You know,
this has been bothering me for some time now so I might as well get it off of
my chest already; Hollywood
needs to quit fucking up comic book movies.
There. I said it. Whew! That feels better. Now allow me to elaborate. You might want to sit down for this; it’s
going to be one hell of a geek-rant.
First I’ll
start with the obvious: quit it with the origin stories already. Now, I know what you (Hollywood ) are going to say: not everybody is
familiar with the origins of these characters, and we don’t want the audience
to feel they are trying to play catch-up and avoid the movie thereby reducing
ticket sales. Well, I’m not sure that’s
exactly how they’d say it as I’m not fluent in asshole marketing executive
speak, but the problem with this it that you’re demographic already knows the
origins to these characters so IT DOESN’T MATTER! Why the fuck did they need to do the origin
of Spiderman all over again already?
Feel free to change the actors a la James Bond, but save us from another
movie where we have to trudge through half the movie watching some asshole
whine and mope before we get to the superhero we came to see.
I will admit that there are cases
when it works extremely well. Iron Man
being the stand-out in this regard as it’s really only been the origin story
that has worked for those movies. Part
two was extremely annoying with the sit-com style banter between Tony Stark and
Pepper Potts and a villain that lacked any kind of style, charisma, or even a
logical challenge. I mean, if all he has
are whips why didn’t Iron Man just stand back about thirty feet and blast him
with one of those tank decimating weapons we saw in the first movie. Wasn’t that a killer scene when he dodged the
tank’s artillery shell, after being shot down from the sky, and just took the
tank out with one shot as he walked away with the style reminiscent of James
Bond while it exploded behind him? What
was with Brody being able to operate a suit as well as Tony, maybe even better
(he did win that first fight between the two after all), from the first moment
he puts on the suit? Tony nearly broke
his neck trying to learn how to fly in the first movie for god’s sake. Oh, oh, don’t tell me it’s because of his
military training either. That’s a
fucking cop-out and is entirely too convenient.
The third movie was only slightly better, and might have been pretty
decent if he had actually been Iron Man throughout the whole movie. Do you (Hollywood )
really think we want to watch Tony Stark run around trying to fix his suit for
most of the movie? And what was with him
recharging it with the electrical wires from the garage?! I thought that’s what the goddamn arc reactor
in his chest was for. All of a sudden
these suits have a battery life and need to be recharged like my fucking
Iphone? That makes no sense in relation
to everything the movies have set up so far.
Sorry for going on an Iron Man
tangent; now back to the matter at hand.
My point is that the origin stories just get in the way of the
character. I liked Man of Steel, and I’m
willing to cut it a break since we haven’t seen Superman’s origin (the
flashbacks in Superman Returns don’t count) in over 30 years, but I still think
it would have been a better movie had it just jumped straight into the Superman
mythos. Now you’ve most likely fucked up
by choosing to make a versus movie before the character of Superman has even
been established. I realize the D.C.
universe is trying to compete with Marvel’s build-up to The Avengers, but I’m
telling you right now you’re jumping the gun on this one. Now, I have a soft spot for ol’ supes and I’m
REALLY hoping the new movie is good, but I don’t see how Batman can really hang
in a fight with Superman when we’ve just seen him take out almost an entire
city in the collateral damage of his fight with Zod. There’s no logical way for Batman to stand a
chance without kryptonite being a factor and that’s just fucking lame. It doesn’t matter if it’s a villain or if
it’s Batman; using kryptonite is a tired plot device that you shouldn’t even
bother exploring. You might have been
better off just doing a team-up movie where an older Batman (older than
Superman, I mean) is a mentor to Superman and teaches him about how to be the
best superhero possible. Batman could be
teaching him that it’s not ok to take out an entire city, killing millions of
civilians just to defeat the villain, and that Superman’s powerful enough that
if he’s not careful he will do more harm than good and that he’s also strong
enough to be able to avoid causing that level of destruction. Giving Batman this knowledge and wisdom would
keep him on the same level as Superman in terms of superhero hierarchy because
physically Superman wins hands down.
You need to quit making up your own
stories for our beloved superheroes.
There are SO many great storylines and graphic novels written by people
who know and understand what makes superheroes special that you can adapt to
the big screen. You want to finally make
a good solo Hulk movie? Go with Planet
Hulk and listen to everybody scream like little school girls in delight. You could probably turn it into a trilogy,
since you insist on EVERYTHING being a trilogy, (I know it’s not a comic book
but it is in the same ballpark so why the hell did The Hobbit need to be a
trilogy?!) and it would be amazing! So
what if there aren’t many humans in the Planet Hulk story. Humans only tend to drag the story down (Michael Bay
You need to realize that not
everything should be or HAS to be a big tent pole movie. As much as I enjoyed the movie I actually
blame The Dark Knight for this mindset.
It made you believe that every comic book movie has the potential to be
a billion dollar movie, and that, I’m afraid, just isn’t the case. You have ruined the character of Wolverine
with the stubborn desire for this type of giant blockbuster. X-Men Origins: Wolverine was a big steaming
pile of shit that was laughable in its conception and sickening in its
execution. Wolverine is a gritty
visceral character and I would love to someday see a lower budget movie, along
the lines of Punisher: War Zone or Dredd, which depicts the character as he
should be in all of his deservedly rated R glory. I know that Dredd and the Punisher movie
didn’t make the money you’d like to see but it was so fucking cool to see those
characters as they should be and not softened up to PG-13 status for mass
market appeal. Wolverine has metal
fucking claws and we never see any blood.
How is that possible? We should
be seeing decapitations, disembowelings, and amputations in every fight
scene. Goddamn, now that would be a
sight to behold!
Finally, not every comic book
character has what it takes to be made into a movie. Catwoman is the supreme example of this
disgraceful error in judgment. I’m
really not confident that Fantastic Four or even Daredevil can ever make a
successful transfer to the silver screen; not on their own anyway. You will have to choose your comic book
movies wisely and not just ride the current trend trying to make a few easy
bucks. You will just lose money and
alienate the demographic you are trying to entice. Superman is a very popular character and even
he has had trouble in the box office. Do
you really think the Black Panther is going to win over big audiences? Some of the characters might be able to do
something in let’s say a movie made for HBO or Showtime, but the theater is not
where they belong. Show some balls and
use your heads, Hollywood ,
and give us some more quality comic book movies.
