more than one character at work,” he explained.
Reeve said the idea was “laughed down” by the people making Batman, who wanted nothing to do with his colorful Superman films tonally or otherwise. Burton’s Gotham was nocturnal, “muted” and “broody” (as Reeve puts it), while Richard Donner’s Superman ran on vivid colors, daylight, and old-fashioned warmth. For the filmmakers, dropping Reeve’s Superman didn’t belong in Batman’s world — not even for ten seconds.
DC Comics Made the Idea Canon Anyway
Over the years, however, Warner Bros. has had a change of heart. As we learn from The Flash, and the comic books that came later, Michael Keaton’s Batman, Helen Slater’s Supergirl and Christopher Reeve’s Superman all belong to the same universe: Earth-789. So even though they never got to share screentime together, they are now considered part of the same Earth — meaning that Reeve’s Superman could fly over to Keaton’s Batman and save him if needed.
Why Reeve’s Joke Is DC’s Entire Business Model Now
Reeve’s pitch reads differently today because DC Studios has built its entire current strategy around the thing Warner Bros. rejected in 1989. All the DC heroes now share the same world in the DCU — except for… well, Batman again. Matt Reeves’ The Batman exists completely outside of the DCU right now. But James Gunn has promised that the DCU’s Batman is on the way soon. That Batman will ultimately share screen time with David Corenswet’s Superman and Milly Alcock’s Supergirl.
The irony isn’t lost on anyone paying attention. In 1989, the fear at Warner Bros. was that letting two heroes acknowledge each other on screen would collapse the tone each franchise had worked to build. In 2026, DC Studios is discovering the opposite risk: that building an interconnected universe doesn’t guarantee audiences will follow you into every corner of it, no matter how confidently the connective tissue is laid down. Supergirl‘s box office numbers just proved that.
Whether or not Christopher Reeve’s cameo would have actually worked in Burton’s Batman is beside the point. What’s notable is how early he saw the appeal of exactly the storytelling structure DC and Marvel are now betting their futures on. Reeve was ahead of the times.
The writer of this article knows nothing. Comics have had shared universes for decades
Damn, I miss that man!
Although Reeve might’ve been the first, or one of the first, to suggest it for films, the DC comics were doing alternate universes and hero teamups a looooooooooooooooog, long time ago.