James Gunn has shut down a conspiracy theory suggesting that he knew Henry Cavill would be ousted as Superman back in 2021.

Some DC fans had accused the director of lying about Cavill’s Superman exit, claiming he knew the superhero would be recast back when he was promoting The Suicide Squad in 2021.

To bolster their argument, the fans shared a quote from actor Nathan Fillion, who said he found out he would be playing Guy Gardner/ The Green Lantern in Gunn’s upcoming Superman movie at the premiere party for The Suicide Squad. This led them to allege that Gunn knew he would become the new DC boss and phase out Cavill’s Superman back then.

The director clarified the timeline on Threads, insisting Fillion found out about his casting at the Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 premiere party last year.

Gunn, who became the co-head of DC Studios alongside Peter Safran in late 2022, also insisted his new Superman movie was always going to have a new lead actor.

“I don’t quite understand how that fits,” he wrote on Threads. “Aside from the fact I had no interest in running DC until Peter decided to do it with me so he could do the exec stuff & I could focus on creative, when I was hired to write Superman it was always intended as & pitched as a new Superman story, so why would I lie about not planning that at the Squad premiere which would have amounted to the same thing at the end of the day? How does this particular conspiracy theory make sense?”

Cavill made a cameo appearance as Superman in a credits scene in 2022’s Black Adam and confirmed he was back as the character. However, Gunn and Safran were hired to take over DC months later and they decided to recast the Man of Steel.

Superman will be played by David Corenswet in Gunn’s upcoming film.

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