It has been a difficult week for all concerned with the sad news concerning Justice League’s Zack Snyder and his family which has seen the director depart from the finishing the project with Avengers Assemble and Avengers: Age of Ultron helmer Joss Whedon stepping in to help complete the film and oversee the reshoots that are scheduled.

Now it has been announced that Doug Liman has exited the mooted Justice League Dark project, which is currently in pre-production, via THR. The filmmaker of Edge of Tomorrow, Mr. & Mrs. Smith and The Bourne Identity has departed citing “scheduling conflicts” – indeed, it’s the second superhero film the director has left in the past couple of years as he was attached to 20th Century Fox/Marvel’s Gambit, starring Channing Tatum in the lead role, which has been stuck in pre-production limbo for a while.

The spin-off DC film as part of the larger universe of films is a darker version of Justice League that revolves around such characters as John Constantine, Swamp Thing, Etrigan the Demon, Deadman, and magician Zatanna. WB and DC are now on the look out for a new director with Andy Muschietti (IT) one of the names mentioned thus far.

The DCEU has been through a tough beginnings – both Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and Suicide Squad suffering from negative reviews and word of mouth, but both were big successes ($873million and $745million worldwide respectively). Its latest film, Wonder Woman, has so far fared much better with a plethora of positive reviews thus far with Justice League set to follow later this year, and Aquaman (November 2018), The Batman (reportedly due 2019) and The Flash (TBC) set to follow.

We will keep you posted on any new developments. Wonder Woman opens on June 1st, while Justice League arrives on November 17th.